Best SEO Domain Name Options

[Kevin Walker]

Hi Warriors, Happy Monday!!

I need some advice as I'm looking for a new domain name and I'm going by the advise for Guru Bob in the 30 Day Challenge on this matter. He says go for .com, .net, .org in that order and if these are taken you should the go for hyphenated versions of the domain name and if they are gone use a suffix or prefix in the domain name with the preference being for the suffix.

I've missed out on the .com, .net and .org for my domain name, but I can have .org.uk. So, would this be as good as a straight .org domain?

I can also have, using the example mydomainname, my-domainname or mydomain-name, but which is best - an hyphen between first and second words or second and last words?

Also I have an option of using a suffix - mydomainname1.com so here the domain contains my themed keyword (albeit with a suffix) without any hyphens and it's a top level domain as well and the most desirable of the three TLDs (i.e. a .com). Would this be the best option to go for? Would this be as good as mydomainname.com i.e the best option for a TLD?

Many thanks for helping me to arrive at the right decision.

Regards, Kevin.

[Mike Adams]

I have written about this alot on the warrior forum. Please take my advise.

I finally figured out why my inner pages wont rank

Relationship between URL and Keywords for SEO

Relationship between URL and Keywords for SEO

[DuncanMae]

The crucial part is to have your main keyword in the domain for SEO.

So if your keyword is "straightening bananas", ideally you want straighteningbananas.com if you can't get it then try adding an extension such as, blog, site etc...till you find one that works.

If you are dealing in "straightening bananas in Manchester" you want the uk address.
Google will give you priority if you are a local uk business with a .uk address over .com.

So, you need to know if your market is local or global and a must is to have the keyword in your domain.

It's arguable which of the extensions after .com have more google love.

[System Wide Solutions]

i agree with duncan.

[McBrett]

Hi Kevin,

I think most people would agree with that .com, .net, .org advice.

The .org.uk I wouldn't go with unless your target audience is in the UK. Although again, if I was targeting that area I would use the .co.uk.

In my opinion, I'd use the prefix. themywebsite.com for example.

I would probably check out Google's keyword tool as well to see if there are any variations of your core keyword that gets searched. Might not find anything that you like, but it's worth a shot.

Good luck on your search!

[Mike Adams]

The domain name extension has absolutely no bearing on your ranking.wordpress.org and wikipedia.org both rank fairly well. Having your keywords in the domain name have no discernible effect on your ranking. You may have a better CTR from the SERP because people will assume that your site is about the keywords in the domain, but it will not help you rank higher.

Amazon and barns & nobles (bn.com), if you look at just the domain names, have nothing to do with book or books but they rank great for nearly every single book in print. Why? Because search engines rank PAGES not WEBSITES.

They both have great content with millions of external and internal links. They can effectivally create their own rankings by just the number of their internal links. Also these sites have an affiliate network. Hundreds of thousands of people link to their site just by their affiliate link.

[brandon_kent]

Hello,

The text connected with those(anchor text) links is one of the most significant SEO factors to get right when it comes to optimizing a site.

[paulgl]

Originally Posted by DuncanMae

The crucial part is to have your main keyword in the domain for SEO.

That is one of the biggest myths out there.

Only if you can get it. The domain does not matter. It's what you do with
it. I guess people get to this forum by searching for warriors.

People wish it was so easy. And when they fail, they just can't believe it.

If people were steered and guided to things that actually matter, this forum
would be empty.

Peruse this forum. Filled with failures, rantings, and complete disbelief that
because they followed some guide, by the letter, they just have to be #1.

But they're not. What they failed to do was the hard work. Hard work
beats domain any day.

Hard work is the most important part of SEO. Not domain name.
That just doesn't sound as sexy. So the domain brokers and re-sellers
get rich off of hope.

Paul

[spanisheye]

I have to disagree Paul. For small niches, the right keywords in the domain name can be hugely beneficial.

We were reviewing one of our sites today. It has the exact keyphrase in the domain name, we put just 1 link to it about three months ago (and it's a crappy link to be honest) and it's number 1 in Google already...and gets around 200 - 300 visitors per day.

I don't think we would have had the same results with a domain name that meant nothing.

[Mike Adams]

@spanisheye again, you CTR from the SERPs may be increased because the users will see that the site is directly related to what they searched. Believe me if you had the domain http://how-to-make-money-online.com but the content and links pointing at the sait was about football. You will not rank for the key phrase "how to make money online" you would have a shot at ranking for key phrases related to football.

In fact do a search for "how to make money online" the domain http://how-to-make-money-online.com is not even in the top 100. Why, because it has no content and no links related to "how to make money online".

[spanisheye]

Mike, I'm not talking about competitive keywords here. I did say that for "small niches" it can work well, which is exactly how and why it has worked for us.

For my large sites, in more competitive niches, I never even bother with the keywords in the domain name. I prefer to go with something catchy for those that people will remember.

But yes, for small, relatively uncompetitive, niches the keywords in the domain does work.