An interesting post in MediaPost talks about how the new TLD’s may become a nightmare for trademark holders but also will be a boon for sites trying to get their SEO rank increased.
“”””Search Engines and the Domainrush If and when it does happen, look for an immediate impact on search engine marketing. Search engines love keyword-enriched domain names, since finding exact keywords in domains proves to be an extremely strong indicator of a Web site’s relevance to a search query.
By combining a newly acquired generic domain name with a very good search engine optimization (SEO) strategy, a small company could find itself ranking among extremely competitive search terms and among Fortune 1000 companies. Of course, Web sites need quality inbound links to rank high on Google, but a great domain name can go a long way.
Keyword-enriched domain names and URL paths (there is a difference) are usually what it takes to achieve a top-10 organic ranking. Take, for example, AllFreshSeafood.com (ranking No. 4 on Google for “fresh seafood”); BreakingNews.com (No. 6 on Yahoo for latest breaking news”) and BagelBoss.com (No. 4 on Google for “bagels”). I’m sure you get the point. “””””
The article goes on to say:
“”””Now that we’ve established that a keyword-enriched domain name can be extraordinarily valuable, just think about owing a domain like .insurance — you could have auto.insurance, life.insurance, health.insurance, business.insurance, etc. Beyond the obvious and tremendous SEO benefit, imagine what this will do to build brands.
I am curious to see if those who register new generic TLDs will use them to dominate their niche or resell domains. Only time will tell.
ICANN reports that there will be a six-figure charge for registering these new domains. That is chump change for major domains — and even those that want to be “””
We agree.
We think that the new domain extension will be huge moneymakers for the registrars that sponsor them.
Of course not every extension is going to be great but there are some that will be huge.
“Search engines love keyword-enriched domain names, since finding exact keywords in domains proves to be an extremely strong indicator of a Web site’s relevance to a search query.”
Has this been proven. One would think it is true but honestly, most keyword rich domains are parked and thus not great search results.
I read someplace that google all but ignores the actual domain…I would believe this due to the fact that I have developed “exact” names that google barely sees…content is king
Google plays down the importance of domain name.
One example I always look at.
SEO.COM
SEOMOZ.org
SEO.com out ranks seomoz.org
Seo moz is a monster. Huge site. Apparently 500,000 in bound links. Best quality naturally occurring links. Yet….seo.com out ranks it. SEO Com is a thinly spread commercial exercise with very little relevance to people looking for info on SEO
Why?….I think it’s the power of a single keyword premium .com
It all depends upon the credence that Google assigns to any particular extension. All extensions are treated differently currently and I’d expect that to continue. It also changes based on your location, ie. .com, .co.uk .com.au et al.
Will be interesting to see how Google treats these new extensions anyway, but don’t automatically assume they’d treat them as .com’s as they’d have you believe in this article.
Ben,
“It all depends upon the credence that Google assigns to any particular extension. All extensions are treated differently currently and I’d expect that to continue.”
Is there proof of this somewhere?
Domain name is one of many areas that go into a website’s ranking. This is referred to as the “exact match” bonus. This is because odds are when a searcher types ebay they want ebay.com, paypal > paypal.com. I’ve created mini-sites on exact match domains in low to moderately competitive niches and had the site ranking with a fraction of the effort that would be required of any other domain. MSN tend to give even more of an exact match bonus than Google does.
Many people think that with all other things equal a .com, .net, and .org get the same exact match bonus. This bonus does not carry over to the lower quality domains like .biz and .info. Some .info domains will rank, but that’s after extensive link building.
Exact keywords and phrases are absolutely a strong signal for search, generally speaking, as the point about SEO.com suggests. This goes for broad terms, and shorter two-three word competitive phrases, and I tend see this more with .com names. But it’s not just the domain – there have to be other considerations for optimizing a site around a keyword domain, but the results still come quicker.
We are going to see a new concept in search that deals with TLD optimization, or in other words, how the TLD is managed could impact search engine visibiity for the content within that name. If you want proof that the TLD has an influence, look at .edu, .and .gov. These are controlled content TLDs, and it has long been recognized that links and content within these TLDs, when considered with other factors, are *generally* more trusted. There are of course many other factors, but objectively there is a difference.
Also look at country codes – internationally Google offers the option to search in country’s CCTLD, and that alone proves that they do consider extensions as a semantic factor. The inference is that the CCTLD related content would be more relevant to a particular geographic location, based on TLD alone. But again, it’s not a slam dunk for other registries, considering that .travel, .jobs, and .info haven’t owned the SERPs in their respective keyword space. That comes back to the quality of content, and that quality is related to how the registry is operated (example, wild west open regs, versus some level of content and reg control).
We are definitely headed to an era where not only the domain needs to be managed well for search engine, but the registry operator will need to be aware of search factors as well.
Here are a couple of columns that I recently wrote for MediaPost Search Insider on TLDs and the impact on search:
.Anythinggoes? The Impact Of New ICANN Vanity Top-Level Domains
http://www.mediapost.com/blogs/search_insider/?p=831
More On The Search And Brand Impact Of Vanity Generic Top Level Domains
http://www.mediapost.com/blogs/search_insider/?p=842
For those who have interest in this area the Search Engine Strategies show is set for August 18-22.
The show has tons of speakers and sessions on all things related to SEO.
To check it out go to:
http://www.searchenginestrategies.com/sanjose/
What a info
@Rob Sequin na, I just made it up.
All jokes aside, do some testing, you’ll find that’s exactly what Google do. Every namespace, .com.au, .co.uk etc is different as well. Also how they treat .com .net .tv .info
The only real way is to test, watch lots of sites and see what Google are playing with as they never really stop adjusting the algos.
Dont take my word for it, DIY, the only way.
Great Article i love it…..
But i have seen that my .org domain has higher ranking than CBSE.com domain !
with same content….