The Complete Idiot's Guide

Growing Your Business With Google
By Dave Taylor

Does domain name affect search engine ranking?

Dave, does your domain name impact your SERPS (search engine results placement)? That is,if you use a nonsense name, will it negatively impact your search engine ranking? Would "www.thebestsearchengine.com" rank better than "www.google.com" for the query "best search engine"?

There are hundreds of different variables that modern search engines consider when determining which of the thousands - or millions - of results should be presented in the top slots, one of which is definitely the domain name of the site.

Other variables include the age of the domain registration, the last time the DNS record was changed, how recently the page was changed, how many other pages point to the page in question, how those other pages link to the page, whether the words in question appear in the title of the page, in a header, how frequently the key word or words appear in the text, and on and on and on.

Indeed, we don't actually know the exact formula and there's an entire industry of people trying their very best to figure it out and then remarket the specific tactics and layout suggested by their experimental data (and guesses). They're Search Engine Optimizer (SEO) and ...

Article continues at: Does Your Domain Name Affect Your Search Engine Results?



Category: Google Q&A   (Article #5853)
Comments

Can you suggest whether I can use two domains for the same site. I want to have a site with .co.uk and .us and will use same site in 3 copies. Is it legal.

Posted by: Rajesh at September 17, 2006 1:17 PM

Great question, Rajesh. I would suggest that you cannot, or at least should not have the same content under more than one URL. The problem is what Google calls a "duplicate content penalty". In a nutshell, don't have the same content accessible through more than one Web page address, whether it be different domains or just different pages on the same domain.

Posted by: Dave Taylor at September 17, 2006 2:02 PM

What about purchasing another domain and simply redirecting it to the original location of my content?

Posted by: Michael at March 1, 2007 8:20 AM

Michael, that can be a viable solution, but you need to ensure that you don't get into a situation where you have the same page of content accessible through more than one URL. That is, if you have, say, xx.com as your existing domain and also want to have yy.com, you need to make sure that you use what's called a 301 redirect so that when people -- and search engines -- go to yy.com they are redirected to xx.com properly.

Posted by: Dave Taylor at March 1, 2007 9:12 AM

But will having multiple domain names redirecting to a single website actually affect search engine results? For example if I have brand name as the main domain name but point to it with several domain names that have keywords in them, will this help with organic search results?

Posted by: Sam at April 20, 2007 9:24 PM

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!









Remember personal info?


Please note that I will never send you any unsolicited email or communication. Ever. I hate it just as much as you do.

While I'm at it, please note that by submitting a question or comment you're agreeing to my terms of service, which are: you relinquish any subsequent rights of ownership to your material by submitting it on this site.









Growing Your Business with Google
Buy The Book!

Site Contents
Blogging News
Google Q&A
Growing Your Business
Inside The Book
Reviews and Testimonials
Search Engine News
Updates for Readers
Buy the book!
About Dave Taylor
Contact

Subscribe!



Subscribe in NewsGator Online


Get Updates via Email!
sent monthly


Search




Archives by Category
Blogging News
New Wordpress release, a must-have for security and features
Google Friends Newsletter for April, 2006
What's your opinion of these blogs?
Crafting the Ideal Business Blog Comment Strategy
Come up to speed on Business Blogging @ The Blog Business Summit

Google Q&A
AdSense moving to video ads?
Should I integrate AdSense in my site design?
Does domain name affect search engine ranking?
Why don't I rank highly for all relevant searches?
Stuck in the Google sandbox or delisted?
Coming soon: Google Shopping?
Can I add new Web sites to my Google AdSense account?
How to read Google AdSense reports
Can I have AdSense and other Ads on my site simultaneously?
Does AdSense for Search pay less than AdSense for Content?
How do I target AdWords to specific Web sites?
Can DNS changes affect your Search Engine Results Placement?
Google AdSense adds "Advertise on this site"?
Exactly what does Google PageRank mean?
Does Googlebot visit more often because of my blog?
How do I optimize my Web site for a specific key word?
How much do I need to bid on Google AdWords for keywords?
Why Text Links are Better than Graphic Links
Does Google Consider My Site a Link Farm?
What's New at Google?
Paid for SEO but I still have PageRank 0?

Growing Your Business
Welcome, Entrepreneur!
Join me in Chicago for the System Seminar and learn even more about Internet marketing
Learn about business writing with a free ebook
Announcing the Growing Your Business with Google workshop!
How to Get Started with Google AdSense
How quickly should companies respond to customer email?
LinkedIn + BusinessWeek poll = connection spam?
Tips for getting more traffic to your blog
Search Engine Friendly, or Easy Navigation?
The Table of Contents

Inside The Book
Foreword, by Guy Kawasaki
Introduction to the Book
Increasing Your Business Visibility (chapter 1)
The Benefits of Increasing Your Visibility (Chapter 2)
What Is Google Anyway? (Chapter 3)
Learning about Google Search (Chapter 4)
Disassembling the Google Search Engine (Chapter 5)
What's Your Core Business? (Chapter 6)
Living in an Online World (Chapter 7)
Your Business Website (Chapter 8)
Assessing Your Competitors (Chapter 9)
Keeping Track of Customers (Chapter 10)
The Basics of Building A Good Business Site (Chapter 11)
Developing Online and Offline Content (Chapter 12)
Stretching Your Marketing Dollars (Chapter 13)
Secrets of the Online Marketing Masters (Chapter 14)
Content, Content, Content! (Chapter 15)
Becoming a More Popular Site (Chapter 16)
Becoming an Online Expert (Chapter 17)
Advertising Your Business with Google AdWords (Chapter 18)
Making Money with Google AdSense (Chapter 19)
The Advantages of Affiliate Programs (Chapter 20)
Avoiding Dumb Online Promotional Mistakes (Chapter 21)
Growing and Expanding Your Content (Chapter 22)
The Future of Findability (Chapter 23)

Reviews and Testimonials
Falesa Adkins says...
Mark McGuinness says...
Holli says...
NetworkWorld's James Gaskin says...
Craig Swanson says...
Andrew Sikorski says...
David Teten says...
Dan Janal says...
Robin Stavisky says...
Skip Uldriks says...
Don Bell says...
Vincent Wright says...
Andrew Goodman says...
Denise O'Berry says...
Thomas Duff Says...
Kevin Farnham says...
David Karlins says...
Tom Peters says...
Janet Attard says...
Jim Sterne says...
Gregg Stebben says...
Nick Usborne says...
Robert Scoble says...
Chris Pirillo says...
Rajesh Setty says...
Brad Fallon says...
Bill French says...
Debbie Weil says...
Andy Mindel says...
Andrew Goodman says...
Initial "Growing Your Business with Google" Press Release

Search Engine News
Google Friends Newsletter - April 2007
Beta announcement of Google AdSense Referrals
Enabling Secure Anywhere Access in a Connected World
Google Friends Newsletter
Google Launches Hosted Communications Services
AdWords now has fraud analysis accessible to advertisers
Google doesn't support click fraud. But isn't that obvious?
Welcome to Google's online payment system, Google Checkout
Google now offers Ad Scheduling for AdWords
AdSense click fraud done by robots?
AdSense: Google's Hidden Payroll
Fun new Google service: Movie info
Google agrees to pay $90 mln in click fraud suit
Latest news from Google: Google Friends Newsletter
Nofollow: Another salvo in the Spam Wars
Google Toolbar Gets Personal
Yahoo Search redesign scheduled?
Note from the Google AdSense Team
What's the future of Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising?
New Google AdWords Keyword System Released

Updates for Readers
Blogging for Search Engine Results
Why does advertising site Chitika audit commission payments?
Google Adsense Update: Section Targeting
Understanding "link:" results (book errata)

Join the List!
Join my author info mailing list, where you'll learn about my upcoming books, speaking gigs, and more!


Book Links
RDF XML
Powered by
Movable Type

sitemap | link to us!