Importance
of Website Domain Name in Search Engine Optimization
By Asif
Iqbal
Website domain can play very important role in your SEO campaign,
search engines take very valuable information through your domain
name. You can be credible, authentic, more reliable, and more
valuable for search engines. You’ll come to know how effectively you
can take benefit from your domain name.
Why to have Keywords Specific Domain Name
Keywords specific domains, or keywords in domain names are highly
valuable to search engines, such as www.seoservicespakistan.com
where “SEO Services Pakistan” is a keywords, but I would always
recommend to have brand specific “easy to remember” domains, you
can’t have a single keyword or phrase for a website, can you? Then
why to have a keyword specific domain name? You can always keep
keywords specific files or directories to support your SEO work and
be flexible with domain name, since domain name is going to be your
online identity and your direct traffic will heavily depend on your
domain.
Is Your Website Domain Easy to Remember?
Website domain name is as important as the identity for any
brand. There are more than 100 million registered website domains in
the world, how many website domains one can remember? Selection of
most appropriate domain name for your website is one of the very
important aspects of building your image on internet. Why I say most
appropriate domain name is just because finding best domain name
will be one of the most difficult tasks.
Strategy to Select Best
Domain for Your Website
There are three ways through which you can select most
appropriate domain name.
- Company Name Based: Example www.5icreations.com where
“5icreations” is company’s name
- Catchy Title Based: Example www.tradekey.com where “Trade Key”
is title
- Keywords Based: Example www.webservicespakistan.com where “web
services Pakistan” is a keyword phrase.
Whenever you will select domain, keep these elements in mind and
try to select a domain which can help you in search engine
positioning and also in online branding.
Google takes Old Domains as Gold!
Google gives more importance to older domains comparatively than
newly registered domains, the older the domain better the chances of
getting good rankings in Google. Here one thing should be kept in
mind that the domain registration details should not be refreshed or
updated frequently, if you update or change domain registration
information, then there is a chance that Google will consider your
domain as new, since there are people who have made it very
profitable business, they registered domains and sell them.
Avoid Being Suspect, Get Credibility by Your Domain Name!
Search engine have become very smart, they can track server
statistics, domain whois info and compare these information with the
available contact information at your website, if information
doesn’t match they can give you poor rank or no rank. That’s why it
is always advisable that you have same information at website and at
domain registration, don’t try to update server information too
often or else search engine can take that modification as a change
in ownership and your domain becomes fresh once again.
One Year Domain Registration vs Multiple Years Domain
Registration
Normally people register their domains for one year even though
there is a possibility of registering domains on monthly basis by
domain registration companies. Recently the trend has changed now
smart businessmen are registering their domains for multiple years,
why this change occurred? Why people are investing more money on
domain registration?
Newly registered domains are just like
infant babies to Google, they have almost zero reliability,
credibility factor from their domain registration, there is only one
way for those infant babies is that they get themselves registered
for multiple years, if they want to be credible and reliable to
Google eyes. Google has been always a logical company and there is a
logic behind this credibility factor, those websites which are
registered for one year or few months can adopt black hat SEO
techniques or they can be involved in any short term activity to
bring quick ranking, it’s just because they have invested very less
amount of money
How Search Engines Treat Sub Domains
Search engines give equal importance to sub domains as they give
to domains but there are website which are excessively using sub
domains for their promotion. This indicates that very soon search
engines will have strict policy related to sub domains.
Domain Name Tips
- Try to select “easy to remember” domain name, after all we all
need to increase direct traffic rather hoping from search engines
- If you’ve already taken domain, try to have keywords specific
files or directories
- Register your domain name for multiple years (five or ten
years)
- Mention your contact details clearly at your website
- Keep the same contact information at website and at domain
registrant
- Don’t mess with sub domains but it’s always good to have few
relevant sub domains
- Take care of Canonical URLs
- Avoid geographical/country specific domain, unless your target
market is specific
- .com is still the most popular domains in search engines and
in people
- Don’t modify domain information, it can refresh your domain’s
age according to search engine
About The Author
Asif
Iqbal is a Research Analyst, eBusiness & eMarketing
Consultant, SEO Specialist, Trainer, Speaker and Author, specializes
in eBusiness, eMarketing, SEO, branding and promotion and has
trained dozens of qualified SEOs. He can be reached at asif@asif-iqbal.com
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