better to have dashes in domain name or not?

[angelas111]

is it better to have dashes in my domain name or not?

does this make a difference in terms of seo or serps?

like for example (these have nothing to do with me just throwing the out there)

cheaphotelrooms.com

or

cheap-hotel-rooms.com

i prefer the dashes because its easier to read.

does it matter though?

 

[Realign02]

It really doesn't make a difference the SE's see it as the same.

 

[Mp3Mage]

In terms of SEO, makes no difference at all.

No dashses makes it easier to sell =]

That's about it really ....

Ranzuken

 

[angelas111]

ok. great. just the confirmation i was looking for.

 

[entreprenuer]

heh, I wondered about this too. But I would have to disagree. Dashes "can" actually make a difference in certain situations.

for example, say you are targeting the keyword 'ice cream'
icecream.com would definitely outrank ice-cream.com assuming they have the same backlinks.

So yes it "can" make a small difference

 

[biks]

I've always wondered if myicecream.com would be better than ice-cream.com.

 

[herron]

Dashes are easier to read and this might help sway some users to click on your page over others once you have a decent SERP. Other than that the SE's just ignore them.

 

[GTP_Smile]

ok.. thats how i wasted all my time trying to find domains for my microniche,

then forced myself to register domains that came out lame :grin1:
frieken nO0ob could've used hyphens, ughh!

n e way, i put thanks to y'all!

 

[henbima]

Personally I always use "no dash", it's easier to sell and easier to remember.

But since it's hard to get .com, .net or .org for a nice keywords.... I sometimes use dashes, or use prefix and suffix of general keywords like "HQ", "cheap", "best", etc

In terms of ranking, I found that they have no difference between with or without dashes. It's all back to backlinks and on page SEO.

My 2 cents

 

[OldMadHatter]

that spoiled brat named Matt mentioned once (cannot find the reference now, webpronews panel I think) that hyphens could become a Big G no-no since certain elements abuse the SE with cheap .info domains of keywords+hyphens. I would not put all my hopes on this mix - one day G will fire such silver bullets just to regain some credibility for their search results.

 

[jodyberry]

Personally I always use "no dash", it's easier to sell and easier to remember.

But since it's hard to get .com, .net or .org for a nice keywords.... I sometimes use dashes, or use prefix and suffix of general keywords like "HQ", "cheap", "best", etc

In terms of ranking, I found that they have no difference between with or without dashes. It's all back to backlinks and on page SEO.

My 2 cents

Yep, I've had to "settle" for a name with dashes a few times, since the name I REALLY wanted was taken!

BTW, as a tip, GoDaddy has a great thing called SmartSearch that will give dozens of variations of domain names. Even thought I don't buy my domains through them, this has helped me a few times when my brain was tired trying to think of alternative names!!

 

[sddk]

SEs can detect keywords directly; without/with dashes, single/plural ...

and you can use it to make it easier to anyone ... but don't let your URL go long, short domains are the best ... use abbreviation words, (-) or (0-9).

 

[OldMadHatter]

@12 I agree on all points there, but doubleplus agree to the shitlist reference.
unfortunately for the free world <sic> G tries to identify itself with the Internet and nobody seems to challenge them. from the BH point of view, I think only one entity (in turn controlled by its shareholders' greed) to worry about makes things easier for us and I would rather test, play and listen than face a strong regulator like they put in place on certain makets in Europe.

 

[raygun3001]

Really interesting stuff here. What's the SEO significance of .com .net .info .co.uk .us etc. is there an order of SEO worth?

 

[raygun3001]

Also I was thinking, do redirects form multiple domains help? i.e. redirecting cheap-hotel-rooms.net cheap-hotel-rooms.info cheap-hotel-rooms.us to the same page?

 

[JimBow]

Personal experience and extensive research on my part show:

These days hyphens don't make any difference. I think they make URLs more readable, but I think generally it also makes domains look spammier, especially if it's a generic, keyword rich domain. Most "brand" domains don't use hyphens.

.com domains seem to carry the most weight, but region specific (eg .co.uk) domains seem to get quite a bit of love from regional Google searches.

Redirects from multiple domains don't help with SEO, but can obviously stop people from squatting variations of your TLD. If using redirects make sure you use 301 HTTP redirects.

 

[nullacceptance]

WITHOUT dashes is easier to memorize.

 

[ericshan777]

choosing no dashes would be benificial for you on the long run... when you decide to sell your site in the future, it would be easier to sell... just my experience though...

 

[steveo536]

adding dashes doesn't matter at all in terms of SEO, but generally it's better without dashes because of return visitors and word of mouth. Most people don't think of adding dashes when typing in a URL

 

[whatsup]

domains with dashes are harder (in my experience) to communicate via phone like when you give someone your email or and url.
For SEO there seems not much difference.