Domain names

[actionbiz]

Hello Warriors,

Sorry For the Title, I was Actually going to ask another question so ignore the title on this one Forgot to change it before I hit the post button
OK have a couple questions here and hope someone will help.

As it turns out I set up a site about a year ago and have done nothing with it, after looking today I see that a few of my sites pages are ranking on the second page of Google which is great . I believe with some further seo i can get them to move to page one.
Here is the question.
My site revolves around a search term that can lead in many directions.
This is not it but for example let's say my domain was something like

howtoraisea.com (example) so my posts or pages on the site might be and this is the question
should they be howtoraisea.com/cow howtoraisea.com/chicken
or
should they be
howtoraisea.com/howtoraiseacow howtoraisea.com/howtoraiseacow

I am wondering, if the exact search term in Google is how to raise a cow
which structure would be better for Google

Second question Is there any SEO strength if over time I got say, how to raise a cow.com and how to raise a chicken.com and forwarded them to the pages on the main site

REMEMBER THE Above is only an example

Thanks For the Help

[outwest]

Domain is very low in the list for importance for SEO

[yukon]

I would do something like:

hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-raise-a-cow/
hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-show-a-cow/
hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-breed-cows/
hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-tip-a-cow/ <----

[CoryW]

I second what yukon said. At the least, have the keyword you are targeting as the page/post name, "how-to-raise-a-cow".

[outwest]

Listen to Yukon
but what he is detailing is Called Silo Structure so its not as simple as just putting
a category,

read this thread carefully
Silo Arcitecture Linking Question

[BigNorm]

If you are building a site which is similar to what your outlining. I would look at adding original content(of course) but also provide an opportunity for others to contribute as well then have Adsense showing with shared revenue. An authority site such as the one your outlining will grow a lot faster with input from others who are experts in different fields.

[paulgl]

On the other hand, about.com has been very
successful at making every topic a subdomain,
then sub topics like keyphrase.about.com/other-sub-topic

Not that I would ever tell anyone to do that,
but about.com is ripping it up with that.

Paul

[yukon]

Originally Posted by paulgl

On the other hand, about.com has been very
successful at making every topic a subdomain,
then sub topics like keyphrase.about.com/other-sub-topic

Not that I would ever tell anyone to do that,
but about.com is ripping it up with that.

Paul

They also use sub domains over at howstuffworks.com

hxxp://adventure.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://auto.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://people.howstuffworks.com/culture
hxxp://entertainment.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://home.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://money.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://science.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://electronics.howstuffworks.com/tech
hxxp://videos.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://blogs.howstuffworks.com/
hxxp://games.howstuffworks.com/

Really I would never consider sub domains unless you have a HUGE site like about.com & howstuffworks.com.

I'm sure they run sub domains just to make their life/work easier to manage, I did a site: search for auto.howstuffworks.com & that sub domain alone has almost 20K pages.

[Juvv2096]

Originally Posted by yukon

I would do something like:

hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-raise-a-cow/
hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-show-a-cow/
hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-breed-cows/
hxxp://farmerjohn.com/cows/how-to-tip-a-cow/ <----

Haha, im surprised no one laughed at your cow tipping, maybe they dont know what it is? Im Australian so I get it

I would have to agree with the link structure too. This is easy to do if you are using wordpress which I guess you would be.

In regards to your last question you wouldn't get much benefit from doing a 301 redirect from those URL's. You would be better off making a website dedicated to it and making it a micro niche site with 5 pages of content thats unqiue and like 700 words with pictures etc on how to raise those cows. Build some back links to them and you should be able to rank for the exact match search term.

[actionbiz]

Thanks to everyone for the input.
I started working on a site about a year ago and as I find myself doing with some sites just let it go by the wayside.

After watching a webinar on publishing books for amazon,kindle etc I remembered the site I started so after checking a few key phrases I found that all my posts were ranking at the top of the second page with no work done other than just writing the content. So I know with a little work I should be able to get them all to the first page for their respective key phrases.

The tie in with the books for the tablets is based on the subject material I am putting on the site. I can take the content and break it into a series of books.

Again appreciate the help.

[yukon]

Originally Posted by Juvv2096

Haha, im surprised no one laughed at your cow tipping, maybe they dont know what it is? Im Australian so I get it

Ha, Ha, that was an inside joke for farmers only.

I grew up in rural Indiana (USA), I never tipped a cow but I did go snipe hunting once when I was about 9 years old, I figured it all out after about 10min. of hunting for snipes in a corn field, LMAO!

[Juvv2096]

Originally Posted by yukon

Ha, Ha, that was an inside joke for farmers only.

I grew up in rural Indiana (USA), I never tipped a cow but I did go snipe hunting once when I was about 9 years old, I figured it all out after about 10min. of hunting for snipes in a corn field, LMAO!

Hehe I have never actually done it either, since I live in the city. I don't know wether its a myth or fact?