Your thoughts on OnlineCasinoz.co.uk

[OnlineCasinoz]

Hi, I'm thinking of starting up a casino affiliate site and wondered what you guys think of using the domain onlinecasinoz.co.uk

I'm never sure if using a z for an s in a domain is a good idea so would like some opinions if you think it will prove negative in any way.

Thanks for any replies.

[universal4]

I think if you work at it (no matter what the name is) you can make it work.

Also, since the s and the z are pretty close on the keyboard it might be a common miss-spelling error.

I think the domain has a lot of potential as far as branding goes also....

Rick
Universal4

[diceman]

I just bought it sorry...

lol just kidding of course. The z would be fine imo as well. z is close to the s. People do type casinoz and according to adwords 320 global. In yahoo 11,700 results from the search "casinoz". Perhaps it would be worth your while If you can target niche phrases with the word as well.

[OnlineCasinoz]

Thanks for your comments, very much appreciated.

[davemerry]

I think both the posters are right, you may pick up traffic from misspellings and domain has a lot of branding potential, treat it right and you could make something of it!

[OnlineCasinoz]

Hi, thanks for your comment.

When you guys mention the domain has branding potential, do you mean in regards to initial custom logo and design? I've never worked on a site in this way before but my plan was to learn wordpress which I'm having fun playing around with at the moment and to give the site a social feel. I'd planned to build traffic slowly for the big keyword phrases over time and to see it as a fun challenge really.

Is there anything specific about the branding you would advise I look at from the outset?

Thanks again.

[ck8795]

Well I will be the odd one out here and say that the domain is no different than any other.

You might as well have registered omgihavethebestcasinositeever.com.

Yes its a typo, but do you really want to build a site based on a typo that gets little to no traffic. People won't remember to add the z - they will remember the s. I'd rather have a brandable domain than something that's trying to piggy back off people's minor and careless mistakes...don't forget the .com is already a mini site.

[OnlineCasinoz]

HI Kaus

Thanks for the reply. I don't want to give the impression I registered the domain for typo traffic, it was simply available whilst I registered a few other .co.uk gaming related domains which matched various keywords. I guess the reason for my question is to see if people think the domain is worth putting time and effort into. As I'm going to work regularly on whichever domain I end up using, any minor traffic it might receive via typo should hopefully be irrelevant. When you mention the .com is already a mini site, are you saying there might be trademark or copyright issues? Can a term as generic as this really be grounds for complaint?

[universal4]

In a way kaus is right, but I also think that the domain chose has branding potential and if handled correctly visitors could be convinced to remember the spelling with the z emphasized.

As a side note to Kaus, have you purchased the domain mentioned in your post? omg

Rick
Universal4

[graham]

Well I will be the odd one out here and say that the domain is no different than any other.

You might as well have registered omgihavethebestcasinositeever.com.

Yes its a typo, but do you really want to build a site based on a typo that gets little to no traffic. People won't remember to add the z - they will remember the s. I'd rather have a brandable domain than something that's trying to piggy back off people's minor and careless mistakes...don't forget the .com is already a mini site.

I agree with Cheryle here.. I am not a big fan of having a "Z" anywhere in a domain unless it has to do with Zoo's or something spelled with a Z.

[OnlineCasinoz]

Hi graham

I do generally think this as well, but the industry is so competitive, high volume searched for keyword domain availability is scarce unless you want to go for a lesser searched phrase. For this exercise I was hoping to use a "go big or go home" domain and I thought this one might be it. Do you think it's a domain that would be penalised in any way, either by SE's or other gaming affiliates or affiliate managers? Kaus for example immediately saw the negative so I guess others will as well. I would like to believe it has the potential to achieve something over time without being penalised or seen in a negative light that hinders in any way otherwise I can just as easy rethink and go for a different domain. I obviously want to be on a level playing field with others new to the industry but I originally thought this one might have some xfactor but maybe that is not the case after all.

[ck8795]

No I haven't Rick, but if your interested I can pick it up and we can deal

Something else I haven't seen posted in this thread yet. Someone mentioned people searching and the typo. Let's assume adwords is correct in that 360 visitors search for "online casinoz" globally -

Google automatically gives you the correct spelling - and most people will click the correction to view the results.

Fine doesn't matter right - because yahoo is apparently saying 11K+ search for online casinoz - same deal

So if by some chance someone does search for online casinoz as a type in yahoo - they are provided with the results for online casinos.

If your thinking the domain is your golden ticket - your mistaken

If however, you want to build on the domain and from there make it into something great - fine nothing is wrong with that. My post wasn't meant to sound like negative nancy - it was simply stating that the domain itself isn't anything special and the benefits from having a typo domain really aren't there.

[OnlineCasinoz]

No I haven't Rick, but if your interested I can pick it up and we can deal

Something else I haven't seen posted in this thread yet. Someone mentioned people searching and the typo. Let's assume adwords is correct in that 360 visitors search for "online casinoz" globally -

Google automatically gives you the correct spelling - and most people will click the correction to view the results.

Fine doesn't matter right - because yahoo is apparently saying 11K+ search for online casinoz - same deal

So if by some chance someone does search for online casinoz as a type in yahoo - they are provided with the results for online casinos.

If your thinking the domain is your golden ticket - your mistaken

If however, you want to build on the domain and from there make it into something great - fine nothing is wrong with that. My post wasn't meant to sound like negative nancy - it was simply stating that the domain itself isn't anything special and the benefits from having a typo domain really aren't there.

Hey Kaus, I really appreciate your feedback and I'm sure you're not a negative nancy, just about the typo issue which I agree with. My intention was never to benefit from potential typo traffic visitors because as you mention, google corrects the displayed results. I'm sure any benefit either from SE typo errors or direct type in errors will be very minimal if any. I am thinking specifically for a domain as a starting point to build on. I've got a few to choose from, I just thought this one might give me a very slight starting edge.

[universal4]

Ahh yes, but one thing I just thought about Nancy,

If the domain in question did have some branding done, wouldn't google show the site as a result since if in fact the searcher did search for the name with the z it would be a valid result.

Good discussion...

Rick
Universal4

[graham]

Hi graham

I do generally think this as well, but the industry is so competitive, high volume searched for keyword domain availability is scarce unless you want to go for a lesser searched phrase. For this exercise I was hoping to use a "go big or go home" domain and I thought this one might be it. Do you think it's a domain that would be penalised in any way, either by SE's or other gaming affiliates or affiliate managers? Kaus for example immediately saw the negative so I guess others will as well. I would like to believe it has the potential to achieve something over time without being penalised or seen in a negative light that hinders in any way otherwise I can just as easy rethink and go for a different domain. I obviously want to be on a level playing field with others new to the industry but I originally thought this one might have some xfactor but maybe that is not the case after all.

Like Cheryle kind of touched on I think if you are doing this completely from an SEO perspective I don't like the domain. But hey, you really have to spend $xx,xxx - $xxx,xxx for a really good domain nowadays.

What I do like about it is it is shorter than a lot of the horrible domains people are using out there. Has some brandable aspects (though .com would obv be better), has some good main keywords in it, though there is no way you will ever rank for "online casino" with it unless you drop big bucks or get really creative on your link building.

As for whether it will be negative, obviously this is tough to say because if you build a recognizable brand and do enough link building you can get anything to rank for any term (ie. look at wikipedia), though this is no small job. Really it comes down to what your goals are with this domain and how much you plan on spending to reach those goals.

[OnlineCasinoz]

Hi Graham

Thanks for the reply. I've decided to go with it as based on the comments here any success will depend on the time and money I put in. My main concern was the domain might have been judged negatively by the search engines, affiliate webmasters and affiliate program managers but hopefully that won't be the case.

Thanks for all the comments, much appreciated.