Will a keyword-rich domain name drive search engine traffic to your website?
06 May 2009
A client recently reported paying a four-figure sum for a keyword-rich domain name. He did so on the assumption that it would provide a return on investment through increased search engine traffic to his website. But will it? Unfortunately, probably not.
You could be a millionaire …
The trade in domain names can be big business: a few years ago business.com broke all records when it was sold for $7.5 million. AsSeenOnTv.com, which went for $5.1 million, is currently the second most expensive on record.Note 1 But will buying a keyword-rich domain name make a significant impact on a site's search engine rankings and hence its volume of search engine traffic? Both Google's own advice as well as logic suggest not.
Google's guidelines
Google's webmaster guidelines give site owners guidance on what to do to help Google find, index and rank their sites accurately. However, employing a keyword-rich domain name isn't included anywhere in the detailed advice provided.Note 2
The logic
Logic also suggests that a keyword-rich domain name is not the way to Google's heart. Its inner workings are of course a closely guarded secret, but Google's success lies essentially in its extraordinary ability to match relevant content to given search terms. The idea that Google would allow site owners to bypass its evaluation process and to skew to any significant degree its assessment of the relevance of a piece of content implies a serious flaw in its system.
Such a flaw would also directly undermine Google's revenue-generating capability. This is because Google earns substantial revenues from its AdWords® service – paid advertising for those whose content may not, for whatever reason, achieve sufficiently high "natural" or "organic" listings. Allowing keyword-rich domain names to improve rankings to any significant extent would encourage site owners to purchase services from domain name dealers rather than buying advertising services from Google.
Clearly there are strong business reasons for paying large sums for domain names such as their value in other forms of marketing (business cards, letter heads, website banners, logos, jingles, TV advertisements etc). But their impact on search engine rankings is likely to be low.
Conclusion
Given that Google has always gone out of its way to stress the importance of good content, if high rankings are the objective, it might well make more sense for site owners to invest in content rather than in expensive keyword-rich domain names.
Ted Page Director PWS
PWS web services
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