Domain Names & URLs Google Likes


by Leroy Chan - Date: 2007-01-07 - Word Count: 351 Share This!

Before optimizing your on page factors and building the inbound links to your sites, you first need to look at your domain name and URL structure.

Here are a few tips from statistical research about domain names and URLs that might be contrary to what you have heard in the Internet Marketing forums...

Include Your Keyword

The keyword that best describes your site should be included in your domain name. Use Overture.com inventory tool or WordTracker.com to find the keyword that has some search volume. Try not to use a keyword no one is searching for.

Avoid Dashes

People have already taken many .com domains that are good keywords. But these domains can still be registered when hyphens or dashes are use to separate the individual keywords. The idea behind this was to help Google see the keywords. However, Google can see the individual keywords in a domain name even if there are no hyphens separating them. You might see some domain names with one hyphen in the top ten, but Google tends to rank domains with hyphens lower than domains without hyphens.

Keep It Short

The optimum character length for a domain name including the "www." and the ".com" is 11 to 16 characters. That sounds odd and it doesn't leave you with much room but the research suggests this. Google tends to rank short domain names higher.

Register a Dot Com

Google tends to rank ".com" domain names higher than the other domain name extensions such as ".net," ".org," ".edu," ".us," ".biz," ".info" and ".name."

Include WWW

Google tends to rank domain names that include "www" higher than domain names that don't include it. Include the "www" in your URL when you are doing your link trade request or in the resource box of your article submissions.

Put a Forward Slash at the End of the URL

Google tends to rank URLs that have a forward slash "/" at the end higher in their search results pages than URLs that don't have it. When you trade links with other websites or you put your domain in an article resource box, remember to include the forward slash at the end.

Copyright © 2006 by Leroy Chan


Related Tags: seo, keywords, domain names, urls, ranking factors

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