How to rank #1 for brand name when its 2 competitive keywords?
-
Hi Mozzers,
I have recently began the SEO on a website which is a few years old, with little SEO done beforehand.
I really want to get this domain ranking #1 for its brand name, however the brand name also happens to be a combination of two highly competitive keywords - one of them being "hire".I have done everything I can think of as a recommended step to signal Google, but it still sits between position #20 and position #15 (on a good day).
So far I have:
Set up G+
Linked the website
Added Rel=publisher
Submitted site to Yell.com and a couple of other business directories
Added branded links from every the bio of each article on the blog pointing to the homepage.
Built a handful of branded links from related niche websites.
Set up social pages.Question:
What else can I do to improve on its position in the SERPS?More info:
The site ranks number 2 in Bing for the brand name. The domain is an exact match of two keywords without a hyphen between them - the site ranks position #1 for that search on Google.Question:
Would a hyphenated domain make any difference at all?Thanks everyone!
-
"What else can I do to improve on its position in the SERPS?"
Backlinks, backlinks, backlinks. Validation, validation, validation. There are a ton of citation sources available, and I would submit to as many of them (that are reputable) as you can. One thing to remember is: don't only link to the homepage if you want the subpages to get some good ol' Google love.
"Would a hyphenated domain make any difference at all?"
If you already have a good domain in place, I would not go changing that. The existing domain name probably has domain age and history, along with backlinks in place. Only if the existing domain had a spam or penalty issue would I change the domain.
Be patient. The changes will not come fast. Google has to validate your new information from each source, and that can take a while. To speed it up a bit, link out to your social and ciation sites (using a nofollow or not, up to you) as they will link back. Once you have the new links in place, submit the URL with the outgoing links in GWT using fetch as Google. If it is a legit business, submit to major data providers such as Axiom, since Google uses them for data validation. You will need a tax ID and some other information tho.
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
-
Sometimes I write a post for another site and then post the first 1/3rd on my site to help promote it. Is this a bad idea?
Sometimes I write a post for another site and then post the first 1/3rd on my site to help promote it. Is this a bad idea? When I do that should I be adding a canonical link to the original post? Should I have /make sure the 3rd party site does something? Is there anything else I should do? Thanks in advance.
Branding | | mcarroll0 -
If I bid on my brand name, will it make the keyword more expensive for my competitors
Our brand name is being bid on by out competitors. If we bid on our own brand name, for which we rank #1 for all our profiles and website, will we make our competitors cost per click higher?
Branding | | Catherine_Selectaglaze0 -
Branding Association for SEO, and Google's understanding of a "brand Name"
Hey guys. so I currently run my own business here in Queens NY, for Web Design and online marketing, specifically SEO, SMM, SEM, and some inbound marketing that ties to SMM and SEO. When starting I was in a different business, and had kept my old business name. I plan on re-branding myself January 1st with a brand new name, the name i'm seriously considering is "Media Marketing USA". I was able to purchase MediaMarketingUSA.com. I feel this name is good and bad at the same time, and here are some of the reasons. The pro: Easy to remember, sounds big, and describes my business well. The con: Sounds generic, and I worry it will be hard to brand. I used the mentioning tool provided by Moz and see that nearly everyday 500-1,000 people are naturally mentioning Media Marketing USA, one of my biggest questions is will this give me a competitive advantage in SEO, or will it hurt me in SEO as Google may not see this or understand its a brand name? Do you personally think this is a good name to re-brand myself and use as my main website? The Website itself will be used as a corporate website, a method of inbound and outbound marketing through content creation, Social Media, and of course SEO, targeting specific locations, and specialty services and industries in the NYC area. Please share your thoughts with me, THANKS!!!
Branding | | tonyr71 -
Naming a brand & domain
Hi Experts, We are selecting a brand name and domain for a new ecommerce website. The major keyword in this industry is lets assume xyz. It is by far the most searched keyword in this industry, but it just sounds horrible for branding purposes. For SEO purposes how important is it to keep that keyword in the domain / brand name? can we make up for the lack of that keyword in the domain / brand name if we decide to pick a brand name that does not have xyz in it? Thanks for the help 🙂
Branding | | TVape0 -
What is the weight of .pro domains? Will they rank?
.pro Domains have ben out there for a while but seem to as late started to be adopted. Thoughts and opinions welcome.
Branding | | bozzie3110 -
Drop In Rankings / Traffic... Can you find any technical issues with my site?
I haven't spammed the engines, if anything I haven't done enough link building. So let me start here: I split my old domain www.STbands.com into two separate domains - www.Suddora.com and www.CustomOnIt.com . The main site now goes to Custom On It and each page directly 301 as it was relevant. I knew there was going to be a little blow back... The first month went fairly well but last week we noticed a dip in organic search traffic and sure enough some of our main keywords are now suffering. I am wondering if this is because we haven't been building enough links to the new domains or if our new eCommerce CMS (magento enterprise) has technical SEO issues that is giving Google trouble. Nothing on GWT looks terribly wrong, should i be searching for something specific? Anything helps at this point, we are in dire need of some direction on what could be wrong. Any suggestions?
Branding | | Hyrule0 -
Is it a bad idea to have a catchy brand name url redirect to an exact match domain
A friend wanted to setup a website where people would share and vote on "widget" ideas where the winning idea got build for free. They bought cute the domain name widg.et and branded their site as widg.et. However, for SEO, they are having widg.et forward to www.sharewidgets.com. Then, to complicate things further, they changed their business model to remove the voting feature and now the site is just set to show off the widgets they've made and let people order new custom widgets. They might add the voting feature back later. "Widget" and "widgets" in this case has an SEOmoz difficulty of 72% and 71%, so quite high and none of the two word or long tail phrases have much traffic. What do you think they should do: Remove all domain forwarding and use widg.et as their only domain as it's less confusing and better for branding Get another domain that includes their keyword widget for the SEO exact match benefit Keep it as is, even though "sharewidgets" is no longer quite as applicable Many Thanks!
Branding | | skincareseo0 -
What are the best ways to improve/trigger "Brand Signals"?
Google considers some companies "brands" or stronger "brands" than other sites. What are the best ways to show Google you are an actual brand, not a fly by night eCom?
Branding | | zachc_coffeeforless.com0