Url question for seo

[fertilityhealth]

Would it be beneficial to use url that is a match for my keyword to help with seo, then have my currently url forward to that one so I don't have to change any marketing materials?

I was one of the feedback that I got when doing the on page keyword optimization tool on seo moz.

Thanks

J

[RyanKent]

No, you would keep MOST of the link juice. You would lose between 1-10% of your link juice with the redirect.

[fertilityhealth]

Ryan,

I do have a lot of links pointing at my current url. Would I loose all that link juice if I was to change to a keyword specific url with a .com and forward the old url to that address.  That is the main thing I took form you first response as to why this may not be a good idea.

Thank you so much,

J

[RyanKent]

Not necessarily.

You would need to put time and effort into the web page for the keyword URL. You can't just make a crappy page and then link it to your site. That is called a doorway page. It is a violation of Google's terms and your site can be removed from Google's index for this violation.

If you do create a quality page which targets these keywords, it will rank well because of the domain name, but you lose out on your domain authority. This one page website will never have quality links to build it's page or domain authority.

People are often attracted to the glamor of a key word site ranking at the top of SERPs. What they don't realize is the page ranks so well because the other results are not properly optimized for the same keyword, and/or are low quality pages.

[OcularConcepts]

It would still be suggested to have a website built on that keyword rich domain and you can link to your main website from this satellite site. It will still stand a good chance ranking high if the domain matches your main target phrase exactly.

[RyanKent]

Search engines treat extensions equally. A .edu site is not rated higher then a .com site, and a .com isn't seen as better then a .info or any other extension.

The reason a .com is preferred is "brand" awareness of the .com TLD. Think of any major company like McDonalds, Walmart, or Facebook. Add a .com to the name and you have their website.  Many people automatically will add a .com to any brand to find their web address.

If you build a site cheap-cars.net, then you can be certain a percentage of your potential customers will wind up on the cheap-cars.com, cheapcars.com and cheapcars.net sites. If those sites are offering a similar product to you, then those potential customers might never make it to your site.

The other consideration is whether you already have an established site, or are you building a new one. With an already established site, it doesn't make sense at this point to move unless you already have challenges with your site name.

[RyanKent]

If I understand your question correctly, you want to know if you should redirect traffic from your established site to a new URL which is a keyword match to help boost your search engine ranking.

If you have an existing site with traffic and links, then I would not move to a keyword site unless it was an absolute perfect match and a .com. Google has clearly indicated they are reconsidering reducing the value of keyword domain matches. You could move and then wind up moving back a short time later.

It seems many are drawn to the glamor of a keyword URL. Yes, it is nice to have but it is only one of 200+ factors used to determine ranking. I would focus your time and effort on improving your site's content rather then chasing the URL.