A number of times, clients have come to me after they have already registered their domain name. In many cases this is not an issue. However, sometimes by choosing a slightly different domain name could have meant better search engine results.
Many years ago I used to own an embroidery and screen printing business. Due to this I have always kept an eye on what is going on in the apparel decoration industry. Therefore, about 2 years I decided to set up an online store to sell Christian garments.
To start with I set the store up as part of Digital Ark. After a couple of months I was struggling to make it any higher than the 3rd page of Google. This was a silly move as Digital Ark was focused on web design and web hosting. I registered the domain www.christianshirts.co.uk, designed the site as Christian Shirts by Digital Ark and was very quickly making the first page on Google for 3 of the key searches.
Another great example was another one of my clients. They were expanding into specialised green roofing systems. After discussion and some key search word analysis, it was agreed to set up a new web site (as opposed to setting up the green roofing as part of the main web site). As they wished to focus on the local market, Colchester was also added to the domain. www.greenroofcolchester.co.uk was very quickly achieving a top search ranking for green roof Colchester or green roofing Colchester.
However, just by setting your domain name to something that contains key search words, it does not always work. I wanted to register a domain to help promote the discounted web hosting services that I offer for Christian and charitable purposes. Many of the domain names I wanted were taken. Therefore, I registered www.christian-web-hosting.co.uk (I have registered domains with single hythens and had good results). Alas even with a lot of hard work optimising and promoting the web site, it still does not appear anywhere in organic search results. Conclusion, it is being penalised for 2 hythens.
Conclusion
There is no ‘silver bullet’ to what does and does not work. However, it is worth taking a moment to consider what is the best domain name for your business. Getting this right could result in more search traffic.
If you are thinking about registering a domain for your business and would like help, please do not hesitate to drop me a line on simon@digitalark.co.uk.
Regards
Simon