Make sure that you’re sending the right message to your online car shoppers. Make it brand friendly - Don’t just pick your domain name based on SEO. SEO definitely has a big impact on your rankings and your performance, but you also need to think about branding. Your domain name should match your brand name so that customers can find you. Choosing the right domain name helps with relevant anchor text Anchor text are the highlighted words on which a hyperlink appears and can be used as a pillar to boost SEO. When the words highlighted in the anchor text match with the web address, it sends a positive signal to search engines about the authenticity of the website.

• Domain Seochoosing The Right Domain For Seo Services
• Domain Seochoosing The Right Domain For Seo Marketing

This article covers choosing a right domain name for best SEO. There are tons of articles suggesting one method of picking domain name over another. In the end, it will all come down to your personal choice, and picking a domain name that has nothing to do with your brand or your niche, doesn’t necessarily means you won’t get good rankings.

When choosing a right domain name, this is what you should know.

Are Keywords important for SEO when choosing a right domain name?

Getting it done right in the world of SEO can be tricky on so many levels. There are so many different opinions on what the right approach is to skyrocket your website to the very top of search results. Google algorithms keeps evolving from day to day, which makes it hard to guess what would be the right approach. This is the troubled part for everyone who is just starting with their website.

Domain name keywords used to have much more importance, but that has changed. Most of you might think that having the keyword in the domain name will boost your rankings. The truth is, domain keywords are not that important as they used to be for SEO. To go a bit further, they can even hurt your rankings if implemented incorrectly.

Domain Keywords used to rank differently

Just a couple of years ago, search engines credited much more importance to website domain name. Search algorithms were very complex, but the logic was different. Finding relevant site for a given search was often based on the domain name.

This led to over-optimized websites for the given keywords. People started to serve optimized pages for bots, instead for humans. Buying links from another sites was very popular, which made it difficult for people to find quality information.

After the domain name anarchy, Google changed the search factors. What now seems obvious, it was a pretty unexplored territory at the time. Google determined that the content of the website is more valuable to people than domain name.

Choosing Brand over Keyword for Domain Name

Let me try to explain it this way. Try to remember a few websites you recently visited. It’s most likely that their domain wasn’t stuffed with keywords. It was probably a short, brand focused name. I chose wpbrainery.com for this domain name, even though it has no mention of WordPress or Tutorials. Think of Twitter, Techcrunch, Zynga.. Nothing in that domain names says what the website is about.

It became obvious to Google, that people were exploiting the system with exact-match domain names. Since then, Google has drastically changed its algorithms and it became more important to have a great content that people actually read over having keywords in the right places.

Make no mistake, keywords are still important part of your SEO, but they are not the only thing you should be focused on.

I want to have Keywords in my Domain Anyway

You absolutely can! The intention of the content above this wasn’t to discourage you of for using keywords when choosing a right domain name. I was merely trying to point out that choosing a brand as your domain name will not hurt your SEO in any way.

Having keywords in your domain name can still be beneficial. Even though it might be hard to find a domain that is available for certain keywords. To help you easily find available domain names, use WPBrainery’s domain finder tool. I’ll share my favorite domain finder tools:

Alternately, I’ll share my favorite domain finder tools:

Don’t throw away your keyword strategy just yet!

While it’s not a necessity to have keywords in your domain, it can still be beneficial if you are able to find one. This is because of backlinks and, more specifically, the anchor text used in those backlinks.

Let’s say your lava lamp store’s domain name is totallavalamp.com. Any time another website links to your website, it will likely look something like this:

“I really wanted a yellow and green lava lamp, and the only place I could find it online was at Total Lava Lamp.”

This is incredibly beneficial for SEO because your targeted keyword is being used often in backlinks to your website, which is a strong indicator for search engines that your site has something to do with lava lamps. Unlike the80sstore.com, which says nothing about lava lamps.

This kind of approach should only be taken if you can incorporate a keyword and keep the name brandable. Be careful not to have a long domain packed with keywords. It looks spammy.

To get the most out of your domain name, make sure your domain name follows your brand name.

Which TLD should you choose? .com, .net or something else?

TLD stands for Top Level Domain. And choosing the right TLD matters. The most common TLD is .com and some people consider it to be the only “real” TLD.

TLD’s to consider while choosing a right domain name

.com was created in 1985, in a time when internet went public. The intentions for this domain were to be used as “commercial”. It’s easy to guess that the .com is shorten from commercial. As the presence of .com domain began to spread, it soon became an industry standard.

.net is the second most used domain extension. It was created around the same time as .com extension, but .net was made specifically for business purposes. As you guessed, .net stands for “network” and it’s widely used with companies offering network or internet services.

.org is the third most used domain extension. It’s often used by organizations and it’s easy to guess that the searched company is organization without even visiting the website.

There are many other TLD’s available, but their popularity and usage is not that high. Also, some TLD’s a considered as spam or not safe, like .biz or .xyz.

So which TLD should you choose?

If your website is not an organization or internet service, you should always go with .com extension. Your TLD won’t have negative impact on your SEO, but choosing the wrong one might put you down with low ranking websites.

Besides .com extension, extensions with highest values are country extensions like co.uk or .de. Why? Because to get a country extensions, you’ll need to provide company info to your national domain registrant. Registering your domain in this way, it usually cost nothing. So it is assumed that the company is “verified” so to speak. But it doesn’t necessarily means that. You can also buy a country TLD.

In most cases, choosing .com as your TLD is a good choice for choosing a right domain name.

Domain Name With or Without Dashes

So many people are having this question: Should I use dashes inside my domain name?

Even thought this is something worth debating, my advice is without. Don’t use dashes inside your domain name. Why? The reason why should be very obvious if you think about it.

Let’s start with marketing. Let’s take for an example wpbrainery.com. That domain is obviously taken. While I was searching for available domain name for this site, it could have easily happen that it was already taken by someone else.

I’m sure it happened to all of you. Domain you really like and you think you scored a jack pot with the name, is already taken. Naturally, your first next step would be to add a dash in your domain name and check availability. In my case, I would search for wp-brainery.com. Woohoo! It’s available!!

But you will easily fall into the trap! There will be two websites with similar domain name, possibly with the same or similar niche. So you are expecting users to remember your domain name and to land on your website after they type in your domain name directly. The truth is, with proven case studies, that user will simply type wpbrainery.com and hit enter. User will rarely take dashes into consideration. By doing that, the traffic will go to a non-dashed domain.

Would you ever consider purchasing domain face-book.com? Of course not, why would you!

Hyphenated domains are usually confusing. People usually get confused with the dash. They often forget the dash.

On the other hand, by using dashes, you can get some extra attention on your domain. For example, buycheapusedsamsungphones.com looks complicated and you have no idea what it says. Unlike buy-cheap-used-samsung-phones.com which grabs much more attention than the first example.

Domain Seochoosing The Right Domain For Seo Services

Having more than one hyphen is not recommended.

How does Google treats dashes in domain name?

Google and other search engines couldn’t care less whether you have or don’t have dashes inside your domain name. For search engines, domains of both the types are same.

What matters is the way you treat your domain. When deciding to go with or without the hyphens, you should put people on the first place, instead of bots.

Extra Tip – Buy them ALL

Well, not all.. Even though it presents an extra cost while just starting with your website, a useful tip while choosing a right domain name is to purchase variations of your domain name as well. So if your domain would be mybrand.com, you would want to purchase my-brand.com and possibly mybrand.net. Or similar variations. That will make sure that you own TLD’s for your domain name which will eliminate possible confusion and competitors.

Conclusion

I hope this article helped you decide how to choose a right domain name. Even though it all comes down to your personal preference, niche or business name, this guide will definitely help you avoid some most common mistakes when choosing a domain name.

Got a domain name in mind? Check it’s availability here!

To have a better understanding of SEO and WordPress SEO, there’s our guide right here.

If you would like to add something, share your experience with domain names, leave your comment bellow! If you liked the article, use the social buttons and spread the word!

This is the first in a series of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tips and tricks for auto dealers. We will walk you through the process of how to optimize your website to perform the best it can on search engines with a new post about automotive SEO in the first week of each month. As you try some of these techniques and consult with us about your SEO, watch your exposure and sales increase.

Why domain names matter for SEO
Your domain name connects your customers to your dealership.

When you search something on Google, the keywords are bolded within the domain name and description of each listing on the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). The more a user’s searched words match your domain name, your description, and content on your website, the more likely your dealership website will show up high on SERPs.

People used to create domain names that matched exactly with keywords so that they would show up high on the list of SERPs. Since then, Google has updated their algorithm so that you actually get penalized for doing that sort of this. However, domain names still have a big impact on your automotive SEO and branding.

What makes up a domain name

1. Subdomain - The first part of the domain is known as the subdomain, and it’s optional. The most common subdomain is “www” at the beginning of a domain such as our website, www.autojini.com, but there are many other variations to describe a certain page like mail.autojini.com or calendar.autojini.com. You don’t need to have a subdomain; for example, our website could be just autojini.com. Moz suggests that you should use subfolders over multiple subdomains.

2. Domain name - The second part is the domain name itself also known as the IP address. This is the part that we will be talking about the most later on because it has a big impact on SEO efforts, and you have the freedom to be more creative with this part. This is the section where you’ll purchase your domain name from a website like Godaddy or Namecheap.

3. Top-Level Domain - The last part has many names including Top-Level Domain (TLD), extension, and domain suffix. The most common TLD is .com, but there are several other common ones such as .net, .edu, and .org.

If you already have a website for your auto dealership with a domain name that you are happy with, please skip to the section called “Benefits of a good domain name” towards the bottom to find valuable information. If you’re looking for the perfect domain name, keep reading.

How to choose the perfect domain name
Try to make your domain name the following things for the best automotive SEO results.

1. Make it easy - Ease is everything today. The easier your domain name is to read, say, spell, and remember, the better off your dealership will be. Your domain name should be memorable so that customers don’t forget about you. Google takes into account ease and keywords in your domain name when ranking it, so make sure that it’s optimized for customers to easily use and remember. Having a processing fluency that is quick and simple for your domain name benefits your dealership in many ways.

2. Make it concise - Short domain names perform better and are easier to remember. They make processing fluency easier and can make your domain name more recognizable. According to one study, the 50 most popular websites have an average of just 6 characters in their domain name. Think about Google, Amazon, and YouTube. As a rule, you should try not to exceed 15 characters.

3. Make it relevant - Make sure that your domain name is relevant to your website. As an auto dealership, your domain name should include something about vehicles, your dealership, or its location. Your customers should know that they’re on a website for your auto dealership based on your domain name. People should intuitively be able to tell what your website is about based on your domain name. Make sure that you’re sending the right message to your online car shoppers.

4. Make it brand friendly - Don’t just pick your domain name based on SEO. SEO definitely has a big impact on your rankings and your performance, but you also need to think about branding. Your domain name should match your brand name so that customers can find you easily. Your brand should be consistently portrayed on your website, in marketing materials, at your dealership, and in your domain name. Mentioning your domain name in different places throughout your website can help your branding effectiveness.

5. Make it a .com - About 75% of domain names have a TLD of .com; it’s the most popular and most recognized. However, if that isn’t available, you can go with one of the other popular TLDs mentioned above or use a ccTLD. A ccTLD is a country code Top Level Domain. Some common ones include .us (United States), .au (Australia), and .uk (United Kingdom). You could also make your TLD location or industry specific. You might think that a TLD with relevant keywords would help your dealership website perform better online, but Google doesn’t take into account keywords in your TLD. You’re better off just sticking with a popular Top Level Domain like .com or .net.

6. Make it keyword friendly - Your domain name should be unique, catchy, and relevant to your brand. If your website is www.wesellcars.com, that’s not very unique. While it is relevant to what you do, no one will associate that domain name with your dealership because it’s too generic and not brandable. Instead, include at least one generic keyword that’s applicable to your dealership. Generic keywords perform better in domain names since they have a broader reach. Don’t stuff your domain name with keywords in the hopes that it will rank higher on SERPs because that’s not how it works. You shouldn’t focus on specific keywords in your domain name because Google will punish you for matching to keywords exactly. If this happens, you have to have the most effective automotive SEO and the best content to make up for it. Instead, go for generic keywords that will allow you to pop up on many peoples’ SERPs.

7. Make it straightforward - Avoid hyphens and numbers if you can. You can use up to one hyphen if you need it, but don’t confuse your online shoppers with symbols and numbers they can’t make sense of. You might even prevent them from clicking a link to your website if they think it looks like spam.

8. Make it thorough - Some experts suggest that you should purchase domain names with slightly different spellings than yours. This will direct people to your site even if they happen to spell your domain name wrong. Some also advise that you buy the same domain name with different extensions to capture more of the market and avoid other dealerships from using a domain that is very similar to yours.

9. Make it legal - Make sure to check for trademarks before you decide on a domain name. You don’t want to pay for a domain name and then find out that someone else has a similar one. Avoid getting sued by not risking trademark infringement. It’s better to be safe than stuck with outrageous legal fees.

Benefits of a good domain name

• More credibility – Your customers are more likely to trust your website and your dealership.
• Higher rankings on SERPs – Google pays attention to domain names…let this work in your favor.
• More website traffic – Watch how domain names impact SEO when you see your traffic increase.
• Higher Click Through Rates (CTRs) – Domain names relevant to website content receive more clicks.
• More potential for branding – Adding more positive things that relate to your brand has a big impact.
• Higher sales – People are more likely to be interested in your dealership and your vehicles if they’re taken to a website that is what they were expecting. Watch how a good domain name increases conversion rates and sales.

Stay tuned next month to find out the next step in the process to getting your entire website Search Engine Optimized. Watch how this advice and these tips can help improve your online performance.

Domain Seochoosing The Right Domain For Seo Marketing

If you need help finding a domain name, AutoJini can help. Consult with us about your automotive SEO needs, and let us lend our expertise to help your dealership succeed. Call us at (515) 232-2024 today!