Exact match .ORG/.INFO vs. all query terms .COM - proof?
-
Hello world
I have searched among tons of quality articles here on forums, but surprisingly I haven't found topic that goes into the deep water when it comes to a specific KW rich domain problem.
Let me first state that I'm mainly based this topic on the information found in following blog posts by randfish (that guru with the beard).
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/exact-match-domains-are-far-too-powerful-is-their-time-limited
and
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/google-vs-bing-correlation-analysis-of-ranking-elements
My questions is only related to RANKING aspect of the domains - NOT how is sounds, smell or dance.
As all good simple .COM KW domain combinations are already taken, only thing that is left is to be a bit creative using non .COMs exact match, hyphens .COM exact match, all query terms .COM with a letter or word added etc.
QUESTION and case study
I found a good keyword phrase, let us called it 'super domain' with low competition & high monthly searches and great revenue possibilities.
Naturally, first step is to acquire a exact match .COM domain (EMD).
But, of course, that is not possible because 'superdomain.com' and super-domain.com has already been taken by some greedy domain broker waiting someone to pay $1.000.000 for it. Not an option.
What options do I got?
OPT1) superdomainA.COM (keyword phrase with added 'A' at the end)
OR
OPT2) superdomain.ORG/NET/INFO (keyword phrase on non .COM TLD)
I couldn't find any studies with test and clear results regarding this subject.
This is VERY important because, regarding to the links I posted, there is a 0.10 better correlation if choosing OPT1) superdomainA.COM, even if using exact match domain OPT2) superdomain.ORG/NET.
But they haven't been cross tested in that results in the same post. So it's big '?' sign to me.
As SEO market is getting more and more competitive, it is important to not leave anything to chance. I would appreciate if randfish, or anybody else could give some inputs about this.
Thanks in advance!
-
i'd agree with Klarke, the first choice should be .com because people just assume that extension with domain names so you might miss out on traffic If the domain is not available, then you can choose either the .net or .org .
-
Hello,
Thanks for your response. This is a bit controversial, as many research shows that choosing 'correct' key phrase TLD will have significant impact on ranking.
But imagine scenario where even OPT2 can only be achieved with hyphens!?
Do you still recommend using OPT2 in such case?
Please let me know.
Thanks.
-
It really does not matter. But if given the choice, I would go with either the .net or .org. And keep an eye on the .com in case it drops.
Or better yet, I'd try to pick a brandable domain where I can register all the TLDs to secure it. Having all the keywords in your domain isn't worth much these days. Once users start to associate your unique name to "super domain", the benefits will be multi-fold.
I would avoid the .info and the OPT1 for the same reason. Marketers abuse them.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Need advise/strategy for cleaning up backlinks to my site
I recently redesigned my website (studio35design.com), and with that, I'm finally paying attention to SEO. I used a few different tools to find the amount of backlinking domains I've built up through the 7 or so years. The numbers are the following: 52 Total Backlinking Domains (800+ links):
Moz Pro | | rubennunez
• 17 of those are from blog commenting - they are pretty much all NF
• 20 of those are from sitewide footer credits on websites I've built. They are all old, as I stopped adding sitewide links to my client sites over a year ago.
• 7 of those are from spam. My site was hacked last year which contributed to alot of it. I've since then completely scrapped my old site and built this one on webflow (Not self-hosted like my old WP site).
• The other 10 or so are from forums, and the odd photo credit. As you can tell, almost none of these backlinks links are really any good. I'm surprised that my DA is 27 really. So moving forward, I need to know the best strategy dealing with these "bad" links. For the spam, I'm going to disavow in google webmasters. As for the rest, here are my questions... QUESTION 1:
As for the sitewide links, would the best thing be to remove the link altogether from the footer of each one of those sites? Some I can't because they are really old, and I don't have access to them (I'll probably disavow), but the rest I can still go in and update. QUESTION 2:
Will removing a ton of links at once hurt my DA and my google ranking? I can probably eliminate 500-600 links within a few days just by removing the sitewide links. How quickly can I expect those links to drop off? A few months? QUESTIONS 3:
Should I disavow blog commenting links even though they are NF? Does it matter at all? QUESTION 4:
I noticed 5 or so of the domains I have links one aren't working domains anymore. How quickly can I expect those links to drop off? Thanks in advance for your help.0 -
Keyword rankings and main company tagline not matching
I have a question about keywords rankings and on page keywords. I don't rank very well for the keyword "Nutcracker". But, my tag line is "Your one stop Nutcracker and Ballet Gifts source". One of my most important keywords is "Nutcrackers" (see the s 😉 ) and I hot hit really hard in my rankings with the google algorithm update. Almost a 30 position difference from one day to the next. Am I shooting myself in the foot by having Nutcracker being in the forefront, even though my chances of ranking for that are very low as there is high competition with more actual "The Nutcracker" related content. I do have the word "nutcrackers" on my home page...but all of a sudden I feel like i'm wasting space, or I should have made the tagline "Your one stop Nutcrackers and Ballet Gifts source". It just doesn't sound as good. I just recently dove headfirst into SEO and moz, so I consider myself a noob, but I learn quite quickly. Thank you for your help! Esmee/Owner www.nutcrackerballetgifts.com 12-inch-nutcrackers-n1211-a.jpg
Moz Pro | | NutcrackerBalletGifts0 -
Http://dev.visualwebsiteoptimizer.com
Hello. http://dev.visualwebsiteoptimizer.com seems to be hanging all the pages. Most pages will not load for me. Even your contact page will not load. The forum seems OK. Alan
Moz Pro | | loopyal0 -
Open Site Explorer vs. Linkscape... without mozRank passed how do you measure link value?
Hi all, Since Linkscape was retired we've been struggling without the mozRank passed data for our competitor research. However, I've read that it wasn't a particularly reliable metric to go on so my question is: what makes a link more valuable, in your opinion? I'm trying to work out the relation between Page Authority / Domain Authority / Number of Links etc., ideally to come up with some form of ranking system where we can say: Overall link value = ( (A x Page Authority) x (B x Domain Authority) x (C x Number of Links) ) / Number of Linking Domains or something like that. Is this a good way to go about it? What do you guys look at when using the OSE data? Thanks in advance for your help!
Moz Pro | | OmarKattan0 -
Ultimate Ranking Tool integrating Analytics / Adwords / Google WM Tools
I currently use SEOMOZ Campaigns and Advanced Web Ranking for monitoring our KW rankings and those of competition. AWR is a brilliant tool with so many different reports, methods of viewing etc. SEOMOZ campaigns are good but don't come close to the monitoring power of AWR (EG I monitor over 50 competitors on over 1000 KW's on a Daily basis with AWR and recieve a variety of set emailed reports on the data). However, one thing that SEOMOZ campaigns have that is useful is the traffic data - but this is still a bit basic and I think could be improved. The problem with AWR is that it doesn't integrate with your Analytics / Adwords / Google WM Tools - so it is only showing you half the picture. Knowing how your site ranks for each keyword is helpful, but it would be nice to understand the value of each keyword. For example, being able to see your rank position and how much traffic that keyword has sent you over time would be helpful. It would also be nice to see the number of searches that are performed for that keyword each month . For example, lets say I saw that I was ranking at number 11 for “hover mower” and getting 500 hits per month. Two months from now, if I was ranking at position 7, it would be nice to be able to immediately see how that changed the amount of traffic I was receiving for the term. Is a position of 11 (first item on page two) better than position 10 (last item on page one)? If you can link it to your analytics, you could then link it to your goals, and goal values to get a complete picture of where your keywords rank the value of the rank, and the improvment on that value when rank changes. If browsed around for such software but can't find anything like this - does anyone know of any software that can do this - or something close to this? Many thanks
Moz Pro | | James770 -
How Accurate is grader.com?
Because I noticed a couple conflicting information they recommends me to do, but it conflicts some SEOmoz recommendations.
Moz Pro | | smstv0 -
Ranking reports don't seem to match reality
seomoz shows our site at #1 for a keyword that we're actuallly #2 we seem to rank #2 even when I disable personalization (setting URL token) or using incognito mode on chrome. Any insight on how seomoz verifies these ranks, and if I can place credibility in them?
Moz Pro | | brianjolney0 -
Seomoz Spider/Bot Details
Hi All Our website identifies a list of search engine spiders so that it does not show them the session ID's when they come to crawl, preventing the search engines thinking there is duplicate content all over the place. The Seomoz has bought a over 20k crawl errors on the dashboard due to session ID's. Could someone please give the details for the Seomoz bot so that we can add it to the list on the website so when it does come to crawl it won't show it session ID's and give all these crawl errors. Thanks
Moz Pro | | blagger1