the bottom line in domains is...

...it doesn't matter in the end??? Your objective input would be appreciated, and please feel free to disagree/correct if inclined.

After asking and researching about what makes a good domain for quite a while, the task has become somewhat futile. My assumption is what's done with the site and how it is advertised is what counts - not really the name of the site. It seems if anything about a domain itself is important, it could be the memorability/catchiness/brandability.

This is much like asking how people play the lottery. Exact if not religious methods are used and othertimes not. Wordtracker was an eye-opener. It's amazing how many successful sites have domains bringing low, single digit and as often zero searches per 24 hour period according to Wordtracker. Domains with tremendous search results are often ones nobody would ever think up unless they knew the domain - such as specific producer names, the blog Waybig, etc.. Is it then illogical to assume that a domain itself doesn't mean much until you do something with the site (and advertise)?

Personally, it's more fun and maybe practical to just go with a domain that is clever and memorable if nothing else really matters much.


Incidentally, what are your thoughts about the following? I own a catchy .net domain I like. The .com of the same exact domain is one of those dull parked sites that has been owned by someone since 2002. My plan is to buy the .com if I could "some day" in the years ahead when I have the money. First, not sure if someone who has had the domain that long would sell it. Furthermore, they may be taking my traffic from me in the meantime (I guess by people who may think up of the domain or hear of it and type in .com instead...or any other way?). I could add "hot" to the domain and make it .com, but would that make any difference in this regard? The queston is: should I add "hot" to the domain make it a .com, or just leave it as it is (.net), or just go with another domain (which doesn't have the catchiness)?

I would never put a paysite on a .net if I did not own the .com domain, unless it is a domain that can be strongly branded with .net, like del.icio.us did with its .us domain (of course, they ended up buying delicious.com in the end so maybe thats a strong indication as to what to do)

that's very interesting and a good point. thanks, Luke

Im in agreement with Luke on the .net vs. .com for a paysite, the ONLY way EVER i would use a .net or other TLD for a paysite is if i knew i had secured the .com and i wanted type-in traffic from my affiliates marketing of the site.

The other thing to remember when looking for domains to use as paysites is that there actually ARE a lot of good ones still available, you just have to spend a little more time searching for them.

All of our upcoming paysite launches over the next few years are all two-word, nice sounding, brandable domain names, yeah they took a while to find but the end results will be well worth that extra time spent finding the right domain for each of the websites.

Regards,

Lee

yeah, it does make sense, Lee. Do you feel the same for blogs...and AVS sites?

And yeah, I like brandable sort of catchy names, whether they are SEO or not...for the reasons I gave, if that sounds reasonable (?)

Lee, I'm sending you a pm...thanks.

Yes, for me a domain must be .com and easy to remember.

This thread confirms what I always thought in the first place, to stick with .com. to be safe. Originally I did but then read contrary things that threw me off.

Paysites have been focused on in this thread, but do these principles also apply also to blogs or any sites of any kind?

For any type of site, a domain that's memorable/brandable/stands out AND keyword based is obviously best, but rarer and tougher to pull off. Please correct any of the following if not accurate, but now Google claims it doesn't even care about your meta tag list of keywords or if you have them, which was probably inevitable. So in terms of keywords, the focus now is really what words Google decides are the most prominent in a site's content to qualify as keywords. Considering these points, why worry so much about the SEO of the domain when it's rather the words used in the sites content? Does this make sense? Any opinions on this?

TLDs are TLD are TLD...

For branding or sponsor program reasons a mayor TLD would be favorable.

For SEO however Google might favor one TLD over the other depending on what part of the world you are in... uk in GB, fr in France, de in Germany, pl in Poland, cn in China, au in Australia. They might even more favor a local TLD if the server itself resides in that country corresponding to the TLD - just think about it if it would make sense if you did it.

CNO TLDs are so very much generic it should not matter for english speaking sites.


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