Which Matters more to Ranking...

11 replies
Hi guys and gals,

I'm trying to choose between two similar keywords for a niche, and not having much experience, I wondered if your expertise might help guide me in my decision. Here are the choices I'm considering:

1. a niche whose keywords get 40,000 global searches
  • a somewhat narrow niche
  • my domain would have hyphens ex. keyword1-keyword2-keyword3 and have a .org suffix.

OR

2. a niche with less traffic (6600 global) but less competition
  • a more general niche that could attract related keyword searches
  • a domain without hyphens and .net suffix

3. buy both domains and somehow redirect the traffic from one to the other?

thanks
#matters #ranking
  • Profile picture of the author webapex
    If it's a close call for you, imaging how tough it is for us to guess with less information.
    Do you need global traffic, checking Local & Exact match tells me for example the amount of U.S. searches for the exact keyword, the search for which your most likely to rank highly.
    Of course testing both would be best, by the way, redirecting usually pays off with a mature domain that has established inlinks, I don't believe it would pay off with a new domain.
    Have you heard of Domain Tasting? I an not recommending the technique, but you might research how they determined the value of a domain in 5 days of testing.

    Domain tasting - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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    • Profile picture of the author premiuminvestor
      I'll say don't get carried away by Global results, change to the Exact Match and see if either of them is really worth pursuing.

      Cos I build alot of niche sites, when I'm in such shoes I'll either go for your second option and dominate easily and if the first keyword semm to enticing I could pick that up too, but I won't redirect anything, would build boih.

      But first check the Exact Match Results first

      OJ
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      • Profile picture of the author hja2010
        Yes, these are the Exact match numbers. Local volume is 27,000 for the first and 5400 for the second.

        Interesting idea - testing and Domain Tasting. I'm going to check that out.

        I guess maybe what you folks are saying is you think going after a less competitive niche even, with that much less traffic, would be better than a tougher niche with 5 times as much traffic?
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  • Profile picture of the author M Stevens
    yeah, definetaly look at exact matches.
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  • Profile picture of the author jasonmorgan
    Not enough information to make a decision.

    Ranking depends on the competition of each keyword.

    Number of searches doesn't tell me much. It could be an indication of potential competition to expect but it's not something you can make a judgement call on.

    Exact match domains, I don't place a lot of emphasis on them. If I can get one great. If not, it's not a deal breaker for me. Most of my better ranking sites don't have the keyword in the domain at all.

    You need to figure out, based on your level of SEO abilities, which one of those keywords you can rank a site for and which is worth the time and effort.
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    • Profile picture of the author hja2010
      Originally Posted by jasonmorgan View Post

      Not enough information to make a decision.

      Ranking depends on the competition of each keyword.

      You need to figure out, based on your level of SEO abilities, which one of those keywords you can rank a site for and which is worth the time and effort.
      ===
      Ok, I found the first keyword as an exact phrase has 27,000 search results and the second 51,000. I think that's what your talking about with respect to competition.

      I didnt quite get what you mean about "SEO abilities" Jason. Are you talking about doing on-page SEO, off page or something else?
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  • Profile picture of the author Nickolie0990
    First thing I would do is see if the keyword has commercial intend, you can use the Ad Labs tool too find that out, second thing is quality of traffic, the amount of search volume is really irrelevant, if the traffic isn't in the buying mode then there isn't any reason why you should put in the work.

    So, I would find out if the keywords you want to use are commercial, then find out how the traffic quailty of the traffic you will be trying to get.
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    • Profile picture of the author hja2010
      Originally Posted by Nickolie0990 View Post

      First thing I would do is see if the keyword has commercial intend, you can use the Ad Labs tool too find that out, second thing is quality of traffic, the amount of search volume is really irrelevant, if the traffic isn't in the buying mode then there isn't any reason why you should put in the work.

      So, I would find out if the keywords you want to use are commercial, then find out how the traffic quailty of the traffic you will be trying to get.
      ===

      Well one measure I used was google's CPC and both were a little over $1.00. I'll look at the Ad Labs tool (as soon as the website is up again )

      Ok so how does one determine the quality of traffic?
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  • Profile picture of the author mlord10
    It is important that you use phrase match or exact match when conducting keyword research. Also, make sure that you look at the commercial intent of your keywords. If it is not a buying keyword, then you may be wasting your time.

    I would not put hyphens in the domain name, but that is just my personal opinion... .net should be fine. I have not noticed a significant difference in rankings with .com, .org, or .net.... just stay away from all of the other extensions.
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  • Profile picture of the author jasonmorgan
    Ok, I found the first keyword as an exact phrase has 27,000 search results and the second 51,000. I think that's what your talking about with respect to competition.
    Getting closer.

    So we now know that if we search for your keyword with google we will get 27k and 51k results.

    But, this still doesn't tell us much.

    What you need to do is look at the first 10 results. That is your competition. All of those other sites are irrelevant since your goal is to rank your website on the first page results of google for your keywords.

    There are tools that will give you a SOC (strength of competition score) or you can check out the sites yourself and make your own estimates.

    Traffic Travis, is free and has an SEO tool (SEO Analysis) It'll give you a break-down of some key SEO information and an estimated difficulty rating. I don't rely on this tool exclusively but it's free which is why I suggest it. Market Samurai is another tool.

    According to the Traffic Travis SEO Analysis, Internet Marketing is an extremely difficult keyword to rank a site for while Internet Marketing For Moms is relatively easy.

    SEO Abilities. It's your ability to rank a site. It's both on page, off page and everything else. Some people are SEO wizards and know how to rank sites quickly and easily while others have a harder time with it.

    Your SEO abilities will have a huge impact on what keywords you can chase after. Internet Marketing might be out of reach for you but Internet Marketing For Moms may be something you can handle. Still too tough, Internet Marketing For Stay At Home Moms is always an option.

    If you're not relying on search engines for traffic, none of this matters
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    • Profile picture of the author hja2010
      Thanks for clarifying Jason, that's really helpful.

      I realized after the many good comments here, that I was not putting enough emphasis on competition when examining potential keywords. It occurred to me that I need to compare the page rank of the top 10 sites. I use Traffic Travis and until now just eyeballed or glossed over PR and focused more on TT difficulty score, which I'm not sure includes PR as a factor.

      Coincidentally, (or maybe not so ) this article arrived in my inbox this morning about choosing a niche that covers PR. Some of you may find it helpful; I did:

      How to Choose a Profitable Niche Topic « Building Income « Essays « Pete Michaud
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