Domain-Names-With-Keywords or Not?

[lcampers]

So I was wondering what the outcome of domain names is regarding whether or not they rank higher in search results because of keywords in the domain name itself.

For example, would a shop selling pens that called itself: we-sell-lots-of-pens-and-pencils (dot com)

rank higher in searches for "pens and pencils"

than some branded domain name like "whatever (dot com)" whose name has nothing to do with pencils or pens.

[inbound]

This is an age-old dilemma, my feeling is that if your marketing budget is for SEO rather than branding then go with a keyword based domain. This gives you the advantage of directories linking to you as "something keyword", this still helps the search engines figure out what you are about.

Branding tends to be a bigger play, small budgets don't often build big brands. Brands work, hence the money thrown at them, but you have to be in an area where you can make enough profit to justify the spend.

We've worked on branded and non-branded sites, search engines certainly send plenty of people to non-keyword domains; it's just that you have to work that little bit harder (hence more SEO budget) for the search engines to do so.

[Simsi]

We've worked on branded and non-branded sites, search engines certainly send plenty of people to non-keyword domains; it's just that you have to work that little bit harder (hence more SEO budget) for the search engines to do so

The major benefit of course being you'll get higher repeat-custom and loyalty rather than "pass-thru" traffic.