Exact match domain
-
Will buying an exact match domain and redirecting it to our main site a good idea, if such a domain is available ? What are the pros and cons ?
Are exact match domains still powerful for ranking purpose ?
-
A very similar discussion here....
-
My experience fits best with what Robert is saying. Simply purchasing a domain and expecting a benefit from a redirection is likely to lead to disappointment, unless the new domain is so appealing and memorable that you plan to use it elsewhere to grow awareness. Otherwise, you should do some additional work to get any benefit from this. But to answer your question ... it's not a bad idea.
We recently moved a client site from page 3 to page 1 for some keywords in the pcb manufacturing industry by moving the entire site to a new keyword domain, being sure of course to implement 301s, flag the change in Webmaster Tools and so forth. It helped that, bizarrely, this particular client had been sitting on the domain for some time and in fact some of their inbound links already referred to it. The transfer of authority therefore has been smoother than might normally be expected. But since nothing else about the site has changed the jump can really only be attributed to keywords in the domain.
-
Thanks to all of you for your useful insights. The takeaway is that it's better to buy an exact match domain and build a useful site rather than redirecting.
-
Hi Atul
James is correct in his answer and likewise Robert provides a good answer also.
Check out a blog post from back in December 2010, 'The Problems with Exact Match Domains' which highlighted the issues associated with exact match domains being given too much weight and SEO benefit.
This was shown in blog post by Rand himself entitled 'Are Exact Match Domains Too powerful? Is Their Time Limited?'
Since then, it is widely believed that Google has changed the weighting that is given to exact match domains and they now count for less than previously. Check out this blog post entitled 'Google: Exact Match Keyword domain Does Not Mean Rankings' by Barry Schwartz over on Search Engine Roundtable.
Going back to your question, there will be Zero SEO benefit from simply buying a new domain and redirecting it to another site. If you were to buy an existing strong relevant website with it's domain and redirect that, there would be some SEO benefit, though mainly from the website rather than the domain name.
I hope that helps,
Regards
Simon
-
This is what we did with one client who was not ranking in the first 5 pages for anything in his profession/niche. We bought an exact match domain utilizing hyphens for a major keyword (3 word phrase). His original domain was his name and Lawfirm. You must understand that law firm is not a good keyword.
We then built a new site that was fully optimized around his discipline and what will be most beneficial to him from a client type point of view.
We then did a 301 redirect of url to url www.oldlawfirm.com to www.new-law-term.com in the .htaccess file. Over the first three months we got about 80% of the previous authority and are still getting some now.
Understanding that we are good at SEO and that we write new content, get new links, have him blog, etc. We now have him ranked on Page One of Google and Bing for about half of the best terms for him.
Was it the exact match domain that did it....not alone, but I do believe it helped. I think it still does but don't believe that will be true in say 2 to 5 years.
So, to just get it and use it as a redirected to the old site I would say, don't waste the time or energy. If you are willing to work a bit, you can do some voodoo with it.
Best -
I totally agree with James!
If you are buying that domain name, then with a small effort you can get it "rank well" (it depends on niche).
Istvan
-
To be honest it will work better if you buy the exact match domain and then build a small site on it and have it rank for the keyword.
Just buying an exact match domain will not mean you will get it ranked if it is a 301 re direct, the only traffic it will yield will be direct type in traffic for the domain and this is only small.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
301 Domain Redirect from old domain with HTTPS
My domain was indexed with HTTPS://WWW. now that we redirected it the certificate has been removed and if you try to visit the old site with https it throws an obvious error that this sites not secure and the 301 does not happen. My question is will googles bot have this issue. Right now the domain has been in redirection status to the new domain for a couple months and the old site is still indexed, while the new one is not ranking well for half its terms. If that is not causing the problem can anyone tell me why would the 301 take such a long time. Ive double and quadruple checked the 301's and all settings to ensure its being redirected properly. Yet it still hasn't fully redirected. Something is wrong and my clients ready to ditch the old domain we worked on for a good amount of time. backgorund:About 30 days ago we found some redirect loops .. well not loop but it was redirecting from old domain to the new domain several times without error. I removed the plugins causing the multi redirects and now we have just one redirect from any page on the old domain to the new https version. Any suggestions? This is really frustrating me and I just can't figure it out. My only answer at this point is wait it out because others have had this issue where it takes up to 2 months to redirect the domain. My only issue is that this is the first domain redirect out of many that have ever taken more than a week or three.
Technical SEO | | waqid0 -
Trash Domain Or Redirect it (unmaintained)
We have an old website with an old domain that has not been maintained for a few years; it now has a DA of 14 and a spam score of 24%. Our current domain (same business) within a few years has a domain authority of 21 and page authority 29 spam score 1%. (Yes, this domain should have been redirected from the get-go) The question is what do you do with it now? Toss it. Or redirect it. That domain has existed for years but still not sure what its value is from an SEO perspective. I would love to hear your feedback. Is there any benefit to redirect the old domain to the current domain. Or is it a negative and what impact?
Technical SEO | | MyBambooSEO0 -
Domain not ranking in Google
https://www.buitenspeelgoed.nl/ is a domain acquired by our client. Previously this website was on http://www.buitenspeelgoed-keupink.nl. With the old domain they were ranking top 30 on 'buitenspeelgoed' in google.nl. Now with the new exact match domain they aren't ranking any more (for months). However, the website is indexed, as you can see on http://1l1.be/nz I don't know what to do anymore. Need some advise. What we allready have done the last months: made adjustments to the 301-redirects (this was originaly setup wrong by the webdesigner (de) optimized the homepage on 'buitenspeelgoed' (strange is the fact that the Moz robot can't access the site). Checked the robots.txt to see if the website was blocked for Google Checked the meta robots to see if the website was blocked for Google Disavowed some spammy (old) links which linked to the old domain Checked Search console > Fetch as Google if there isn't any Malware of some kind (and to see if Google can access the site) Checked Search consol to see if there manual spam actions (isn't the case) Checked for duplicate content by copy/paste some texts in Google and see if any other results are showing up (isn't the case for most of the texts) Please let me know what we can do.
Technical SEO | | InventusOnline0 -
Domain Change
What is the average organic traffic loss one can expect after switching to a new domain? We went from .com to .org and are seeing 50% decline in organic traffic and 25% in Google news traffic. 301s were implemented from site.com/some-page to site.org/some-page and change site was completed in WMT. This traffic drop seems excessive...
Technical SEO | | SoulSurfer80 -
Redirect if old browser or OS to other domain?
Hi, I use cloudflare free SSL option. All is fine except it wont work with windows XP . How do you think is it ok in case of old OS/Browser redirect visitors to other domain or subdomain? What could be impacts or consequences of such step? On the moment if page meko.lv is accessed from XP sp1,2 there is error. If it is possible how could such redirect look? Thanks
Technical SEO | | Mekounko0 -
Does a subdomain benefit from being on a high authority domain?
I think the title sums up the question, but does a new subdomain get any ranking benefits from being on a pre-existing high authority domain. Or does the new subdomain have to fend for itself in the SERPs?
Technical SEO | | RG_SEO0 -
I have a blog on a sub domain, would you move it to the rood domain in a directory?
I have a blog that preforms fairly well on a sub domain, but after reading a post that Rand made to the Q & A I am thinking about moving it to the main domain in a sub directory. What are your thoughts on this? Here are some stats on it. The blog currently gets about 5 x the traffic of the main domain. The domain is older, 2008 creation date. They pretty much register for the same keywords.
Technical SEO | | LesleyPaone0 -
Linking domains on the same C Block together
Hey, I have an online store selling dj equipment, sound & light products such as speakers, lasers, decks, pa systems, karaoke systems etc. I just bought a new domain but I registered it under a different name and address (my personal details). And I plan on hosting the website on a seperate server so it has no connection with my eCommerce store. The main purpose of the website will be to review the products I sell, write detailed how to guides for DJ's, party planners, mobile DJ's etc. There will be links on the current ecommerce website (which currently gets around anything from 500 to 1000 unique hits a day) going to the new blog website. But would I be better off keeping it on the same C Block even though they are going to be two very different websites and the blog may not always necessarily be about the products on my ecommerce website and may be products on say eBay, Amazon, etc. (In otherwords, it's going to be it's own website with an unbiased opinion, but the ecommerce site will be linking to it on certain products that are reviewed on there). Any help is appreciated 🙂
Technical SEO | | tomhall900