Domain name optimisation

[StJerry]

I have read a little about the benefits of having one or more of your key words in your domain name to help with optimisation and improved SERPs

Does anyone have experience or evidience of this working?

Thanks

[jimtimuk100]

Google has over 100 rank factors

keywords in the domain is 1 of those rank factors.

It can help your SEO campaign, what domain were you thinking of? what Keywords?:)

[Lee]

Yes, having one of your keywords in your domain name DOES help. Over the years i have tried and tested this method and it does worl, no question about it.

Lee

[ST3PHAN13]

In my experiences, having your targeted keywords as anchor text on many other sites - is what gets you link popularity and SERP placement.

There are many sites that come up #1 in Google for non-domain related searches.

Try getting some backlinks with your various keywords as the anchors, you should start to see yourself coming up in MSN first, then Yahoo (if the backlinks do well in Yahoo) and finally Google.

PS - It helps in Google to have a Yahoo Directory listing! Also try and make sure that the backlinks you acquire have one as well.

Good Luck.

Stephanie

[markov]

Having keyword in the domain name will ease the indexing of the site. Other than that i don't think it has a prominent place.

[hhheng]

Keyword in domain name will help your rankings, but it's not an important factor. However, if your website show up in SERPs, it will attract visitors. A very simple example was: if you search Furama Hotel in google, then I think your first choice will go to the site with a domain like www.furamahotel.com or www.furama.com.

[aliceadams]

It depends on why your competitor sites are ranked as high as they are.

If the #1 ranking goes to a site with optimized URLs, then yes, optimized URLs is an important factor. But if the high rankings go to sites with say, a large amount of inbound links, then you'll want to focus on link building as far as increasing your rank is concerned.

These factors can change over time for a variety of reasons, so you can never be too complacent with one factor or another.

As far as indexing is concerned, optimized URLs are better than dynamic URLs.

~Nathania Heckert :)

[mugshot]

Besides keyword being in the domain as something nice, something that many miss is that keyword in the domain name is excellent for traffic. Let me explain.

If you search log files, you will see searches where visitors type in the {keyword.com} in the query string - and if you own a waterbed company in Alabama, and your domain name is www.AlabamaWaterbeds.com - and if the user types in alabamawaterbeds.com (assuming they have no prior knowledge of your company, but wanted to find waterbeds in alabama, then your site will show up.

In addition to thinking about SEO - it would be more beneficial to see how you can leverage a domain name also.

[debram]

I've always been a big believer in keywords in the filename. Makes sense if you think about it, having a kw there helps to tell both people and bots what they can expect to see on the page.

:)

[cianuro]

I've always been a big believer in keywords in the filename. Makes sense if you think about it, having a kw there helps to tell both people and bots what they can expect to see on the page.

:)

I agree. If possible, use keywords in your domain. It makes sense for humans too. Also, as Debra said, I also use keywords in file names and directory structure.

[Zhoog]

Yes, Keywords in domains help a little. But Anchor texts in backlinks seem to help more.

I don't think keywords in domain names should be your biggest priority. Try to get your domain name short and easy so people remember it.

After you've found one you should make your file structure SE friendly this is much more important.

Use hyphens or dashes, not underscores. Keep them short, don't use dynamic pages (like: index.php?cat=23123&id=123123123). Use your keywords in the filenames, etc.

I just wrote a short article on this if your interested:
Optimizing URLs (http://www.slowseo.com/articles/onpage-optimization/optimizing-urls.html)