exact match keyword domain

This is really subjective as it depends on your site niche and generally graph up a campaign plan:
- First make sure you have your onsite settled (now beyond the technical aspects also make sure your user aspect is considered; bounce rate, user interaction)

- Then create a stragety
- Mix link diversity
- Focus on Social (this is where SEO is moving)
- Get high value links (Ex. Niche related page ranked posts)

you likely need a SEO campaign plan; some low comp websites can rank by tossing links on a page but more competitive terms would require a more considered plan to avoid getting flagged

Honestly while content matters it won't be enough to get him to the first page.

It's a factor of your onsite SEO which will affect how easy it is for your website to rank with your offsite factors but it's not going to rank it for you. It's a matter of riding up hill or riding on less an angle, you still got to peddle if you want to go anywhere.

Only exact match domain can't get you good ranking. You need to optimize well w.r.t on-site process. Your content should be sufficient and maintain keyword density. Make unique Title and Description covering your keywords. Do some internal linking with relevant pages insert some images with Alt-tags. Hope that will help...