Choice of domain
-
Hi. I want to build a new site that is optimised for a training product that we have. We have an existing domain which I'm considering pointing at this new site. This domain is one of the new .training TLDs. Let's call this domain foo.training where my main keyword to optimise for will be "foo training". I've also looked and can see that foo-training.com is available. I read up on best practices for domains here : https://moz.com/learn/seo/domain
My question is will the .training domain be seen as "spammy" in any way? Am I better to just go ahead and register the .com?
-
In terms of SEO, there are no penalties for using a gTLD. Technically you have an equal chance of ranking well for a keyword than those with .com domains. It comes down to preference, marketing and the SEO work you put in.
I can see the .training domain working well for marketing to a younger audience, it may be appealing and seem more modern. An older audience may be more accustomed and feel that .com domains are more professional.
Exact match keyword domains gained notoriety because they would often get great anchor text when people linked to their website. I don't see why you would have an issue with that because I would naturally link to the site as "Foo Training."
To answer your question plainly, no it won't be seen as spammy but the .com may seem more professional and credible to some users. I hope this helped make your decision easier.
-
Thanks for reply it's much appreciated. This is pretty much as I thought too and I understand that I don't need to have the keywords in the domain it's just for this particular use case, based on what i've seen from how competitors are ranking, i think it will generally help here.
I'm really interested to hear from others who may have used or had success with newer TLDs
-
Generally, the .com URLs are more common and therefore seen as more "normal" to users and more likely to be trusted.
It does not mean that the .training will not work, just that it is different and that may cause other issues outside of ranking. You may remember that when .info came onto the scene, it was used by spammers so much that now it has kind of a black cloud over it.
Of course the trick with the foo-training.com domain is that you have to make sure people put in the dash. Consider issues around what if they leave the dash out, should we overtly mention the dash to remind people (think radio and TV and other ads) etc etc etc.
Overall, remember that you do not have to have "foo training" in the URL to rank well. Yes, it can help, but it really does not give you the power it used to have in the old days due to people using it as a way to spam the search engines to get keyword rich anchor text.
I would lean towards the URL with the dash (if you think it will not confuse folks to have the dash) or see about getting another .com URL and getting your keyword in the slug or in other places. I would defer to other Moz folks to see if they have had much success with the newer TLDs.
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
-
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 -
Domain Authority why is change
Hey seomoz friends!
Technical SEO | | petrospan
I have a question and if you have some links to read about it, bring it on!! What variables changes that measurement?0 -
Domains
My questions is what to do with old domains we own from a past business. Is it advantages to direct them to the new domain/company or is that going to cause a problem for the new company. They are not in the same industry.
Technical SEO | | KeylimeSocial0 -
Domain.com and domain.com/ redirect(error)
When I view my campaign report I'm seeing duplicate content/ meta for mydomain.com and mydomain.com/ (with a slash) I already applied a 301 redirect as follows: redirect 301 /index.php/ /index.php Where am I messing up here?
Technical SEO | | cgman0 -
Does redirect of domain alias help rankings?
Yes... It iz I again ;o) Here's one for you savy techies out there: So, I've got a primary domain which is live, optimized and running smooooth. And then I've got a couple of misspelled domains as well (17 to be exact). Will it have an effect if I 301 those misspelled domains? What's Best Practice for several domain aliases? Example.
Technical SEO | | nosuchagency
Primary domain: bryghusprojektet.dk
Alias domain 1: bryghusprojekt.dk (301 redirects to primary domain)
Alias domain 2: bryghus-projekt.dk (Hosting company infopage)
Alias domain 3: bryghus-projekter.dk (Not activated) Regards.1 -
TLD domain rediversion
Hello, I have got a .co.uk version of my domain which is parked with godaddy and I want to divert it to the .com version which is the live site. At the moment the .co.uk version is showing a godaddy landing page. My setup is: Godaddy as domain registrar, domain.com host separate hosting company. I looked into godaddy panel and I guess I have two options. (which I have done as a quick fix), I have done the diversion within godaddy panel to the .com version. It simply asked for which domain I wanted to forward the .co.uk to, and I have entered the .com version. I can create the .co.uk domain within my shared hosting and repoint to the .com within the hosting company DNS settings, and have godaddy simply point to the hosting company nameservers instead. Are the two solutions above equivalent or is one better than others ? Esp. from an SEO point of view? If someone has technical expertise to explain, this would be great. I think it would also help other companies in the same situation. Thanks ! 🙂
Technical SEO | | dpaq20110 -
Seomoz api for domains working, for domains+directory not?
We're working on a tool using the seomoz api ... for domains we're always getting the right values, but for longer URLs we're having troubles ... Example: http://www.seomoz.org/blog/6-reasons-why-qa-sites-can-boost-your-seo-in-2011-despite-googles-farmer-update-12160 won't work http://www.seomoz.org/blog works Any idea what we might be doing wrong?
Technical SEO | | gmellak0 -
Sub Domain SEO
I am thinking to Add Sub Domains to get better rankings for Local Searches. So I will develop City Specific Sites with Specific Language. For Example qatar.wisnetsol.com. IT will be in Arabic. If my Good standing and Ranking on Google for wisnetsol.com will help my subdomain to rank better? if we setup wisnetsol.com/qatar, how it can target Qatar in Google Webmaster tools? Will links for qatar.wisnetsol.com and wisnetsol.com are seprate? What do you think about this strategy? Is it good or bad?
Technical SEO | | Khuram0