What is the future of EMD sites?
What are the value of exact match domain names (EMDN) given the rumors that Google is devaluing them as they show a high percentage of exact match keyword anchored back links?
There are a couple of factors that still give exact match domains an advantage over the competition.
The first thing you have to do is forget about G and the search engines when deciding on a domain name. In any business it’s a good idea to include your primary business in your name – people looking for a particular product or service tend to select those that use what they are looking for in the company name. (Ignore the highly branded names like Nike who don’t add “shoes”, “golf equipment” etc to their brand name).
I’m talking about Bob’s Electric – would it make sense for Bob to just call his company “Bobs”? Or “Bob’s Company”? No. People looking for an electrician while searching in a phone book or online are going to use the term electrician in their search. When a list of candidates appear they are going to pick the companies that have “electric” or “electrician” in their name over a vague entry named “Bobs”.
This is simple marketing common sense – online or off.
From G’s point of view they can hardly start penalizing people for choosing to use keywords in their domain names when it makes perfect sense from a marketing point of view. They are in the business of providing a “good user experience” and providing a list of sites that don’t use the users keyword in the name or url is not a “good user experience”. How long would you use Google if you typed in “dog grooming service” and they returned a serp list of breeders, pet stores, products etc and not a single site that said “Dog Grooming”? Not long.
As a user you expect that there is probably a site called doggrooming.com and when you query G – because you are too lazy to type it in your browser address bar, or you want some options, or you don’t know you can type a url into your browser – you expect to see a site or list of sites that all say dog grooming somewhere in their serp listing. Those that have the term highlighted in their site Title and URL tend to get your attention and you are pretty sure they are offering what you are looking for. In contrast you may see a wikipedia article on “Dog Grooming” and avoid it as you know they are not offering the service or a NYT article on the subject and ignore it as well. You aren’t looking for a “history” of dog grooming – you are looking for a dog groomer. G has to know your intent and the algo decides this based on the keywords you type in and your search history.
From G’s point of view it probably makes sense that a site called “Dog Grooming” using doggrooming.com as a domain name is probably a site catering to dog grooming. And listing it will result in a good user experience. It’s obvious that the site is probably related to what the user is looking for. And yes it probably has a lot of exact match backlink anchors – it should given its name.
And this is a problem for G in trying to eliminate sites that have an unnatural linking profile. Exact match domains have a natural link profile full of exact match keyword backlinks. They can’t disregard the links as they make perfect sense so they have to rely on the trust factor and relevance of the sites linking in and look at the rest of the link profile – the brand links.
Keep in mind that all the good two and three word EMDN’s were snatched up long ago – they have age and for the most part are valid sites that provide the kind of info contained in their domain names. They aren’t a problem for G.
People who name their site “my-dog-grooming-site-woof-woof.com” are a problem as they are new and tend to have a link profile using an over abundance of exact match keyword anchors from a variety of unrelated and low trust sources. And they tend to lack branded links. Pretty easy for the algo to spot and ignore. This is why you don’t see over hyphenated urls on top of the serps much these days and why the rumors abound that G is penalizing EMDNs. They aren’t – they are penalizing sites with unnatural link profiles. Maybe its better to think in terms of rewards rather than penalties. In most cases a site isn’t penalized – it’s just ranked where it should be. It hasn’t been rewarded high ranking because it hasn’t achieved the necessary criteria. Age, Trust, Relevant links, Internal structure etc. The stuff your high ranking competition has achieved.
Now having said that EMDNs have an uphill battle if you choose to use them. They will continue to have an advantage over non EMDNs but only if you are smart in your linking profiles. I mentioned this in the comments on the last post – EMDNs have a natural variety of anchors too – not just keyword anchors.
The doggrooming.com site should have a mix of links
“doggrooming.com”
“www.doggrooming.com”
“www.doggrooming.com/”
“dog grooming”
“grooming your dog website”
long tails like “my dog gets groomed at Bob’s place”
“bob’s dog grooming”
“bob’s site”
“click here”
etc.
If the EMD has nothing but “Dog Grooming” links or an over abundance of them then it will suffer in the serps. There are many ways to send brand links and a natural link profile will have a good variety of them along with the exact match keyword links.
So. Should you use EMDNs if available? My answer is simply yes but be smart. If you have to hyphenate the crap out of them to include your keywords – don’t. Find a related term or use an add-on before bastardizing your url.
Don’t use “my-dog-grooming-site-woof-woof.com”
use “superiordoggrooming.com”
or “pampereddogs.com”
or “Timbuktudoggrooming.com”
or “Timbuktudoghaircuts.com”
or use a different TLD like .net, .org, .ca (your country TLD)
The point is that you will achieve better results using a primary keyword or related keyword in your domain name than without one. Users will look more favorably at your site in the serps compared to the “petservices.com” site because you use “dog” or “grooming” in your Title and Domain name and you will have a natural advantage when people link to you naturally – they are likely to add a relevant keyword in the link. Don’t always think search engine and gaming G. I want a related site that decides to link to me to use my keyword in the link for traffic purposes. If a pet store links to me then I don’t want them to just use “pet care” in the link. I’ll get more targeted traffic from the pet store site if they use the term “Dog Groomer” in the link.
If you are building legit sites (and you should be) then do what makes sense from a business point of view. Your site should be built around what you provide and not using your keywords because a search engine may penalize you is silly. If your site is legit and you don’t try and manipulate your rankings (everyone does to some degree – just don’t be overt about it) then your search rankings will develop naturally and take care of itself.
I have a site that is six years old and I first built it on a completely unrelated domain. Lets call the site Albatross Lovers (it’s Title) and I used the domain name “nosepickersoftheworld.com”. It’s a static site and at the time I built it prior to finding an appropriate domain name. I loaded it onto the nosepicker domain just to see how bad my HTML coding was. (bad bad bad) Unfortunately I left the pages up as I kept building new ones and suddenly G was sending traffic to it – the buggers indexed it. At the time I was afraid to pull it off and move the work onto a properly targeted domain as it was already indexed and ranking for several terms. So I left it. Within six months the site was ranking number 2 in the serps for just about every keyword I targeted. It has been number 2 for six years now – 1 position higher than wikipedia – but nothing I have done and no amount of legit links (wikipedia even links to it) has been able to unseat the number 1 site (who ironically also links to my site). Guess what the number 1 site’s domain name is? You got it – “Albatross.com”. It’s a legit site. Mine is a legit site. We share a lot of backlinks from the same trusted sources. Mine actually has more trusted links than the number 1 site but in the end the algo has determined that the EMDN site should rank number 1. I have no doubt that had I used at least one keyword anchor in the domain I would be number 1… but I didn’t. Do I know for sure? No but I rank well in multiple domains for many terms not used in my domain and have seen a pattern where I reach almost the top of the serps but never position one. That spot is almost always occupied by an EMDN or a mega trust site – (wikipedia, about.com etc.)
Now my last point – if you are still building thin affiliate sites or made for adsense sites then you are the ones who started the rumor that EMDNs are being penalized by G. And they are.
If you are building typical warrior forum member sites, IM niche sites, Loan sites, Weight Loss sites etc or otherwise high spam niches targeted by all the beginner marketers then you will not do well with EMDNs. Real sites in niches outside the spam niches do just fine. If you are still pissing around with spam niches and affiliate sites then time to move on. Selling IM crap to IMers is a huge waste of your time and any success will likely be temporary. Google does not consider your site “a1weight—loss-over—-night.com” site to be a good user experience compared to “weightwatchers.com”. Hard to believe but get over it. Time to stop playing and start building sites that serve a real purpose other than serving ads or selling affiliate products. There are ways to generate income from a site like “timbuktufurnacereplacement.com” – either because you actually replace furnaces or you sell leads to those who do or provide ad spots to service suppliers. The point is this – expand your horizons and leave the IM niche behind.
Cheers
Griz
Wow! 2 posts in three days???
Excellent bit of advise Griz.
Too many people want to be followers — like those who would create nikeshoesforless dot com, or something of that nature… Like you, I would have to agree that G would be in no logical position to penalize exact domain name sites. Besides, there’s literally thousands of them out there, right?
Thousands and legit – they offer what they advertise.
I have to agree. The issue is that there are a lot of exact domain websites that aren’t branding…they are simply using it for an SEO measure to easily rank for long tail keywords….in essence, they are branding exclusively for search. 5-10 page websites with very little references “out there” in regards to their website because their content doesn’t move anyone in their market.
I think that it will be interesting to see how greatly social references will influence ranking since it can be a truer representation of actual web presence than anchored links (it is hard to game 1,000 “tweet” links from 1,000 different sources) over a small window frame among influencers already established within a market. Dunno how much they are going to rely on this as a bigger ranking potential but I have to say, outside of establishing “friend rings” (which will likely have FB killing large blocks of useless profiles exclusively used for spam), it would be harder to game influence.
I actually asked you a question on Facebook a couple days ago about whether you thought that affiliate links (as in an affiliate e-commerce store with tons of links) pointing out would actually cause problems for the website and if a “buffer” redirect page could change this if this is the case. Would love to know if you have tested this before (I have several e-commerce sites that are affiliate based and don’t want to do any live tests on sites that are ranking…just curious if I am wasting my time from an SEO perspective by utilizing redirects).
On a separate note, I actually ran a small audit on Liz’s site (with her permission) and one anomaly stood out- Her highest pagerank came from an actual redirect page….talk about weird.
Hi Leo,
I haven’t tested affiliate re-directs but the use of no-follow, in principle at least, should protect you from excessive outbound links. In general I have never seen a case where redirects cause problems or for that matter add extra benefit. Have you thought of testing a page at a time with redirects?
Hey Griz,
I agree with everything you say except this:
“Time to stop playing and start building sites that serve a real purpose other than serving ads or selling affiliate products. ”
Isn’t selling products as an affiliate (or leads, or ads, or whatever), what we are here for? It’s either this, or making our own products, which I personally don’t want.
Also, as long as I can snatch up blue bicycle pads dot com and I can sell blue bicycle pads as an affiliate, I will do it. It’s just a question of searches, commission and work involved for me. But usually, even if it’s a single product, I WILL build a site around it if I think it’s worth it.
Cata,
You are describing the type of sites that I’m cautioning readers to stay away from – thin, narrowly focused, single purpose EMDN sites. The only purpose these sites have are to sell a specific affiliate product. These are the sites that G is trying to weed out of the algo. They are unable to build trust, rely on an exclusively manipulated back link profile, easily outranked by trusted industry wide sites and stand out like sore thumbs these days.
At best you succeed until blue pads fall out of fashion – better to spend your time building sites that can move on to red pads and everything else associated with the bicycle market. I’m not saying you can’t succeed with them but they are a short term site at best and I’m suggesting that people start focusing on long term sites that will last and can grow.
In short I am saying there are better ways to sell blue bike pads than with thin affiliate sites.
“In short I am saying there are better ways to sell blue bike pads than with thin affiliate sites.”
Like what? – if you’re not producing them. Every affiliate site, be it 1 page or 100 pages long, is a “thin affiliate site”. Especially if it gets a chunk out of Google’s revenue (because we relate to Google). Google is an affiliate in itself for many big online retailers, and they are trying to maximize profit in every vertical.
You have better info on “blue bike pads” than me, and I’m trying to sell it more aggressively? This is semantics, and I don’t think it’s basis for defining whether an affiliate is “thin” or not.
Cata,
We are on different pages here. I would build a site like “Motor Trends” is in the car niche. My “Bike Trends” site would cover the entire bicycling industry and over time it’s trust factor would be great enough that I would rank on top for any topic I introduce. In that sense I could sell everything related to bikes through any number of monetization options. All the while operating under the guise of a consumer guide within the industry. ie the purpose of the site.
This is the kind of site that will last and as more and more of them enter a competitive niche they will sqeeze all the “thin” sites out of the rankings. I’m just talking about long term strategies – where G is going and how to adapt to the changes. I’m trying to tell you that you can still sell your blue bike pads but that there is a better way to do it if you are considering a long term solution. You are saying that every affiliate site is just a thin affiliate site – I just explained one that isn’t and because of that it will eventually dominate the serps over the ones that are.
I know what you are saying Griz, and of course authority sites are better in the long run, there’s no doubt about it. Also, believe me when I tell you that I would like to build one or two authority sites in one or two industries that I LOVE – and eventually I will. But:
.
Authority sites are not cheap to develop;
Most of them will not break profit in the first months (or even more);
You need A TON of traffic in order to afford to promote products less aggressively.
As I said earlier, I’ve had 1 page EMDs targeted on a single product that got natural citations, because people found them useful.
You probably afford to develop a brand – many people don’t.
I think this discussion could go on and on and on and on
Thanks for this one Griz. This post answered a lot of questions and confirmed things I have been noticing for a while now.
Sound the other post you did in 2008 on Lead Basics – does it need to be updated for 2010 or is it all still valid?
Darren,
I’ll have to go and re-read it! lol.
I tend to concentrate most of my efforts on lead gen and the basics haven’t changed much over the years. The key is creating highly targeted traffic and funneling them to the appropriate place. The process of doing this hasn’t changed much at all other than there are more sources of traffic available these days.
Hey Griz,
Glad to see you’re posting things on Twitter and Facebook – you’re becoming quite sociable these days
I remember Vic saying sometthing similar a while back in TAA, and I then thought to do a mixture of both branded and keyword-rich domains. The keyword rich ones have been leading but the branded ones aren’t doing that bad – although I do buy aged domains and don’t do highly competitive niches.
One thing I wanted to ask you about: changing the link structure and cms of a site (completely) – have you done it before and how long does it take G to move with you (after giving it the 301 redirects).
@Cata – you probably want to be thinking DIVERSIFICATION – I do this on everything to do with business. It might sound great making your own product but you should, even if it’s through a JV.
Nick,
Can you clarify what exactly you are trying to do and why? I’m a little fuzzy – still on my first cup of coffee this morning.
Hey Griz,
Yeah, sorry.
Basically, I’m moving from an OScommerce based site (which has dynamic URLs, such as domain.com/articleinfo.php/article=7 to wordpress, which will make the URLs keyword rich). I just wondered if you had tested anything like this, as I know google will take some time to sort things out but just wondered if it’s usually weeks or months that rankings will fluctuate (I know it’s a gestimate). The thing is, the site I’m talking about does make quite a bit of money, so I don’t want to make the move and lose out too much short term.
Nick,
That’s a tricky one but only because you are making “quite a bit of money” with it. The best guess is that it will take a few weeks to sort things out but you may run the risk of it being prolonged. I would suggest getting the new site up and settled with new content (if that is even possible given the niche) before redirecting. I have only done this twice – once seamlessly and once with disastrous results (which is why I never did it again). I’m sure my niche had something to do with it though (It was a spammy niche). In principle you really shouldn’t have a problem. Just a thought – why not have two sites, keep the existing and use it to help the new one. I typically build several sites in the same market when I find a winner – don’t make it obvious that they are all your sites though.
Sorry I can’t give better advice – if you can live without the income for a while then proceed. Otherwise work a second stand alone site.
That was exactly what I was thinking Griz, thanks.
I have a few sites that are in subniches of the actual niche and I’m launching a further 8 other ‘brand’ sites. And I have been careful to keep them separate (Vic has made me paranoid, just a bit
)
Think I’ll build the other sites and then switch it when I know there’s going to be a few low revenue months.
Nick
Nick – After switching to WordPress I strongly suggest Custom Taxonomies. You’ll be so glad you did!
Hey hey, looks like I’m pissing around with a big spam niche then LMAO! Funnily enough, there is an EMDN site keeping me off #1 for a keyword I had for a couple months early in the year until the Mayday update reversed our fortunes. I haven’t been able to unseat it yet either, which irks me no end.
But the worst is the dipshit owner of that EMDN site can’t even promote the damn big affiliate commission product we’re ranking for cause its against their TOS to have their brand name in the domain! Difference between #1 and #2 is half the traffic. I make only half the big buck in commission I could make and he makes pennies from adsense. Crazy!
Anyway, interesting post Griz, thanks
Terry
Terry,
I just knew I’d get a rise out of you over the weight loss niche.
Just the same, you are experienced and have been at the niche a long time but I think you know where I’m coming from – I doubt you would recommend beginners take the same path. Btw – have you thought about a joint deal with the number 1 site – have them funnel the traffic they can’t convert for the big commissions to you and split the profits. Just a thought.
Hehehe… you’re right, I wouldn’t recommend any noobs try and get into this niche. Way too much work for most but the rewards are there if you have the work ethic of a cantankerous old mule like me! Stubbornness and a never give up attitude pay off in the end!
Yeah, I thought about contacting the owner of that site, but when I took his place at #1 at the start of the year, I always believed I could get it back after I lost it. Still do and I’m working on it…
Anyway, you and the family have a great Christmas!
I’ll be in Liverpool empathizing with your subzero snowy climate for a few days… Brrrrrr – Just right for some warm British ale and some traditional English food …curry LOL!
Makes me wish you had time to post everyday:) Glad you have a life though.
This is really good stuff and makes total sense. I have to admit, it’s gotten harder to find some good names compared to a few years ago because there are so many parked pages out there…from what I can see, none ever seem to rank that well but they must get some traffic. Makes it that much better when you put a really good site on a decent domain. For all practical purposes that should stand the test of time, and Google, for a long, long time.
Happy Holidays Griz!
Mark
Thanks Mark and all the best to you these holidays as well.
Nice post…
A while back I was asked by a client to help them choose a domain name.
The first, and most obvious to me was their company name. We went with ABCInc.com (example).
A few months later they asked me to come up with a different name that would better describe what they do. We settled on DoctorSoftware.com (example) and we slowly noticed more sales inquiries.
When I mentioned to the client that traffic was also increasing and it seems to be since the domain name was changed, they asked me to think of one more name that would even better describe their product.
I started searching various search engines for terms related to my clients product. I noticed that the top results mostly all described the product in the domain name, to some degree.
I kept researching and came up with SoftwareForDoctors.com (example) as the final name. This had a serious impact on traffic and sales, and search engine positioning. Not overnight, but quicker than one would expect.
It was sometime ago so I had limited access (and knowledge) of search numbers but as I began to understand SEO and get comfortable with decent research tools, I was surprised to see that both “doctor software” and “software for doctors” received comparable searches.
Grizzly, any thoughts as to why adding a conjunction between two keywords (in the domain) would result in significantly more traffic?
*** not including the fact that research tools can be misleading
Ross,
The conjunction is not likely the reason – G would treat both terms you used as being the same search – “doctor software” and “software for doctors” – I suspect that you just happened to start ranking better at the same time as you changed the name. The same would have happened had you stuck with the original name. Just a guess as I don’t know the particulars.
Tallies exactly with my limited experience, Griz. An EMD is powerful _if_ people are searching for that word.
An EMD for the sake of grabbing a few of the clicks for some some third-tier long tail is likely not worth the registration fee.
As they day here on the Internet (long before many of today’s players even knew what it was, or were even born) (yes, I am old, I hail from the DARPANET days, long before there was a www service), YMMV. (you can look it up, young-uns, it is safe for work and children).
Regarding an earlier comment … absolutely a good thing to build a site around “Blue Bicycle Pads” … if … you are actually providing any real information about Blue Bicycle Pads. And who determines if you are actually providing valuable info? Why Google, of course.
Griz often uses “oil filters” as an example. So I just searched it. First three slots are the corporate websites of the largest three filter companies in the world, fourth slot is the Wikipedia entry for “oil filters”, likely providing more info on oil filters than any of us ever wanted to know, and slot number five is an independent business with “oil fitters” in it’s domain name. Do they actually provide content, or are they just sniping with an EMD?
Well, they seem to be a large, third-party supplier site that offers everything from cross reference numbers for hard to find filters, to special purpose wrenches, to where to environmentally dispose of used oil and filters, atc., etc.
Probably Google made good call regarding value here. In some ways the third-party site provides more value regarding the subject than the first 4 “name brand” sites, and they do have an EMD. But I don’t think they got that number 5 ranking “becuase” they have “oil filter” in their domain. If you look at what they actually provide, they would appear to have earned it by value provided.
Same sort of pattern repeats through the next five first page positions. “Real” sites of oil filter manufacturers and another catalog site which provides real service, this time with no keywords in the domain.
So, seem to me, for sure, that EMD’s may have a value, but are one of the lesser factors in building site success. Or so Dave opines.
Happy Holidays to all.
Dave,
I like a man who can read a serp page and dissect it properly. The serps tend to reveal a lot about G’s intent in any given niche. The overwhelming fact is that Brand is dominating the large, competitive niches and will eventually dominate the small niches as well when the smart players figure it out.
Wait a minute… I thought the new internet marketing lessons was going to be on the .ca site? I guess I have to drop by all three now. No prob. Also, to all who are out there. I’ve seen a significant drop in the serps if you have an article linking to two link sources that links to your main site. So, say you set up 2 websites B and C to link to site A. You create a page or article on another site and link to BOTH B and C in that same article/page, you will set off some kind of unnatural pattern alarm. This happened with me, although I appear to be working my way out of it now. Can anyone else attest to this theory? Griz?
Actually, now that I think about it, it may not have been that. It could be that adding a navigation menu that links to certain posts at the top of the website may have been the cause for the dropped serps. So either that, or what I said in the previous post. It could actually be the previous thing helping me rebound from it. This is the problem with seo(the delayed reaction).
Red,
and why I advise multiple testing and wait before you start assuming why a certain result happened. You never really know until you can duplicate a result over and over and then correct it.
@Dave Starr,
Value and spam are very relative things (just like beauty is in the eye of the beholder
). Is sniping with an EMD bad? Not from where I’m standing. I have 1 page sniping sites that get natural citations because people find them useful, and this means they provide value. So since people find them useful, Google should find them useful as well, because that’s their main interest: to serve relevancy to searchers.
Returning with a vengeance there Grizz. I have always seen the EMD as nothing more than a single keyword out of many thousands in a niche. From comments I have had it seems that the reason why so many people fail to make a success of their sites is they get fixated on that one keyword. And spend waaaaaay to much time chasing 1 single elusive term.
Especially those after the adsense clicks.
A catchy site name and a big bag of keywords around the niche is always going to be better than getting hung up on just the one main keyword term, and if it means sacrificing an EMD then it may even be a good thing. It means you don’t get caught on the one term and focus all your time on it.
Apart from anything else it will make folks realize the benefit of building a large site around a much broader topic, and DOMINATE.
Happy Chrimbo everyone.
Dave.
Absolutely. There is too much work involved in this business not to think of the long term. Well said.
Hi Dave,
You’re right on the perspective thing. I have personally found them annoying but it’s usually because I wanted a domain and someone got to it before me and I found the pages virtually useless. But…the world doesn’t necessarily revolve around me, even though it should:) Despite my bitterness…Happy Holidays!;)
Was this a guest post? I have been reading your blogs for years and have benefited greatly in $$. I just dont remember you ever starting sentences with “And” along with some other things that caused me to pause and question who wrote this. I don’t mean this as an insult, I have always been impressed with the flow and your style of writing; this article seemed off with with previous articles. My bag if I am wrong.. Glad to see you back to sharing your insights.
Dennis,
Lol. Nope – just me writing in fits and pieces as I try and squeeze in a few posts between a rather busy schedule these days. Living back in civilization is far more time consuming than when I lived in the bush. Nice hearing from you Dennis.
Most of my sites are 30 to 100 or more posts all on one subject. I just keep adding anything I can think of about the topic and will for years to come (hopefully). Do you consider those “thin” sites?
Seth,
Hard to say without seeing the content.
Hey Griz
Merry Christmas to you and your family.
Have a great and safe holiday season to everyone.
Cheers
Hi Griz,
Really cool post and lots of very valid points. But in the end of the post I kinda lost you…
Isn’t it contradicting when you say:
and then
Merry Christmas!
/Mikael
Hey Griz,
It’s been a while. How are things going?
Nice post. There has been a lot of buzz about exact match domains on some of the lists I’m on. I think this might be a focus of Cutts and his team now that they’re pulling back together a bit.
Anyways, what are you up to these days? I moved out to Seattle to work with Distilled and SEOmoz.
Can you provide any insight on aged domains?
I’ve got a few that I haven’t done anything with that are a few years old? EMDN’s that haven’t been used. I understand aged, backlinks, previous (positive) ranks, etc. would make a difference but will just the age of a domain, even it hasn’t been used, help with ranking?
Grizz, or anyone else that may know…
I’m going to test this out soon, but what does everyone think about getting a strong link to be indexed with from the beginning. Is there a better effect or no effect at all by getting a few links and then a strong one, or having your strong one be your first link to get indexed? Anyone test weather G throws more weight in one way or another? My plan was to build “normal links” and then a month later or so then throw in one that will have considerable weight. I was just curious if anyone knew anything about that. I think I remember reading somewhere(possible MMFB) that its good to get a strong link first, but now that things are changing I might want to go as natural as possible. I think I answered my own question, but if anyone else has any input, it would be greatly appreciated. I love theories on this stuff. They are addicting in their own right.
I think I can help Red with his question:
I’ve been watching the construction process of Griz’s other two MMO blogs. The cardinal rule of bear watching is “watch what he does more than what he says.” Of course you need to remember that that some things he does may be tests, as in don’t try this at home or you might blow something up.
I’ve been wrong before (or so my BF tells me), but it would be just like Griz to model the construction of a new site from the ground up for those who care to pay attention. True or not, he’s sure got mine.
Glad to see you back, Griz. –Lorecee
I’ve actually been watching what Griz has been doing with internetmarketinglessons.ca. It appears to be heavily bookmarked(scuttle plus) on individual posts. I don’t know if this is Grizz’s doing, or if someone just decided to help him out. I also noticed they are on bookmarking sites that are indexed in G and some have pr2′s or higher on their index page. The anchor text looks to be a mixture of heavily targeted and general related terms. I also noticed not just anyone can register on these bookmarking sites. So either, Grizz owns them or a buddy of his does. Or the third option. I once came across a “service” that allowed you access to a number of scuttle plus sites(with PR) for a fee. I’m not trying to blow the lid off anything your doing Grizz, so if you want to edit my post I understand. That being said I think all of the above is common knowledge with the folks that do this IM stuff. It also looks like he is trying to relate the words “Grizzly” and “Brears” with having to do with Internet Marketing and SEO. I’m not an expert on G, but I assume if it finds Grizzly and Brears on pages related to that stuff, it will start to equate those words with having to do with the niche. How many other people will choose those words for their IM or SEO site? Most likely only Grizzly. I guess it helps with branding. Just a theory, though. It may not work like that at all. By the way Grizz, which site should we watch most. Internetmarketinglessons.ca, Grizzlybrears.com, or this one? I’ve already picked the .ca to closely watch. Am I in the right ballpark er.. golf course?
[...] Grizz, back from his long hibernation made his observation concerning the use of Exact Match Domain Names as our preferred domain URL as a guarantee to better rankings as something that is not as feasible [...]
[...] nothing works as well as an emd, I've found hyphens to give no benefit. Have a look at what the main man has to say about this. I am outranking EMDs with one year old .INFO with quality content, and find EMDs too restricting. [...]
[New Post] Exact Match Domain Names – Yes or No? – via #twitoaster https://makemoneyonlinegrizzly.com/backli…
Hi Grizz,
Was looking for your original blog “How to make money online for beginners”, but the original blog was removed? What happened? Did you remove it to make a new one and this is it? If so let me know.
I like your new look and template. It looks like WordPress.
Carlos
Regarding the DoctorSoftware vs SoftwareForDoctors post earlier, I would say that the difference in traffic would not be so much due to the number of searches performed in Google using those keywords but more to do with which links the customers are clicking through. SoftwareForDoctors says exactly what the site contains and anyone who is looking for software that has been made specifically for doctors will click through. However DoctorSofware could be construed as a cool name for any software site and people may see it as Dr.Software and not realise that it has anything to do with real doctors.
I think this is a great example of why you should keep your customers in mind as well as (if not more than) Google when deciding on a domain name.
Just my two penneth worth
Okay Griz,
Given what you’ve said here, if I am starting a brand new site today (and this is long-term) do I start it with the keyword targeted domain and wait the months I know it may take for it to rise in the SEPRs because it is new and not yet an authority or trusted site, OR do I use a domain name that has been indexed by Google for 3 years, but has no reference to what the website is about?
Okay, Griz fine…Don’t answer me. Make me read the post AGAIN and AGAIN to get the answer to my question, so you don’t have to repeat yourself. I hated teachers like you…
[...] Here, let me Google that for you: Exact Match Domain Names – Yes or No? SEOmoz | YOUmoz – The Problems With Exact Match [...]
Hi Griz
Wow, my sister and I have just started getting into this money on line business and I had asked her the question just last week about domain names and keywords and if it she had read anything about them being necessary. So anyway, she found this post by you and sent it onto me. I loved reading the posts and replys – sooooo useful. Thank you. I still dont fully understand the whole thing, but hey we’re new at this and I would imagine that in time I will be able to fully participate in these kinds of chats.
Ciao for now
Merv