Which URL is best?

**benthomaslee** · 12 February 2010, 8:50 am

Hi guys,

Being pretty new to the business I was wondering about something and thought this would be the best place to find an answer

From an SEO perspective is it better to have a good domain but multiple hyphens

ie xxxx-yyyy-zzzz.com

or no hypens but less popular domain

ie xxxxyyyyzzzz.info

what sort of weight do google hold with .biz .net .info etc compared with .com or .co.uk ??

Thanks

**casino2k.com** · 12 February 2010, 11:31 am

In my experience hyphens are very bad inside the domain name.

I use them in page's url but I don't buy hyphened domains anymore, it seems more difficult to get good positions in serps in competitive markets like gambling.

**casino2k.com** · 12 February 2010, 11:38 am

Sorry I've read your post again and I see the question was different.

In my opinion it's better using a .com with hyphens than a .info without hyphens.

Anyway I see some .org or .net domains around with good serps for competitive keywords.

**pimpin_azn** · 12 February 2010, 11:44 am

.com is stronger than .info given both domain names are the same.

Hyphens are not as good as no hyphens given both domains have the same extension.

Either way, don't ever let the domain name be the important factor in your SEO strategy. You may get a headstart for ranking only on the specific keyword phrase that your domain matches, but other than that, ranking higher for that keyword phrase and any other keywords is heavily dependent on the anchor text used to link you and what kind of sites those links are coming from.

I hope that helps!

**ziy1978** · 12 February 2010, 2:13 pm

first variant better

**GCG** · 12 February 2010, 3:36 pm

hyphens in domains are ok for SE but not very memorable for visitors

google for work at home forum e.g.

**dhayman** · 13 February 2010, 8:18 am

First, .com has stronger brand name presence, for sure. Second, I would recommend using hyphens, versus not, if the words behind the hyphens are keywords that you are optimizing for. Clearly, in that instance, it is better than running all the words together as one.

However, keep in mind, that people may not "remember" the hyphens, when you tell them about your URL, so you may lose some brand name presence in that regard.

Finally, Google is implementing a strategy that is supposed to go live in the 3rd quarter, that will allow for all sorts of characters (and character sets) to be viable in domain TLD's and URL's, that weren't permitted before. So, don't think that dashes will hurt you in that regard.

**bbonline** · 15 February 2010, 2:56 am

I prefer .org and .net domain extension because they are authorize domain compared to .com and .biz which is noted as very usable for marketing purposes. Regarding domain naming construction, avoid using hyphens. It is likely very confusable to visitors.

**onlinemediadirect** · 15 February 2010, 3:21 am

"You may get a headstart for ranking only on the specific keyword phrase that your domain matches, but other than that, ranking higher for that keyword phrase and any other keywords is heavily dependent on the anchor text used to link you and what kind of sites those links are coming from."

Spot on that man.

**LiveCasinoPartners** · 15 February 2010, 2:34 pm

Out of the two I would select the .com version with hyphens as opposed to the .info.

**cameronlove4** · 18 February 2010, 1:03 am

Google is stressing more on localizations. So, it depends who are your target customers, are they Americans or UK people? If it's UK people then .co.uk is preferrable.

I personally experienced that hyphens don't give that sort of result when the domain name is concerned. But I personally prefer hyphens ehen it comes to other parts of the URL, excepting the domain name.

Originally Posted by benthomaslee

Hi guys,

Being pretty new to the business I was wondering about something and thought this would be the best place to find an answer

From an SEO perspective is it better to have a good domain but multiple hyphens

ie xxxx-yyyy-zzzz.com

or no hypens but less popular domain

ie xxxxyyyyzzzz.info

what sort of weight do google hold with .biz .net .info etc compared with .com or .co.uk ??

Thanks

**catchingsmoke** · 23 February 2010, 4:11 pm

1st off, this depends on you target market, if you're only targeting one country get the regions TLD for the love of God. It makes such a massive difference, i've done a little testing on this, for domains with practically identical domain names, pages and backlinks and the regional TLD does better most of the time. Now also .info's are a wate of time for serps leave them in feeder site hell where they belong.

if you want to target multinationally always get a .com there's still plenty out there just brand yourself and add your keyword, eg umbrellaonlinebingo.com is going to rank better than onlinebingo.info and will probably be just as good as online-bingo-1.com also a brand name is more likely to be remembered by returning users than an accurate seo name with hypens.

hope that helps.

**bilalamjad3** · 24 February 2010, 12:51 am

first is better.

**wolf77** · 28 July 2010, 3:18 am

The first one

**matted** · 28 July 2010, 8:16 pm

I only buy .com domains as my primary sites. I have done the hyphen thing quite a bit but I think in the future I'd try to be more creative and find .coms without hyphens or spend a bit of money to buy an existing domain.

Looks at some of the biggest and best sites. They were around when many more domains were available but have done a good job branding something maybe quasi-related to their SEO terms.

**best.hands** · 29 July 2010, 3:55 am

Originally Posted by benthomaslee

Hi guys,

Being pretty new to the business I was wondering about something and thought this would be the best place to find an answer

From an SEO perspective is it better to have a good domain but multiple hyphens

ie xxxx-yyyy-zzzz.com

or no hypens but less popular domain

ie xxxxyyyyzzzz.info

what sort of weight do google hold with .biz .net .info etc compared with .com or .co.uk ??

Thanks

Learning from expert SEOs, hyphenated or not doesn't really matter. However, professionalism is a bit high with non-hyphenated domains. But domains with hyphens improve the domains readability provided that hyphens are employed in place of white space and not to break readable words.

**Lee-Ann** · 29 July 2010, 4:30 am

.com is my suggestion

**Colossal** · 29 July 2010, 11:37 am

.info do very poorly in Google. I think by now they have been mostly filtered out due to the amount of spam.

so hyphenated .com would be my choice. hyphens are seen as separators in Google so it does have a negative impact but not much.

**zensc** · 25 September 2010, 7:35 am

Well .com is the strongest, then comes net, info, org. If your com is taken i suggest you buy the info!

**jctroy440** · 25 September 2010, 10:59 pm

Ben,

I think after looking around on the subject I found that Father Google isn't fond of hyphens because of the seemingly obvious attempt to defraud another high ranked site. Could be scuttlebutt.

I have a .info domain parked for the bestcasinoonlinenow and was thinking of using it for the UK Europe site I discussed with you several weeks back.

(That project is at 80% right now by the way and I will be talking with you soon about it)

After looking into that I think I will go the .co.uk route or the .com route on the UK Euro facing site because of the weight that Google puts on these domains and you have to throw Google UK into the mix as well

That's my story and I'm stickin' to it

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spot on

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The first one

Tough question

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