Stupid Question?

Hi there,

This may be a stupid question, but if I want to buy an exact keyword domain, does it matter what order the words are in? I'm guessing so as it's called 'exact' match, but thought it'd be worth asking...

Yes it does, if it is a phrase like "cheap blue widgets" then widgetsbluecheap.com isn't going to rank well if at all for people searching "cheap blue widgets"

big_steve_mac said:

Yes it does, if it is a phrase like "cheap blue widgets" then widgetsbluecheap isn't going to rank well if at all for people searching "cheap blue widgets"

Click to expand...

Damn. Thanks for clearing that up for me anyway.

Figured it might be easier to ask here instead of opening a new thread.

What if I want to buy a long-tailed domain name but want the exact words in various orders to play mostly in sequence with my keywords.

I want my site to push:
free
widgets
tools
boats

Will it harm the rankings if I get:
FreeToolsWidgetsandBoats . com

But if people search for:
free tools (it's in order so it's good for Keywords)
free widgets (in order, out of sequence)
free boats (in order, out of sequence)
free boat tools (Out of sequence)
free boat widgets (out of sequence)

Now what if I heavily backlink my domain for all the above keywords, how do things change then?

Thanks

A few things to consider:

• google (ie Matt) has stated that they are trying to reduce the power of emds (not everything they say they are going to do is true, but this one I believe it)
• "free" is a word with special issues
• If you add all of your kw to the domain, it most likely makes the domain too long (over 20 characters?) and also looks spammy.

Try to get emd for the best of those phrases, and try to get the shortest domain you can that includes your best kw.

Also, remember that you won't be targeting all of your kw to your home page!
so, for example, a good domain might be:
boattools.com or boatwidgets.com

and then you will target your kw like this:
free tools -> boattools.com/free-tools
free widgets -> boattools.com/free-widgets
free boats -> boattools.com/free-boats
free boat tools -> boattools.com/free-boat-tools
free boat widgets -> boattools.com/free-boat-widgets

that way you get some of your kw into the url twice without it looking like you are stuffing kw

big_steve_mac said:

Yes it does, if it is a phrase like "cheap blue widgets" then widgetsbluecheap.com isn't going to rank well if at all for people searching "cheap blue widgets"

Click to expand...

don't know where you get your info from but me, my bank manager and my new yacht don't agree with you.

with the above example I'd take widgetsbluecheap.com above cheap-blue-widgets.com or cheapbluewidgets.info anyday.

Yes EMD's are important, but so are shitloads of other things. A good chunk of my income comes from pages without the search term in the url, in some cases the search term isn't even listed on the page!

Yes EMD's are important, but so are shitloads of other things.

Click to expand...

+1 to that - don't obsess on the domain name, pick something decent and get started on the real work - sitebuilding and backlinking!

partymarty4870 said:

don't know where you get your info from but me, my bank manager and my new yacht don't agree with you.

with the above example I'd take widgetsbluecheap above cheap-blue-widgets or cheapbluewidgets anyday.

Yes EMD's are important, but so are shitloads of other things. A good chunk of my income comes from pages without the search term in the url, in some cases the search term isn't even listed on the page!

Click to expand...

You, my friend, have just made my life. Google sees hyphens as separators and underscores as linkers, right (That's what Matt said a while ago anyway...)? So by that logic, wouldn't it be even more effective to have cheap-blue-chicken-nuggetsrather than cheapbluechickennuggets

Google sees hyphens as separators and underscores as linkers, right

Click to expand...

Matt was mostly referring to the rest of the url, not the domain name:
mysite.com/cheap-blue-widgets
(you can't have underscores in domain names anyway)
see here for an update from 2007, but it's the most recent update from Matt on the topic:
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/whitehat-seo-tips-for-bloggers/

That said, the issue with dashes, is the same as with any other character you add: it lowers the percent of the domain that is emd:

cheap-blue-widgets.com and cheapbluewidgetsco.com both have the exact same domain/keyword ratio.

So, technically cheap-blue-widgets.com is NOT emd, it's a near emd.
Personally, I've had good results with a domain with 1 dash in it, it's not a handicap... but the power of emd is likely to diminish somewhat anyway, as G tries to reduce the factors that are easy for spammers to manipulate.

And finally, you should always take into account the "manual review factor" - would your domain name be marked as spam at first site if you had a manual review? ie:
my-cheap-and-free-blue-and-red-widgets.com
just make sure it looks presentable...

"
and then you will target your kw like this:
free tools -> boattools.com/free-tools
free widgets -> boattools.com/free-widgets
free boats -> boattools.com/free-boats
free boat tools -> boattools.com/free-boat-tools
free boat widgets -> boattools.com/free-boat-widgets
"

I think that this is exactly how I will do it.
It gets the benefit of having the dashes as separators.
It does not look spammy to real people landing there.
And I can then keep each page focused.
Now I have to find my short URL with my overall domain name.