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www.brand-keyword.com does match brand and keyword, but the difference is too small to worry about IMO. Yes, you might get some links for www.brand-keyword.com but I wouldn't worry about that any more.
Yes.
Look at adwords, play about with safe search.
>Look at adwords, play about with safe search.
Have any proof this applies with the ordinary algo? AFAIK, if you are brandwidgets.com, this won't give you any boost for a search on just "widgets."
Are you saying that brand-widgets.com gets a boost?
Yes. It seems clear to me Google does give a boost for keyword in domain name. It isn't just all anchor text.
Do you mean that as a literal search for "keywordinfo?" I just ran this, and none are pages with "keyword info." And only 34 matches for "keywordinfo."
David Miller is the ceo of brand keyword
his email: david.miller@brandkeyword.com
his web adress: www.brandkeyword.com
and his products are best found at: www.brand-keyword.com
Try searching for searchengineoptimization
compared to search-engine-optimization
compared to search engine optimization
>Can Google read the keyword in www.brandkeyword.com?
Yes.
>Is it better to have www.brand-keyword.com?
Yes.
what will be better?
brandsearchengineoptimisation.com
or
brand-search-engine-optimisation.com
the hyphenated wins, in germany we know this since years. In US You came a little later on that:-)
imho the "-" is nower days a standard for composed domain names. ( widgets-orlando.com or even sergey-brin.com ) Only if the standard changes it might have effect on the serps.
Yahoogle! would bold search terms in the URI when present. For example, if I search for brand secondary keyword, the brand in the URI would be bolded.
www.brandkeyword.com
If I searched for brand keyword, neither would be bolded.
www.brandkeyword.com
If I searched for something keyword, the keyword would be bolded in the URI...
www.brandkeyword.com
Now, if I had a www.brandkeyword1keyword2.com domain, this is where it got interesting. I could see the brand get bolded during searches and the keyword2. But, Yahoogle! would not see that keyword1 in the middle of the URI.
When hyphens were present in a URI, all terms were bolded when searched.
Summation
My research shows that the first and last words in a URI were visible, but nothing inbetween. If words were separated by hyphens, then all were visible.
Since Yahoogle! has changed its display of the SERPs, it is hard to really test this any further. After viewing Google SERPs for years, I'm convinced that lots of hyphens may hinder a campaign. Shorter URIs are always better for the user and for the spidering SE, those that are left! ;)
[edited by: pageoneresults at 4:02 pm (utc) on Sep. 28, 2003]
I have a lot of domains using everything talked about here: brandkeyword.com, brand-keyword.com, cooldomain.com
I've seen them all rank at different times.
So even if they can read, I just don't think they give it much weight. The only benefit I can see is based on how people link back. But my experience of this is that even when you have quality content, natural linkage is very slow. Therefore you have to go out there and get links, which means you can suggest to people how they link to you. Which again makes the URL less important.
Based on numerous SERPs I have looked at, the weight on keyword in domain name is substantial if you are keyword.TLD or keyword1-keyword2.TLD. 0 or 1 hyphens with Google can give a strong edge.
I wish that were true for the keyword phrases that I watch. For instance, a site representing a new product in our industry has gone to #2 in the serps in just two months because he has a www.keywordkeywordkeyword.com domain. The search has 3.6 million results and they have only 5 backlinks. As a matter of fact 3 of the top 5 in that search all own a keywordkeywordkeyword domain with different extensions.
From my own limited experience, it seems google is relying heavily on keyword domains.
search for the generic name for a
well known egg roll sauce.
the top results are for a blog theme/skin,
and a domain that was commented on in a blog
by someone using the word as a sig.
the results finally reach the actual product later on
towards the bottom of the serps.
the parked word.tld does not appear at all.
it is an active domain with a generic website.
++++
Can Google read the keyword in www.brandkeyword.com
No. Google dropped partial keyword matching over a year ago. In other words,brandkeyword will only match for "brandkeyword" not "brand" or "keyword".
The common work-around for this is to use delimiters like "-" or "_" to separate words. Geocities pages generally rank well and their delimiter is "_". I don't know that Google has a preference for delimiters. The underscore is NOT legal in domain names so be careful. I licensed www.virtualhost.com/blue_widgets and it turned up #1 for its targeted search phrase. I had to license www.blue-widgets.com. It is only ranked #3 or #4 for the same search term.
You seem to be angling for a better "allinurl:search term" ranking. Remember that keywords in the url are not as important a ranking factor as they were before with Google. Can't hurt though. When I set up a site my consideration of api ranking is:
#1 AllInTitle
#2 AllInText
#3 AllInAnchor
#4 AllInUrl
Others may differ but by setting up my sites using the criteria order above seems to deliver the best results. What I'm saying is that there are more important factors than the use of keywords in the url that you should focus your attention on. In links Google considers both the anchor text and the hypertext:
<a href="http://www.my-keywords-here-in-the-hypertext.com">But the keywords in this anchor text carry more weight</a>
The common work-around for this is to use delimiters like "-" or "_" to separate words.
True, and its a common mistake. Google doesn't recognize the underscore as a space, only the hyphen, so use hyphens for file names if you want to get the benefit of keywords from file names as anchor text.
hyphens:
[google.com...]
underscores:
[google.com...]
In links Google considers both the anchor text and the hypertext:
are you sure? I was not aware Google treated html markup as content.
