Dashes are better than Underscores ...

... between keywords in file names.

[skyhawk133]

In a guest post by Vanessa Fox on Matt Cutt's blog, Vanessa points out dashes are much better than underscores. Matt later bolds this line in the blog entry for emphasis.

I had not thought about this, but apparently blue_widgets.html is considered 1 word, where as blue-widgets.html is considered 2 words. So for multi-word titles used as static HTML names, it looks like using a hyphen is far better than using an underscore. A brief look at the SERPS does confirm this.

[tedster]

As a side note, this conversation goes back 3-4 years on the WebmasterWorld boards. For example, see confirmation of the same thing from GoogleGuy here in 2003: [webmasterworld.com...] -- but the discussion was even older than that thread, and was conclusively settled, in the Supporters Forum.

With all the noise being made right now about this hyphen/underscore factor, I fear we have a new "Flavor of the Month" for aspiring SEO efforts. It's really NOT worth changing all the file names on a site just to get the minor boost that might, sometimes, come from having a "keyword in the url". The challenges of getting a new url indexed -- or not -- far outweigh the potential payoff for the effort, IMO.

This is not the next magic bullet for better ranking on the SERPs.

[BeeDeeDubbleU]

This is not the next magic bullet for better ranking on the SERPs.

Yes, let's not carried away with what is surely just a minor point.

[Chris_D]

Tedster, I'll see your 2003 GG reference - and raise you a 2002 reference

:)

I would go with hyphens, personally.

[webmasterworld.com...]

[mister charlie]

i'm surprised this is being discussed. i had thought that this was pretty much common knowledge. as ted notes

As a side note, this conversation goes back 3-4 years on the WebmasterWorld boards.

i heard this topic debated ad nauseam years ago.

[pageoneresults]

Tedster, I'll see your 2003 GG reference - and raise you a 2002 reference.

I'll call both of your references and and raise you a 2001 reference. ;)

[webmasterworld.com...]

Bluffing of course. ;)

[wildegray]

Thanks to Tedster again for redirecting me here.

I'd originally tried posting a thread on this myself.

Mister Charlie; the reason this is being discussed more, I think, is because of the huge number of greenthumbs in the game now (like me) and because of Matt Cutts' recent post about the use of hyphens (http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/guest-post-vanessa-fox-on-organic-site-review-session/)
(well, actually Vanessa Fox's post on Matt's blog) where Matt *bolded* the line *hyphens are better than underscores*.

At least, that's why I'm here. I thought they'd be treated the same.

Obviously, regardless of three or four years ago, Matt has left that question in the dust as of two days ago.

My question is, if I wish to change the file extensions on my site from _ to -, how do I go about it without killing my pagerank or facing duplicate penalties?

I've only got about 20 pages on the site, but each is named with a key_phrase. My PR is okay (it exists, at least; and in Yahoo! I'm on the first page for my prime keyword) but in Google I have no ranking in the top 100. Granted, the site needs to be re-written (it's an artifact from my mentally challenged predecessors), but I want to do everything I can to increase it's strength.

CAN I CHANGE one page at a time, wait for PR to filter over, and bleed through the process that way? ANY THOUGHTS?

[Robert Charlton]

...the reason this is being discussed more, I think, is because of the huge number of greenthumbs in the game now...

Some of whom may be so green they haven't read the preceding posts in this thread. ;)

ANY THOUGHTS?

Yes, forget about it. As several earlier posts in this thread indicate, the infinitestimal gain that you might get from hyphens in filenames is not worth the disruption that making such a change will create. Write some good content instead.

[tedster]

To back up Robert, when this issue first became clear to me a few years ago, I realized I had one site with underscores used in the filenames for almost all of the 2000+ pages. At the time, I felt I had better things to do - and I was not aware of any major ranking problems, although we can always use a boost.

Still, I blew it off, mostly out of time pressure plus not feeling that it was all that big an issue. Those pages rank beautifully today for those very keywords, and I'm glad I never touched them.

[wildegray]

Robert and Ted...

(sucking my thumb) Thankths.

[Hissingsid]

Hi,

I thought that all of this changed with the Florida cock up.

We noticed during and since that fateful update that Google can sense individaul words in strings.

So for example:

stylecodes
style-codes
style_codes
style.codes

are all read by Google as:

style codes

FWIW I don't think that it does this perfectly and a hyphen is a pretty strong failsafe way to ensure that Google reads the individual words.

So the hyphen folk-law drives me to hyphenate.

Regards

Sid