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Domain Name Articles
Keyword-Rich Domain Names
By Jill Whalen - 6/27/2002
The myth of using keyword-rich domains for SEO purposes has been perpetuated for
way too long, and quite frankly I'm tired of seeing it written about as if it's
an all-important SEO factor.
See for Yourself
Perform some searches in any spidering search engine and sure, you may very well
find keyword-rich domains in the top spots. But upon closer inspection, you'll
see that the same keywords are also in the Title tags of those sites. Title tags
*are* very important to high rankings; I daresay that they're as important as
body copy. Many see the keyword-rich domain name, and assume that's what is
causing the high ranking. Yet it's much more likely that the high ranking is a
direct result of the Title tag and/or the body text, along with the other usual
SEO suspects.
Look at the Links
And let's not forget about off-the-page criteria. The reason why some sites are
in the top of the results isn't always readily apparent by just looking at the
site in question. Some rank highly simply because there are keywords in the
hyperlinks pointing to the site. Google is especially susceptible to this
phenomenon, which has been dubbed "Google Bombing" in the Web Blog world. If
enough sites link to a site using the specific keyword phrase in the hyperlink,
it can have a dramatic effect on rankings. David Gallagher recently interviewed
me for his Business 2.0 article entitled "Top of the Heap," where he wrote about
his quest to become the number-one site in Google for the phrase "David
Gallagher." All he did was ask everyone who read his Web Blog to link to his
site using his name in the hyperlink. Once the "Google Dance" for that month was
finished, he was number one!
And no, his site does not have "David Gallagher" in the domain name. (As an
aside, the sites he was up against were fan sites for the actor David Gallagher
from the TV show "Seventh Heaven." You can read David's article -- and my quotes
-- in the July 2002 Business 2.0 print magazine.)
What About Directories?
With directories such as Yahoo!, it may appear as if keywords in the domain name
make a big difference to rankings. After all, the directories are not spidering
the words on your pages and don't have much to go on to determine your position.
But you know what? My very unscientific research shows that in actuality,
keywords in the Yahoo! title are the more likely reason for top rankings.
Remember, those that purchase keyword-rich domain names very often name their
site the same thing as their domain name, and submit that phrase to Yahoo! as
their title. For instance, a site with the domain of keyword-domains-r-us.com
would probably be titled, "Keyword Domains R Us." As with the spidering engines,
the words in the title are likely to be what's boosting those sites in the
Yahoo! results, not the domain name.
What the Engines Say
Just to be sure I wasn't leading you down the wrong path, I asked Tom Wilde,
General Manager of Search Services at Lycos, if domain names factored into their
ranking algorithm. He told me that they are a factor in the Lycos algorithm, but
since they're so open to being abused, they're a very small factor. He confirmed
that the Title tag and the body text copy were given much more weight than the
domain name. However, for those of you who just don't feel comfortable unless
you have keywords in your domain name, Tom did tell me that using a hyphen
between the keywords would be your best bet for getting them recognized as
separate words.
Don't Worry About It
Since I've optimized hundreds of sites without ever purchasing keyword-rich
domain names (and always get high rankings), I'm sticking with my "don't worry
about it" stance! Like the Meta keyword tag, domain names are definitely not
something to obsess over. I recommend purchasing the domain names that work best
for branding reasons. To me, YourCompany.com name makes a whole lot more sense
than your-keywords-here-so-you-can-rank-high.com, no matter how you slice it!
Contact Jill Whalen by e-mail at jill@highrankings.com, or by phone at
508-309-3037
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Jill Whalen of High Rankings is an internationally recognized
search engine optimization consultant
and editor of the free weekly High Rankings Advisor
search engine marketing
newsletter
She specializes in search engine optimization, SEO consultations and seminars.
Jill's handbook, "The
Nitty-gritty of Writing for the Search Engines" teaches business owners how
and where to place relevant keyword phrases on their Web sites so that they make
sense to users and gain high rankings in the major search engines.
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