Exact Match Domains

[PerchDigital]

Hi All Which strategy from below would be best for the purchase of an exact match domain... 1) www.shiny-blue-widgets.com 2) wwwshinybluewidgetsshop.com Wondered if there was much difference in either as I know both have plus and minus points.

[ThomasHgenhaven]

Hi Gareth,

From my experience, it doesn't really matter that much. The second one looks slightly less spammy, which might work for your advantage in terms of interacting with users.

Also, you might want to look at the SERP before developing the domain. if there are already similar exact match domains ranking on the keyword, it's harder to get a top ranking.

Best,

Thomas

[Diegomh7]

Tough question to anwer confidently and with any solid evidence.  The best I can give you is in my own experience the past 4 of 6 clients whcih are relevant to the conversation have non-hyphenated urls which ranked slightly higher in google.  The combo we used was to H1 tag to match but using spaces which I guess gave google a little more to munch on.

[PerchDigital]

Hi Thomas, Great point about checking for similar exact match domains already in the SERPS. I've always thought the search engines considered the hyphenated option spammy rather than the searcher, or is it both?

[PerchDigital]

Cool, nice idea about the H1.

[Wayne76]

Gareth, I think that the hyphenated URLs have been commonly associated with spammers for so long that Google, more or less by default, wised up to the game. Our personal site findmyaccident.com is without hyphens and we've managed to rank rather well, yet when we did A-B testing with a subsite that had hyphenated URL, the results were not as promising. Granted, all the variables were not the same, but it was enough evidence to persuade us to avoid hyphens, if possible. Hope this helps!

[Jinx14678]

Per the "leaked" rating guidelines, I believe raters are told to be on the lookout for Hyphenated Keyword domains. Also Google's patent for a new technology to actually devalue exact match domains was approved last month i believe.

In my opinion exact match will be dead soon, so using it as a strategy is probably not the best idea.

With that being said, i would say the hypenated version would be the worse long term bet, but no one can predict the Google future!

w00t!

[Dan-Petrovic]

You will find this article interesting: http://www.seobythesea.com/2011/10/googles-exact-match-domain-name-patent-detecting-commercial-queries/

[Jinx14678]

Yeah i knew i had read that recently. In my opinion Brand is more powerful of a tool than an "SEO Trick" but of course if you don't have a brand and are only trying to sell someone elses stuff it is hard i guess.

So i guess the answer to his question would be situational, meaning is the using of keywords in the domain relevant to the user experience?

w00t!

[PerchDigital]

Great feedback all. Thank you.

[Oversteer]

With the "shop" element in the domain option #2, you no longer have an exact match domain (EMD).

The hyphenated version would be preferred. However, with 3 hyphens you're probably beyond the acceptable limits.

From my perspective, neither is a good solution. I'd go the brand route instead..

I also agree with Shane Thomas that the EMD bonus will likely diminish over time.