EMD will work as long as brands will

branded matches = clashofclanshack.com

if you checked serps, most of them are like:
clashofclanshack.com
clashofclanshack.org
clashofclanshacks.com
clashofclanshackz.com


I saw a lot of people here saying exact match domain is bad way to go but its exactly the same as brands are.

Look. branded searches. People write "MOZ" in search because thats brand name. it gives them good boost. now they write "MOZ SEO" another boost for them, overall and for keyword "SEO".

so now they search for "clash of clans hack". EMD were supposed to die but IMO they work very well, exactly like brands do. its basically the same. people just put main kw as their brand name.


and after all, they get BRANDED SEARCHES, which you wouldnt get in fake niche, with spammy site.

thats good ranking factor because spammy websites wont get branded searches no matter what (apart from having emd)

so when they before searched for "MOZ" (moz.com) or "MOZ seo" it will be now exactly the same but on EMD : "Clash of Clans Hack" (clashofclanshack.com) or "Clash of Clans Hack download", which will also trigger the "Clash of Clans Hack" as brand, and therefore will list EMD with boost, because they already have branded searches


and after all, theres a rumor we are allowed to have bigger ratio on branded anchors.

your opinions?

I really needed to make that thread to share what ive realised

This topic tends to be a bit controversial. At the end of the day, in my opinion, it's just a matter of avoiding "over optimization".

I'm sure you're going to receive some conflicting responses here and with that said, I "usually" choose to go with the branded route but this decision varies from project to project (depending on the goal(s) and the niche).

I have a website thats an EMD for a keyword im not targeting.

I have absolutely no content on this keyword, the only thing related to the keyword is the domain name and links with brand anchor text.

The homepage is ranking #15 for the keyword.

EMDs work.

You can't compare one of the most spammy niches ever where exact match ratio is over 10%. Google has a specific ratio for each niche. When ever single site in the niche is spammed and default ratio is 10%, then that will be a benchmark for that particular niche.

You are new to SEO, so it's in your best interest not to use EMDs, because you can get overoptimized easily.

I think EMD's definitely work as long as everything else on your site doesn't look too sketchy (over optimized or whatever). If you and a competing site had all ranking factors equal but you had EMD and they didn't, you would surely rank above them.

What exactly will count to over optimization from external anchors ?


emd.com
Http://emd.com

?

As they keywords are used in the domain ?

Or does this only apply to internal problems ?

As the other said the problem is about over optimization, also gaming niche is more allowed to be spammed / over optimized than another niche