How Important Is Domain Age For SEO?

[techconnections]

Hello,
I"m new to SEO, but learning a lot, by purchasing lots of eBooks, reading forums, and building sites. However, this one question about domain age, is one that i'm unsure of because i haven't been doing SEO that long.

So my question is, how important is the domain age for a website, and let me explain my competition.

The keywords that I am trying to rank for have relatively little competition, with the exception of domain age.

The top sites all have domain age between 4-11 years, except for one or two of them in the top.

BUT, none of them have the keywords in their URL, most of them only have between 50 and 100 links, with the except of one that has just over 3K links. NONE of the competition, has the keywords in the description and header tags, so basically their on page seo is horrible.

The ONLY thing they have going for them is domain age, and Index count.

How important are the Domain age and index count, and should i be able to rank above them, considering i get a lot of diverse links, and my pages are optimized using proper on page seo techniques.

THanks in advance.

[Mr Lim]

Without approriate head, title, description tag, the age of domain is useless.

Surfer will definately not enter those sites without any content they are searching.

So you can easily score with simple contents.

[attorneydavid]

Based on my observations I'd say domain age as in age the domain was registered is a very minor factor. Page age as in the date the page first appeared in the google index as an actual webpage seems to be of moderate importance. Link age is very important.

[bermuda]

Domain age can be useful in terms of maintaining a website which can have potentials of enjoying top ranks over the net, but provided that the old domain has been connected with an active website online during months and years of registration, and not just using parked addresses which have been deserted with no tangible web space, simply considered to be registered addresses but with no presence because domains always need to be attached to active websites online.

A ten year old domain can be like an address registered just a few weeks ago if it has been simply registered but not taken care of. The older websites which truly are of great values have been functioning online for months and years, powered by links that have also been online for a long time, valuable contents that have been indexed by the top search engines and have already created some established presence in the cyber atmosphere and they would be extremely valuable indeed.

[techconnections]

Thank you everyone for the responses, it confirms what i was thinking.

[seoxcell]

Domain age is an important SEO factor for your Google ranking. Among the hundreds of weighting factors that Google considers in determining how to rank search engine results is the age of your domain — in other words, how long that domain has been around.

[C Rebecca]

See, domain age matters sometimes... If the domain which you are going to use have good reputation and good amount of backlinks.

Same thing goes in reverse, if you domain has bad reputation... that will have negative impact on your website's reputation.

On the other hand if you have a 10 year old parked domain that will have zero impact on your website's reputation.

[Rua999]

@OP if you're thinking of buying a brand new domain be prepared for the google sandbox..

[Juvv2096]

Buy an aged domain, they are much easier to get ranking. Buy one that hasnt been dropped as well, and also try find one that already has some backlinks and a page on it, not just parked.

I have had much more success personally, with sites that have been aged. I have two brand new sites im trying to get ranking at the moment and it has been much harder than my aged domains.

[dadamson]

Based on your scenario, it looks like a very easy place to rank. The pages currently ranking there are only ranking because of their age, they obviously aren't even trying to rank for your keyword.

So for that reason, you will be able to beat them with some strong onpage SEO and a little link building.

[outwest]

Based on my observation domain age does not mean crap

however
if you have a NEW domain ie less than 6 mos its slightly harder to rank higher
but

its more about age of backlinks
the older the site the older the backlinks and the higher you rank

[commoditytrainer]

Originally Posted by outwest

Based on my observation domain age does not mean crap

however
if you have a NEW domain ie less than 6 mos its slightly harder to rank higher
but

its more about age of backlinks
the older the site the older the backlinks and the higher you rank

Of course the older your backlinks, but that would be similar to domain age, through experience it is easier to rank an aged domain more than two years than one that isn't, but also too, if the site hasn't done any activity to their site for a long time, like backlinks, that will play a certain factor when you begin your campaign.

[outwest]

Originally Posted by commoditytrainer

Of course the older your backlinks, but that would be similar to domain age, through experience it is easier to rank an aged domain more than two years than one that isn't, but also too, if the site hasn't done any activity to their site for a long time, like backlinks, that will play a certain factor when you begin your campaign.

I have a competitor ranking 1,2 on about 200 kws in my new niche
all from one domain
the domain is 13 yrs old
hard to outrank? NOPE

he is routinely outranked by new sites less than 1 yr old
why?
his backlinks suck

guess his 13 yr old domain didnt help him much

[MikeFriedman]

Originally Posted by outwest

I have a competitor ranking 1,2 on about 200 kws in my new niche
all from one domain
the domain is 13 yrs old
hard to outrank? NOPE

he is routinely outranked by new sites less than 1 yr old
why?
his backlinks suck

guess his 13 yr old domain didnt help him much

I'm not arguing one way or the other, but to draw the conclusion that domain age does not play a role based on this instance might be jumping the gun a bit. Although the site is outranked by sites with better backlinks, someone might argue that the site would be ranked even lower if it wasn't an aged domain.

Again, I'm not arguing for one view or the other. I'm just pointing out that seeing older sites outranked by newer sites does not mean that domain age does or does not play a factor in rankings.

[Chris Sweeney]

Yup, I agree with outwest and MikeFriedman. Both domain age and link age are important. The older a domain is, the longer it has stood the test of time in Google, and therefore the more trust it is likely to have. However, I feel that link age is even more important and has even more trust. A site that is 13 years old with no links is great, but a 13-year-old site who has a hundred other people who have been linking to it for those 13 years seems even more trustworthy to me. Not only has it stood the test of time in Google, it has stood the test of time to the hundred other sites who are linking to it.

[Jon Potts]

From my experience domain age has only played a role in very difficult SERPs. Searches like financial or insurance are definitely tough keyword terms to reach without the trusted age of a domain... probably because of how many people use those terms to find expensive products.

[mdsurf]

Originally Posted by AlbertSmiths

A website’s domain age is something that cannot be manipulated or faked, which is why the search engines place greater weight on older domains and domains with longer registration dates. The older the domain generally means that more time, money, and resources have gone into it. Websites that are attempting to manipulate the search results typically have a short life span, with the webmasters understanding that one day soon their website may be banned from the results. Therefore, it isn’t cost effective to register a domain for years knowing that one day soon that website will no longer rank.

THIS is exactly correct