Hyphenated domains – good or bad?

[ravisodha]

I have a client who will be changing their domain name from www.brand.co.uk to www.brandglobal.com. There are concerns however that this might affect the searches for brand terms and variants. Hence, there is a suggestion for going for www.brand-global.com. I’m aware that search engines are smart enough to discern the brand name in most cases, but I’m wary if it would impact highly on the brand search terms and would it be a better option to go for www.brand-global.com instead of www.brandglobal.com? Any advice (or reference to discussions around this) would be much appreciated. Thanks

[Sebes]

I don't think it maters to Google, but it does maters to the person searching. I think that using a hyphenated domain increases the readability of the URL and therefore leads to better CTRs (and thus to a tiny advantage in rankings).
Also if someone misspells your brand name it's easier to scan in the SERPS what you were looking for (e.g. searching for "brant product" leads to brand-global.com, which I think is a lot easier to read then brandglobal.com)

Personat opinion, withouth any data: most ppl. tend to use hyphens when typing in a name.[edited]

[RobertFisher]

There are two opinions on this in the SEO world and mine is that it is good. I like the readability and believe for that alone it is beneficial. To date, I have seen nothing proving it is a negative.

But, here is a question: Why change from the brand.co.uk to brand-global.com? Does adding global assist your client's needs in any way. They may be a global company, but why would you not simply leave out global and go with brand.com or .net?

Just wondering,

[DavidKonigsberg]

I don't like using a www.brand-global.com if you have a www.brandglobal.com it looks a tad spammy and second rate in my opinion. I don't think it will impact highly on the brand search terms.

If you do choose www.brand-global.com i would for sure buy www.brandglobal.com and 301 redirect it

-Take a look at domain values the - is always a cheaper domain

[KeriMorgret]

Hi Sebastian,

Can you share more information about most people tending to use hyphens when typing in a name? I haven't seen studies on that before and it sounds like really valuable information to have. Most of the advice I see is to avoid hyphens in the domain name itself as multiple hyphens can look spammy and it's more difficult to say verbally.

In any case, if you do opt for the hyphen, ALSO get the non-hyphenated domain. Otherwise someone else will get brandglobal.com and capture a ton of your traffic from when people don't type in the hyphen.

[Sebes]

Hey Keri,

I do not have hard data to prove this claim, it's purely my opinion and I should have marked it as such. I had a few presentations to customers recently and most of the time when I asked them to go to a specific page the person would use a hyphenated (spelling?) version or search brand1 keyword1 instead of brand1keyword1.
I personally first try a hyphenated version (e.g. -online.com).

So I updated my response to the question to reflect this.

Sebastian