Domain Question
-
Hello fellow SEOmozers!
I'm trying to register a domain name that contains keywords for my business, however the .com is obviously taken (however its just a parked domain without a site) so I have an option to get either .co .us or .net
I wanted to know if the domain extension makes any difference for the search engine or does having .com gives you an advantage over having .co .us or .net?
Thanks for your input!!!
-
Thanks for a quick reply, I made a mistake in my previous post. The domain names that I was referring to were itsupportla.net and itsupportla.com ...
-
Hi Igor,
Although keyword rich domains do seem to hold weight with Google, I wouldn't recommend going so specific as to include the location (itsupportla)
To me itsupport.net is a great domain name, it's short, it's professional, and it tells both Google and your users exactly what you do.
If you have that domain, then it sounds like a winner to me.
Saying that, if itsupport.com is available but only showing a parking page, it might be worth finding the owner via WHOIS and seeing what it would take to get them to part ways with it. I've had some success with this in the past, often the domains belong to people who simply never got around to finishing projects they started, and are delighted to let them go for a few hundred dollars.
Best of luck
David
-
Hello EGOL,
Yes that is on my to do list.
Thank you!
-
David, if I may ask for your professional opinion in regards to domain names. I provide IT services to small and medium size business, haven't advertised online or did any kind of marketing in the last 5 years. I currently have a website (which I am in the process of completely redesigning and optimizing for SEO) which is 911PCTECH.com
I did a little research of my top competitors for similar services and found out that IT Support LA is a very high volume keyword phrase with very low competition. I went out and got the itsupport.net and itsupport.us (itsupport.com is not available and there is no website built) My services are locally based (southern California mostly) from the 3 domains which would you recommend I use? I read the article that Kevin suggested above, and it recommends to use keyword rich domain names, so do you think its better for me to switch sites and start using itsupportla.net or .us? Thanks again!
-
Contact the registrant and see if you can buy it!
-
Thank you David for the clear explanation!
-
Thank you Kevin! The article did clear things up for me.
-
Hi Igor,
The quality of the domain extension will only play a minuscule role in your overall SEO efforts, so it's not something that should keep you up at night. However, you should take note of the following points:
-
If you are looking at localised TLD's (.us, .co.uk etc), you will essentially telling Google that your site is primarily directed at that country, and it means you could struggle to rank elsewhere. I would therefore suggest always using a multi-national domain (.com, .net etc) if you intend to market your site globally
-
From a user point of view, a more recognisable domain extension indicates more trust in a site, and correlation data suggests that Google reflects this in their algorithm. By this, I mean that if a user looks at your domain and thinks 'that looks a bit spammy', then it would be justified to think that Google would think the same.
This doesn't just mean the domain extension, but the domain as a whole. There are occasions where people are so desperate to get a .com they get a ridiculous domain that no one would trust.
Look at these domains, which seems more trustworthy:
www.your-product-online-4u.com
**www.yourproduct.net **
You want your overall domain name to be short, memorable and as clean as possible.
Although people will generally trust a .com over a .net, don't make the mistake of sacrificing the entire domain for a better extension (as it the example above)
Thanks,
David
-
-
SEOmoz has some best practices: http://www.seomoz.org/learn-seo/domain (further reading http://www.seomad.com/SEOBlog/do-different-tlds-affect-seo.html)
Top-level Domain (TLD)
Top level domains (like .com) are the extensions associated with domain names. For best ranking results, avoid uncommon top-level domains (TLDs). Like hyphens, TLDs such as .info, .cc, .ws, and .name are spam indicators.
IMHO, I do believe it is better to have a .com. But ultimately, this is just one factor of hundreds...
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
-
Backlinks from the Same Domain (But Different Pages)
Wayyy back when (in the days of yore) Mr Cutts spelled out in a video that page rank is distributed equally between the external links on the page. If there are two links on a page, each gets passed 50% of the available page rank etc. (Perhaps an oversimplification but bear with me). As a result of this, the company I worked for at the time (this was the dark ages when sidebar homepage links were in vogue) decreed that we would only ever approach a site about a link for a client once, as additional links had little extra SEO Value. Now you could argue that if there are 5 external links, each acquiring 20% of the power, and your site has 2 of those, you are getting 40% of the power, but lets forget the basic math for a minute. I have scoured the web and Mr Cutts' videos and I cannot find the answer to my question: If my site (Site A) has a backlink from SiteB Page 1, and a backlink from SiteB page 2 - does this count as two separate links in the eyes of Google? If the SAME site links out to my site, linking to different pages in different posts, does this give me more SEO benefit? Thanks for your time!
Link Building | | Turkey0 -
Questions About LinkBuilding
HI, I am about to start link building for my website. I have made a 5 month plan. Can anyone have a look on my linkbuilding plan ? Any suggestions ? Thanks Web2. Submission (Monthly 10 Submission ) (( Squdoo, Hubpage , Tumblr , Blogspot , WordPress )) Blog Commenting (Very Related and Related Comment ) ( Monthly 15 Comments Maximum) Guest Posting ( Must be no-follow links ) (Monthly 10 submission ) Press Release (Weekly Distribution ) (( Distributing 1 Press release the whole month ,15 Submission maximum High PR and Related Only )) Directory Submission (Related Directory Submission Only ) N.B:: Don’t get confused with article directory submission. ( Monthly 10 Submission ) Rss Syndication Submit Infographics (Monthly 10 Submission )
Link Building | | businessowner1 -
SEO Question
If you Google - "San Diego DUI Lawyer" (a competitive term), this guys site comes up: sandiegoduiattorneys.weebly.com/san-diego-dui-lawyer.html Run his site in Opensite Explorer and you won't believe the results. This guy somehow has as much domain authority as Facebook, and maybe more than Moz. How is this possible? How is he getting all those links from random Weebly sites? I'm not saying I want to copy him, but I think it's highly problematic that somehow that site has been rigged to get all that link juice. Any feedback would be appreciated.
Link Building | | mrodriguez14400 -
Multiple on-page links to single domain
Hi, the main focus of my question is to add a bit more information to my client as to where they are going wrong. Firstly they have a directory on a third party domain with subdirectories containing all their product listings. All the links need to be no-follow for sure. However, from a link juice passing perspective if there are per page say 20-30 links to varying URLs on the same domain is it still the same sort of calculation that the link juice is sufficiently weakened that each link has little value, or because the links are to the same domain there is an extra (potential) filter going on?
Link Building | | MickEdwards0 -
How to link building 5days domain
i like to start give some backlinks to my brand new domain any advices for new domain ?
Link Building | | cutekid10 -
Question on Directory submission
If I am submitting to directories for our site. Should I submit them as www.mycompany.com or http://www.mycompany.com or some other way. Any best practices? Or does it even matter? I am a novice.
Link Building | | Boodreaux0 -
Linking Root Domains V.s Total Links
When analysing a company's inbound links, what is more important to note: The number of linking root domains, or the total number of links? And why?
Link Building | | SEOrookie170