Thread: Domain name registration can give effect on SEO?

Lets say i wanna register for my domain name, between these two domain names, which one give more effects on SEO or both domain names just the same in the eye of SE

getfreeiphone.com

get-free-iphone.com

so with hyphen or without hyphen is good in term of SEO?

iphone is probably a trademark term of apple computers. In come cases you may get away with using it, but it is not worth developing a site with a trademarked term in the domain name. Apple is aggressive in defending their trademarks as are many other companies. You can generally use trademarked terms to the right of the domain name extension without problems, so a name like getfreephones.com/iphone_offers/ would be a lot safer.

As far as the use of hyphens you will find the thinking divided. Most would say not to use the hyphens if the non-hyphenated name is available while some advocate the use of hyphens as being more human readable. It is harder for people to remember and to tell them the name verbally or with text ads with the hyphens although it makes no difference if they are following a hyperlink.

Originally Posted by wink0r

iphone is probably a trademark term of apple computers. In come cases you may get away with using it, but it is not worth developing a site with a trademarked term in the domain name. Apple is aggressive in defending their trademarks as are many other companies. You can generally use trademarked terms to the right of the domain name extension without problems, so a name like getfreephones.com/iphone_offers/ would be a lot safer.

As far as the use of hyphens you will find the thinking divided. Most would say not to use the hyphens if the non-hyphenated name is available while some advocate the use of hyphens as being more human readable. It is harder for people to remember and to tell them the name verbally or with text ads with the hyphens although it makes no difference if they are following a hyperlink.

i just give an example about the domain name, i'm not really intend to make website that have trademark domain name, some said domain with hyphen can be triggered as spam site which is no good in term of SEO

I agree with wink0r, both would probably have more or less the same SEO advantage, one is just easier for visitors to read and remember.

Originally Posted by Phoenyx

I agree with wink0r, both would probably have more or less the same SEO advantage, one is just easier for visitors to read and remember.

so the hyphen domain name can be registered without worrying it can be triggered as spam site? maybe it just a myth, i read about this issue on certain forum... people like to buy pure domain name rather than hyphen domain name

I don't think there's any anything wrong with hyphen domains and I have seen people buying hyphen domains for huge prices. Content is which can be triggered as spam not the domain name it self. I have hyphen domains with good content and never had problem with those.

But yes when in domain name market first type has bigger demand and value and hyphen domains. Yet all equal in seo.

But in term of 'branding' your website, so it is good to choose with hyphen or non-hyphen domain name? some said it is better to avoid hyphen domain name

Originally Posted by franberries

But in term of 'branding' your website, so it is good to choose with hyphen or non-hyphen domain name? some said it is better to avoid hyphen domain name

Non-hyphon domains are better for branding no question about that. That's why those domains have a higher value in domain name market.

Originally Posted by bluearrow

Non-hyphon domains are better for branding no question about that. That's why those domains have a higher value in domain name market.

for example, if the cheapball.com has been taken, it is better to choose cheapball.org or cheapball.net or cheapball.info or cheap-ball.com
i think dot com give more value in branding the website

Originally Posted by franberries

for example, if the cheapball.com has been taken, it is better to choose cheapball.org or cheapball.net or cheapball.info or cheap-ball.com
i think dot com give more value in branding the website

You are right if you are talking about russian search engines... But in english sector that is not matter. Of couse, if that domain is not regional as .ru, .de, .co.uk...

Originally Posted by franberries

for example, if the cheapball.com has been taken, it is better to choose cheapball.org or cheapball.net or cheapball.info or cheap-ball.com
i think dot com give more value in branding the website

Then It's big complicated. It need little bit research too. There are facts to consider. Need to se what's in .com so if it already has site about same niche then we need to think again about our brand name. Also if it's a park page then we can take the .net and sooner or later owner of .com will come to you with an offer. You can consider a local name too like cheapball.us.

But cheapball.com already has an established site and it's not the same niche then it's good to go for the cheap-ball.com.

For me I will always go for .com and without hyphen. It might slightly help for SEO and a big help for your website impression.

SEO helps because it does not have extra characters a person searching for that keyword. For example when a person search for "cheap ball", cheapball.com match it better compare to cheap-ball.com because it fits the search keyword perfectly without extra character. The help is not significance though but at least it helps.

As for website impression, it is very important to note that most big companies or big websites don't have hyphen in their domain name. For example gamespot.com or gametrailers.com. So you would want to follow them. Also mostly only Internet marketers use hyphen for their domain name. So when I see a website that have hyphen in their domain name, I know that the site owner is most likely an internet marketer. Nothing wrong with that but internet marketers had been getting quite a bit of bad name recently thanks to all the black hat scams.

great explanation andyteh! sometimes i do confuse with the hyphen and no hyphen domain name, especially when targeting certain keyword on that domain name, do google really care about the (-), or just the word itself

Originally Posted by bluearrow

Non-hyphon domains are better for branding no question about that. That's why those domains have a higher value in domain name market.

I totally agree and normally i will not buy domains with hypen as it gets hard for visitors to remember your URL.

Originally Posted by dominicexcel

I totally agree and normally i will not buy domains with hypen as it gets hard for visitors to remember your URL.

yes i agreed with you, especially when do mouth to mouth advertising to tell about your site, to include hyphen when telling people maybe kind of annoying rather than tell the full name without hyphen

Domain name always effect on seo without hyphen domain name is better than hyphen domain name. and also use same keyword for seo you will get result very fast. your site will be new so in my advise you must go seo very slow dont make rush.

i personally thinks, it helps, check my domain PR 4 and alexa below 4,00,00 and traffic- very less
i get all this might be cause of domain name.

Google treat hyphen as a separator. Domain with hyphen neither hurt nor helps to improve ranking. But domain name without hyphen is better worth for branding.

for the latest google updates,domain-name ranks higher than domain.name, i think using dash domain names is also helpful for rankings.

I think the hyphen is not a problem, the important thing is there is a keyword in the domain or not. for example, try to check on google.com with the keyword:
how to get free
there is blogspot as how-to-get-free so many hyphens, but google page 1 and place it in position 1, i think it does not matter to a hyphen. but if possible get a domain with no hyphen would be better, as they may be more visitors easy to remember the domain.