SEOBook.Com: How Google Killed Category Killer Domains
Well its certainly an interesting read over at SEObook.com a site dedicated as you would guess to SEO topics
Today’s story is on how Google has killed, or at least deeply devalued Category Killer Domain Names
Mr. Wall’s ultimate theory that domain names relevance are being killed off by Google’s new products and algorithm changes. His post highlights a recent newsletter from MediaOptions.com as proof that holders of Category Killers are trying to sell, trying to unload their domains, knowing that the SEO value for exact match domains are in and will continue to decline.
Here are just a few of the issues and statements Mr. Wall makes but you should read the entire post.
“The idea of an exact match domain (EMD) is that you are buying a piece of land right next to the highway. You sink in a lot of money upfront, but hope that it backs out over time by lowering your traffic acquisition costs. For many years this model was both logical and profitable.”.
“At the peak of the domain name bubble recently, the domain name Poker.org sold for a million Dollars.” (note this sale took place
“A domain name is an asset just like a stack of cash, a piece of gold, or a CDO is. But rather than having a fixed universal value, it is only a *relative* store of value that can go up or down based on market conditions.”
“In 2008 Eric Schmidt made the famous quote about how consumers are hardwired for branding. I mentioned how he was signaling the future of the algorithm, but was largely ignored at the time. Since then Google has launched:
- the Vince update, which was driven by query refinement (and thus promotes brands)
- the Panda update, which puts such an emphasis on brand-like signals that it allows doorway pages & scraped Tweets to rank on select authoritative websites
“The algorithm is only going to keep adding more signals that boost brands.
“PoolTables.com might have better editorial content than a mega-retailer like Amazon.com, but it is hard for them to collect as many reviews as Amazon can.”
“Matt Cutts also stated that they like the potential of +1:
Cutts confirmed what Google said when the +1 button launched: Google will use +1 activity to influence its search results.
“It’s definitely a signal we’re paying a lot of attention to,” Cutts said. “It has tons of potential. It looks very promising.”
Big brands can do giveaways to their core customer base to expand into new markets, allowing customers to pay for the discounts with a vote, stuffing the ballot box on these new “relevancy” signals.”
“Google shifted the top AdWords ads to having a longer headline, which provides roughly a 13% lift in CTR. ”
“For commercially viable keywords these have the net effect of pushing the organic search results further down the page.”
“In certain high money verticals Google offers Google Comparison / Google Advisor ads, which allow them to place a 4th ad slot above the organic search results.”"Google has offered graphical product ads automatically matched to the search results. Generally for bigger brands Google offers these on a risk-free cost per acquisition pricing, whereas smaller advertisers need to pay by the click to use this ad format.”
“Search clicks are a zero sum game, so the more risk-free clicks the big box brands get from this ad format the lest clicks there is to go around for everyone else.”
“When Google Chrome launched it replaced the address bar with a search box.”
“That allows Google to…”
- intercept & redirect type-in traffic demand
- re-highlight content you have already seen in the past (likely to be from some larger brands, as they have larger ad budgets & more ways to be found)
- recommend popular searched-for keywords (which are often brands, since awareness-based advertising creates search demand
“When Internet Explorer 9 was launched Microsoft also adopted these featuresTaking control of the address bar one step further, Google has a beta version of Chrome out where the address bar is not even visible unless you scroll over that part of the page. Firefox also offers a similar beta extension! If this feature goes mainstream it wouldn’t be surprising to see Microsoft follow suit.”
“At first that statement seems like it could be saying that it consolidates search volume to a smaller set of keywords & thus could make domain names more valuable.”
“However, if you have ever looked at a list of the most popular keywords you would know that they are largely filled with branded keywords. ”
“The media was aware of this obvious shift & Amit Singhal had to do an interview stating that there was no brand bias to Google Instant.”If you buy a “category killer” it is critical that you rank #1, but in many niches the exact match domains that ranked #1 for nearly a decade are now #3 or #4 in the organic results. ”
“Add in 3 AdWords ads above the organic results & things like product ads and it isn’t hard to end up below the fold. If your relationship to that 1 keyword is your core competitive strategy but you can’t even promote the keyword (because you are below the fold) then the strategy is a failed one.”
“Further, as Google keeps adding more usage signals into the relevancy mix that will keep favoring brands.”
“This is not to say domain names are dead across the board. there is still plenty of opportunity in some areas, but equally some names require large investment & as an SEO strategy may get thrown under the bus by any of the above”
“I Stopped Buying Domain Names”"I believe I was one of the first SEOs to publicly highlight the benefits of exact match domain names. Back when Google engineers were dismissive of it some of the smart money was dismissive of what the engineers stated and made plenty of money from it. But I have pretty much stopped buying domains at this point…as in most cases the valuations generally don’t make sense on a risk adjusted basis in the current market”
“The person who was likely the single SEO most responsible for running up the price of exact match domain names (he over-paid for some of them based on the presumption that the numbers would back out similarly to some of his earlier investments in a market that was dominated by a government-sponsored bubble) has now become a domain seller.”
“Now even he is now dumping many of his exact match domains, which I discovered in the most recent Media Options newsletter:”
“In March Matt Cutts talked down exact match domain names, but the truth is that Google never really needed to discount them, simply by adding more criteria to the relevancy algorithm which boosts brands they already had the same impact.”
“The smart money is now saying that domain names are generally significantly overpriced, especially as an asset class valued based on SEO potential.”
Finally Wall lists two final blows:
“Google also hit PPC parking revenues hard by being so dominant in search that they forced Yahoo!’s bean counter CEO to outsource search to Microsoft. “In one of Google’s new (literally no more than a couple days old) beta search results, they show domain names above the meta description / snippet. That could slightly increase the perceived value of some domain names, but a brand can always leverage relevant subdomains & new domain extensions will soon flood the market, so ultimately any benefit here could end up coming up as a wash.”
So boys and girls what do you think?
I personally have never spent hundreds of thousands of dollars for .net or .org domain or significant money on domains solely on the basis of how they would rank on SEO.
I have bought some category killers on my believe is such a domain puts you in a business immediately.
So if you own say RestaurantSupply.com that’s a business.
MotocycleHelmets.com that a business.
You can take one of these direct match names and start a business tomorrow. You can’t do that vary easy with a web 2.o name a three letter domain, or a long tail.
Over the years I have been approached about partnering with people who had SEO skills to buy a non-com for the sole purpose of SEOing the hell out of it getting it to rank in a high paying lead gen. topic.
I never pulled the trigger on it, because those domains values do in fact depend substantially on SEO and Google which we always have known, is subject to significant change at any time.
However for .com and other highly brandable domains like .Me there value comes only in part from SEO value but a larger part comes from brandability.
Having said that, the two sites we have developed into try eCommerce sites, with Exact Match Domains as Mr. Wall calls them, Luxurybedding.com and DiscountBedding.com are still ranking #1 under Google (and Bing) despite all of the changes.
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So, why does SEO.com rank *above* SEOBook.com in a search for “SEO” in Google, then?
Good points but what is he talking about with “Now even he is now dumping many of his exact match domains”? Media Options is Andrew R, a broker, no?
Premium keyword domains have always been for sale through all sorts of venues. If he knows that little about the domain market, it definitely diminishes the value of the rest of the article.
MediaOptions is Andrew R and yes he is a broker but I do believe he is also a domainer
Google is becoming “too busy” and better hope that people like all the crap they are doing. They effectively went from an organic search machine first to now a monetization search result tool first.
Myspace seemed invincible at one point in time until Facebook came into town.
If Google keeps this up I can see someone else coming and bumping them. It is getting frustrating to sort through what is a paid ad and what is a real search result now on Google and it only keeps getting worse.
I agree with the article. Domaining.com has become a classified site for reporting and providing domain sales. Values have dropped considerably and everyone is dumping and dropping
It’s a great read, written by an incredibly smart guy with expertise well beyond the SEO space.
However, he states, “If you buy a “category killer” it is critical that you rank #1″.
As Fred Wilson says, ‘don’t be a Google bitch’.
If your entire business model depends on Google ranking, that’s a flawed plan from day 1.
I agree with his premise that search engines influence the value of domains, but the values of category killer domains aren’t “killed” because of Google’s changes.
Google is promoting brands? Fine, build one.
Here is what the new owners of RunningShoes.com tweeted a couple weeks ago, in response to Matt Cutts’ video about keywords in a domain name:
Dear @mattcutts, RunningShoes.com IS our brand. Not just a “keyword domain name.”
I’ve been a dedicated Google user for years, long before people know who Google was. However, this latest update looks like crap and might be enough for me to switch search engines. Way too many ads.
The article’s last words sum up the whole article :
“The smart money is now saying that domain names are generally significantly overpriced, especially as an asset class valued based on SEO potential.”
If you view domains as assets valued (exclusively//on the most part) based on SEO potential, yeah Wall has some valid points.
But really, I think domains are valuable because they have intrinsic mindshare. And I would love to hear Wall on why brands are favored by Search Engines.. perhaps it’s because they have mindshare too and Google thinks only the sites with mindshare are worthy of its top spots ?
“As Fred Wilson says, ‘don’t be a Google bitch’.
If your entire business model depends on Google ranking, that’s a flawed plan from day 1. ”
Totally agreed. Google is only one of the hundreds of ways one could market a website.
“Domaining.com has become a classified site for reporting and providing domain sales. Values have dropped considerably and everyone is dumping and dropping”
I wouldn’t say it’s all doom and gloom. Domaining.com is still a good resource for the domain industry and domains are still a good source of income. People just need to find other ways to generate revenue with them and get creative with with what they do with them. When one door closes, another opens……
a solid domain, fresh original content that offers VALUE to users will ALWAYS come out on top in the long run. There is no need for all this “search engine worship/reverence”. If you run a darn good restaurant with the town’s best meals in some back ally somewhere, people WILL find you and RECOMMEND you. Its the same for good quality websites. And it always will be. Why? because its human nature to seek , find and recommend stuff that they can derive value from.
People have been warning about the gasping canary that is overweight exact match domain relevance for a while. As far as the sale prices, yes, they have probably gotten quite bloated, relative to their actual value in organic SEO.
Still, the SEO community usually ‘doesn’t get’ the branding aspects of category defining .com keyword domains, because branding isn’t within their spectrum of understanding. Their thinking is SOOOOOOOOOO left-brain, so searchengine-centric, so Spock’ishly focused on the technical aspects of gaming Google that branding dynamics don’t relaly register with them. This shouldn’t come as a surprise- you don’t go to your auto mechanic and ask him advice on heart surgery. Branding and SEO are two totally different things.
As Aaron referenced above in regards to RunningShoes.com, when your business is selling artichoke dust and you own ArtichokeDust.com, even if your company is named IP Freely Artichoke Imports, owning the industry defining descriptive is a tremendously powerful branding tool… Effectively “becoming” that.com as the basis for your brand is a strong leg up for an upstart.
… and here we see the third phase evolution of ‘getting ahead on the internet’, where the marketers take over. From the day G introduced ads, organic SEO became nothing more than a cost efficiency metric in lowering adspends, or targeting the more lightly competed longtail. Period, end of story.
“Brand awareness” has always been the gold standard objective of the spenders, who are rapidly figuring out that $50K worth of targeted social chatter usually has more resonance and expands reach further than $50K worth of adwords clicks, which offer about as much marketing durability as a newspaper ad lining a birdcage.
IMO, the article is spot on the money in terms of how exact match keyword domains interplay with search, their actual value to organic SEO relative to the delusional sale prices domain speculators often think they’re worth to said, but SEO’s don’t “get” keyword domains as a marketing tool, if for no reason other than SEO’s don’t realize that, while very important, there is other marketing in this world outside the influence of search engines. This is probably the one and only intelligence type where domainers ‘get it’ more than SEOs.
It’s a very well written article by Aaron, but he makes one big mistake/assumption IMO, and also the story is titled wrong, meaning it is misdirected.
He is assuming that since the big brands and the new Google graphics/layout with more directories, photo ads, ect…. take up the page on Google that domains like “PoolTables.com” won’t be as valuable anymore since visibility will now be less.
He is right that what Google is doing and the brands dominating are making the game harder, but for that reason alone, PoolTables.com becomes even more necessary to own if a company wants attention.
He says Amazon will dominate b/c of the reviews and ad placements on Google. Okay….that may be true…… but does that mean that nobody in the world will ever try to compete with Amazon by selling pool tables? No, of course not. He makes it sound pointless to try to compete with them. I say these things make PoolTables.com now MUCH more valuable.
He also titles the article in the Title Tag, How Google Killed Category Killer Domain Names? It appears to me he just has something against generic domains baseon on his historical leanings against the generic domain market and domainers. Why does he single out category killer domain? Again, he’s a SEO guy and this is what I expect from Aaron ; Always twisted with bias. Truth is, if what he says is really true, it affects 100% of all domain names big and small, just category killers, but also brand names still looking for recognition. Why would it just matter to category killers? It seems the article is carefully crafted to disparage category killer domains when really his points apply to all domains, with the exception of maybe the biggest, dominant brand name domains out there.
Lastly, he offers no solution to Google dominating the results pages with maps, graphics, photo ads, etc…… He makes it sound as all is lost. I say the only real solution is a better domain name. What else is there until another medium or competing service takes off? Right now there’s Facebook, Groupon, etc….. but will take some time to mature as a reliable ad partners and stil that won’t be enough advertising inventory or necessarily the correct expenditures. Under the circumstances Aaron laid out, what else can you do besides upgrade to a better domain in a tighter market with less visibility. You need all the visibility you can get now with more competitors and Google now pushing organic search results even further down the page. More visibility, recognition, trust, and respect come with a great, recognizable, memorable domain name, which oftentimes is a generic domain name. The best generics get higher CTR than mid-tier generics year after year, and the authortativeness and trust in the domain, whether right or wrong, is already built in. Try that on most unknown brandables, even if geared in somewhat of a generic context by the words towards a prodserv, the CTR is still lower almost 100% of the time. Great generics always win in CTR in parking. I don’t have any proof of that in Google Adwords, per se, but I see no reason for it being any different. Great domains stand out.
Google wants to rule the Web AND the World … now also the mobile payments …
techcrunch.com/2011/05/26/google-wallet-offers/
In a world of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.
In a world of 100′s of tlds and ever-changing search algorithms, .com is king.
Even back in the days when Google was just a couple of guys working on a University research project, you could still see where things would have to go. Google, like most everything else would eventually have to be commercialized. People thought the Internet was going be something that had Free stuff for all.
During those “free days”, Google concentrated on building the best mouse trap they could. Their strategy would be to create such a massive market share that they would completely dominate Internet search …before they introduced commercialism and monetization.
GoTo came along and beat Google to the punch. But, thier day in the sun was not going to last. Google had become that dominate power they had been striving for. At that point, add advertising monetization, and nobody can touch them. They still can’t.
But, the Internet is far too big for one company to dominate forever. They may remain a big player, but there will eventually be others that may become even bigger.
Just like all other media, the engine that makes it go is advertising. As the Internet evolves, it will become more and more of a place where you must pay to be found. And, you will pay Big to be found.
Even as traditional media suffers and dies at the hands of the Internet, the advertising costs are still extremely expensive. Take a look at the price of running a magazine ad or a national TV commercial.
The Internet will continue to evolve. The methods of online advertising will evolve. And, the cost of online advertising is likely to completely eclipse the prices currently paid for traditional media advertising. It probably won’t even be close.
If this theory does not turn out to be total bullshit, how would you possibly hedge against it?
Good Domains.
Hang in there Domainers, hang in there as long as you can!
Great post by SF.
MHB has some of the smartest readers in the domain blogosphere.
The dot com / country code is still the brand address you want, status & provenance. Just look at your own auto & clothes !! branded? aspirational? Establishment? The worlds leading corporations are not anything other than dot com.
Through the use of Google Keyword Tool, I found the top keyword search terms for buying real estate in Denver. The top search results were; Denver Real Estate, Denver Homes and Homes in Denver. Over the last three years, I acquired all three (dot)com domains that match these keywords. Our Internet business strategy (from print to web) was to grow organically versus paid for keyword search. Google wanted to charge us $8/click for an adword campaign around Denver Real Estate….ridiculous.
Presently, for keyword, Denver Real Estate, my company’s website: http://www.DenverRealEstate.com is page one rank one on Google, Yahoo and Bing. we are working on the same strategy for the other two keyword. IMO, it does matter to have the brand match the keyword search term for real estate. In less than 2 years, we recouped the cost of acquiring DenverRealEstate.com through closed Internet leads.
I just acquired DenverRental.com as well to build an online rental business.
-Peter
Excellent comments bt LS Morgan.
I always break down value of domain as Brand into the following:
* Type-ins value
* SEO value
* SEM value – better click-through rates
* Branding value – easier to remember from billboards/radio
* More non-bookmarked return visitors value
* Better word-of-mouth/free PR value
* Trust/image value – particularly valuable in ecommerce
I just had a very interesting discussion with a very successful internet marketer
who markets ecommerce sites mainly by buying adwords and who now buys
top of the line ecommerce .com domains (in stealth mode obviously).
His whole reason for buying domains is 2-fold –
1. to get better SEM click-through rates, which means he can bid less per click and get the same results.
2. better domain gives him better trust factor, and that significantly improves adwords traffic to sales ratio.
Those two factors alone will often make the difference between being non-profitable with adwords and being very profitable.
SEO this SEO that…what a bunch of crap.
Just focus on what you re doing and all will be swell.
Go read “BullS’ and your life will be healthier.
Nobody has the right answer-it is all your BS opinion which is just BS opinion.
I’d bet good money that the person selling those exact match domains has another reason.
“The smart money is now saying that domain names are generally significantly overpriced, especially as an asset class valued based on SEO potential.” Guess that runningshoes.com guy is crying in his shoe box right now.
oh and i forgot to mention. . . . imho those aren’t category killer domains since they lack the .com
Please read.
Many moons ago, (nearly 8 years) I began researching the hidden (and sometimes confusing) details of Internet marketing, focusing on the key bullet-points to “business” on the world wide web.
Basically, where does one start, what is important, what strategies work and which do not, and where should one focus his/her time, energy and money as it relates to actually monetizing and developing a “business” on the Internet.
Regardless of the new trends and developments, one thing, at least to me, is crystal clear.
If you own a keyword – (exact match) —> (.com) domain name, you have a real-world competitive advantage in that particular market or industry. Regardless of the industry, or commercial value of the product or service (or GEO).
You have to put things in to perspective.
* The SEO guys all…eat, breathe, and dream about SEO.
* The Domain guys all…eat, breathe, and dream about Domains.
* The (Agency) Marketing guys all…eat, breathe, and dream about Marketing.
* The Social Media guys all…eat, breathe and dream about Social Media.
My elementary point is, the SEO guys will tell you that if Google decides to give less weight to keyword (exact-match) domain names, then why not have a $7 domain name :vs: a $70,000 domain?
However, the answer is simple. >>> Of course the equation of value —> to —> domain acquisition is LARGELY based on business budget, company ambitions, and the willingness of the current registrant (domain owner) to sell.
At the end of the day, a keyword (exact-match) domain name offers (3) things WITHOUT having anything to do with search engines.
1. Instant Recognition.
2. Mindshare and Respect.
3. Memorability.
Google, is only one piece of the puzzle. Make no mistake about it, it can be, (depending on your product/service) absolutely vital to your overall business to have page one organic rankings, however, it is NOT the INSTANT “make-or-break” situation MANY suggest. It is FREE, targeted traffic, and awesome if you have it! However, in my opinion, Organic rankings mean much more to SMB’s than to national or international companies. I don’t think any global brands will be closing their doors if they aren’t being found organically. That’s the catch, the global brands are paying sickening amounts of money to brand-their-brand, penetrating across many cities, states, and nations. PPC is only one of a hundred ways, but that is directly related to Google, but NOT organic rankings.
In my honest and experienced opinion, local domain names are probably the most undervalued domains of any, while many others are overpriced. I think on a local level, there is HUGE opportunity to develop or sell “geo-longtails” to SMB’s in the market.
At the end of the day, I’ve managed to sell dozens of keyword domain names for xxx, x,xxx, and xx,xxx to domainers, SMB’s, and billion-dollar companies. WITHOUT question, the hardest part is the education and value proposition stages. Once they comprehend the full-scope of “internet business”, the price point and “sale” becomes easy. Many, many, many times I have experienced the reply, “we don’t NEED it, but for the right price, we’ll take it”. In many instances, these sales were “defensive” strategies, to keep their competitors away from owning and building on the “generic” brand. Many companies would say, “We aren’t interested in overhauling our brand, but, we know if our competition overhauled theirs, and used a generic domain/brand, it could potentially negatively affect our marketshare and revenues.”
So in conclusion, at least from my perspective, owning and operating a generic keyword (exact-match) domain name is a moving target.
Should you buy one? Well, can you afford it? What’s your short and long-term strategy? What industry or commercial value does it have? Ultimately, I believe those in control of these generic domain assets are in a great position in terms of an “investment”. If you want to flip, lease, build an indexible landing page, a full-blown website, or park (least-desirable situation), then you are free to do so. For a $7.67 renewal, (.com), I would personally take keyword (.com) domain names over any stock, any day.
Ps: I could have NEVER (ever) in a one million years built certain industry and media relationships, or earned the type of revenues, or had the organic rankings in multiple verticals, or been the beneficiary of hundreds-of-thousands of page views WITHOUT OWNING “exact-match” DOMAIN NAMES. I would not have a business if it were not for domain name ownership, just being honest.
You can argue the pros-and-cons and value or strategy until the end of humanity, but at the end of the day, today, in 2011, having a great intuitive digital brand, combined with some creative juices and marketing savvy, can be as good as of an investment under the sun you will find in our current economy.
Final word to any newbies reading this.
TAKE YOUR TIME.
Take pieces of advice from SEO, domainers, marketers, etc., and formulate your own, custom plan. EVERY SINGLE industry is different and with research and creativity you can find opportunities to exploit, I did. The general concept is to find as many competitive advantages as possible. (direct-navigation, organic rankings, social media, etc.,etc., etc., — some you can directly influence, others you can not.) Obviously, building a business off or online, isn’t easy, however, from my perspective as it relates to the digital world, your domain is your brand, and your brand is everything.
Food for thought. If your digital business goes under, and you didn’t have a cash-value (premium) domain name, then, you just let it expire. End of story. On the other hand, if you do have a valuable domain name, your company goes under and your domain name is STILL an asset — with a “cash-out” option…think about it.
>>> e.g:
Dear @mattcutts, RunningShoes.com IS our brand. Not just a “keyword domain name.”
This effectively levels the playing field.
Terrible, terrible news for .com owners
but great news for other extensions,
especially for shorter extensions like
.Co
Robert
Don’t think its great news for other extensions at all.
.co hot hot!
Must buy .co!
.co replace all internet with new web address!
Today is age of .co!
no more .com!
.co!
Must act fast before time run out!
Come on guys.
How can you deny the very obvious.
In one full swoop, Google is effectively making all those key term domains that people have been paying six figures for worth the same
as John Doe’s $7.49 domain he registers today.
Only the effort of the site owner and the content now matters.
The only real factor now is the length of the domain. The shorter the better.
This is now about the only variable that you can pin on making the domain valuable.
Therefore, my prediction is that short LLL will even increase in worth and value more.
This the the new reality.
Learn to live with it.
@LS Morgan and MHB nailed it on the head. Most SEO people are blind to branding, they do technicals for a living so naturally the sky is falling if those aspects change. The importance of brandability will never change and is something ALL businesses understand, even the people at the tippy top of a corp.
Branding is everything, .COM generics and descriptives rule the internet and are here to stay, no matter what a bunch of software/SEO nerds say. But let these guys unload their premium .COM’s at a discount, I’m not complaining.
The day we acquired SavannahRealEstate.com was the same day we stopped all print advertising. The name is everything to our business. We have been blessed with organic rankings “Google” “Yahoo” “Bing” since the acquisition. While my fellow brokers and agents are spending thousands or tens of thousands of dollars on advertising….weather it be print,media,or internet we spend “0″ and thus we constantly enjoy a steady flow of high quality leads. As Peter mentioned with DenverRealEstate.com – the domain SavannahRealEstate.com has paid for itself at least 100 times over!!!
One final thought…….when entering into the real estate business we needed a competative advantage…….we succeeded BIG TIME!
Congrats on high ranking Luxurybedding.com and DiscountBedding.com!!!
4 me linguists do not change instantly we are hardwired 4 a few hundred years yet. Marketing memory is more important than anything Amazon was an anchor Amazon.com used. The smart money will not be unloading the premium keywords, although I wish they would.
It’s great to see/read so many intelligent people commenting on Mike’s blog, who always has the best readers. Nothing more for me to add, except SEO means nothing to me personally since I don’t develop, and I been buying exact match domains since 1997 and it’s done me well. I could care less what Google has to say.
I really think this is not a smart move by google, if i type in dating it really makes sense dating.com comes up top, i know they paid a lot for the domain and bacuase they paid a lot more likely they are a sirius dating site.
Jim
Have to agree with you, there are a lot of very smart people that comment and share there thoughts here.
thanks to all.
The comments I made directly to Aaron’s article bear repeating here…
SEO is only part of the story
Aaron, you’re missing the big picture here. Most companies of any real size will be doing paid advertising in tandem with their SEO efforts. And that’s an area where exact-match domains have played and will continue to play a key role, since the right exact-match domain will generate a higher CTR (and correspondingly more traffic/a lower CPC) than “branded” alternatives, assuming we’re not talking about a case where there’s a clear “household name” company in the mix.
I covered this in my case study, where I pitted “electric bicycles” against 2 branded alternatives, and managed to generate a near-doubling of CTR for the same ads, bids, keywords, etc. In other words, the ONLY difference was the domain name. http://www.memorabledomains.co.uk/ppc-generic-domains.html
This is down to the fact that Google will bold the URL if it is an exact match to the search in question, so you’ve got one ad where the URL is lit up like a christmas tree and therefore stands out from the crowd. At the same time, there’s a psychologically compelling “click” of recognition when people see and take note of the URL, since it matches their train of thought at the time they conducted that search.
Because the CTR improvements have literally nothing to do with Google’s algorithm, they’re not going to go away – if anything, the owners of exact-match domains are having a field day right now as Google is experimenting with adding the domain name at the end of the ad title, and also moving the URL up to be the second line of the ad (thus bringing the highlighted text into even more prominence).
So any company spending a reasonable amount on PPC should sit down and do a bit of math, and see what this kind of CTR improvement might mean to their ad budget, sales, ROI and bottom line.
And that’s before we even start to consider the roughly 90% of advertising that takes place offline, where an exact match domain can really help because it makes the URL to be visited (when such a call to action is desired) much, much easier to remember. Instead of forcing somebody who is being bombarded with marketing messages and who has an extremely limited attention span to 1) learn what your company does and 2) remember a contrived URL, they instead only have to remember a URL that fits into their existing thought pattern. A frictionless process, that again will pay huge dividends in terms of ROI.
Beyond that, there’s also the “credibility boost” which, while unquantifiable, is nevertheless very real. If you’re competing against 100 other companies to sell a particular product/service, the fact that you have THE domain name that EXACTLY describes that product/service helps to make you look like the leading player in the market rather than just another also-ran.
So even if there was literally ZERO SEO benefit to be wrung out of an exact match domain (which will never be the case, since the credibility factor alone makes it easier to build links, for example) there is still massive value in securing the right domain name for companies savvy enough to look beyond the very narrow issue of Google’s possible dialling-down of some nebulous “SEO boost” given to exact match domains.
Oh, and then there’s Bing – but I think I’ve made my point!
One more thought…
Sorry, forgot to add: the more Google makes it hard for companies to get traffic organically, the more important it becomes for them to seek out an edge – any edge – in the paid PPC advertising race.
So as Google clutters the results with maps, photos, images, in-house results from group companies, places, etc. etc. merchants are going to HAVE to turn to PPC to replace the lost traffic (Google’s plan all along, of course – it’s as clear as daylight) and the one un-replicable edge they can secure for themselves is the exact-match domain for their main keyphrase, since all other aspects of the PPC process (keywords being bid on, landing pages, ads, budgets, bids etc.) can be replicated by competitors, but the exact match bonus – the one Google really CAN’T take away – will accrue to them and them alone.
This is worst day for .com holders by far.
This essentially devalues all $xxx,xxx domains to $7 domains thereby leveling the playing field.
Excellent point Robert. And at 1% of .com, that puts premium .co’s somewhere around, say, 8 cents?
Sounds about right
You need to go inn and read with an open mind imo. Yes there are risk factors.
Part of me was thinking what is seobook hidden agenda. Is he jealous of old timers and who have more cash then him? Seo this seo that. He missed the boat. Rick will blow him away even with seo or franks massive traffic. Berkens has this as well.
The URL bar issue worries me some. But in meantime a lot of money will be made.
These seo experts are intimated with category killer names to advise to clients. Less work and pay for them imo.
“And I would love to hear Wall on why brands are favored by Search Engines.. perhaps it’s because they have mindshare too and Google thinks only the sites with mindshare are worthy of its top spots ?”
I think there are a number of factors in this
- wanting to reduce marketplace duplication (the fewer people there are in the supply chain the more of the value Google can capture)
- these signals can be quite expensive to create (if SEO is hard & expensive fewer people will invest in it)
- getting tired of dealing with a lot of the same scams over and over again
- the brands buy a wider array of ads based on not only direct response, but also branding-based goals
If you think about it, Google’s push toward promoting brands is sorta inline with their strategy to promote raw domain authority, except that:
- some key brands get an extra boost
- some of the high authority domain names that built authority in cheesy ways got whacked.
“Branding and SEO are two totally different things.”
I would have agreed with this statement 3 or 4 years ago, but in many ways SEOs have been forced to approach SEO from a brand-first perspective. If I see too many huge brands in an area I won’t enter it unless I think we have some sort of branding advantage angle that I can think up almost immediately.
“The Internet is far too big for one company to dominate forever. They may remain a big player, but there will eventually be others that may become even bigger.”
The big catch here is that many of the competitors are *also* pushing toward promoting big brands.
Bing’s Stevan Weitz was recently interviewed & mentioned things like “a digital representation of the offline world” and “a web of verbs” … when you unpack those statements & read his other comments I think it also indicates the desire for brand advantage & advantage for larger platforms that can be tightly integrated into the search results. In some areas vertical integration will replace the concept of organic search results. We are already seeing a bit of it in Google & Microsoft is pushing down the same path.
stonetemple.com/articles/interview-stefan-weitz.shtml
And, for as much as people promote that social media is somehow different, HP research shows that the items that bubble up the most on sites like Twitter tend to generally be more of a megaphone for stories that are already in big media: “we found that mainstream media play a role in most trending topics and actually act as feeders of these trends. Twitter users then seem to be acting more as filter and amplifier of traditional media in most cases.”
h30507.www3.hp.com/t5/Data-Central/HP-research-shows-mainstream-media-drive-Twitter-trends-to-a/ba-p/87985
“Don’t think its great news for other extensions at all.”
I agree here. I actually fear that the glut of other domains adds so much confusion to the marketplace that everything but .com & proper CCTLDs take some sort of hit.
Thanks for the tons of smart & insightful comments over here
It’s really a bust for me to read on long articles but this one’s a great one, even comments are really feeding thoughts.
I fancy the thought of how this would really affect SEO, brands, and overall internet marketing. The play of browsers, ads, and domains, overall investments is a fun game. Kind of reminds me how Schwartz is making a fuzz about how better such changes are for THE premium domains that command direct traffic and how people should stop being Google’s bitch.
Without a doubt, SEO is a definitely something to consider but not everything should be based on it. People should have better foresight and a more solid footing on how it runs and not base everything on what’s currently hot because once your footing changes then you fall back down and start all over again. Nobody wants that.
LOL @ Cline Robert’s comment (yes the fake one).
Don’t be a Google Victim…
If your business model solely depend on Google ranking, SEO etc…
you are the victims of Google…
Google can manipulate your business whatever they like by changing this…changing that…you ends up deep shits…
@Jim
“… SEO means nothing to me personally since I don’t develop, and I been buying exact match domains since 1997 and it’s done me well. I could care less what Google has to say.”
I agree with your comment.
Exact match keyword domain names is the way to go.
Forget the SEO strategies…Google keeps changing this…changing that anyway…how can you keep up with all these SEO craps…you rather go to beach…enjoy your life…
How many people were using Mozilla Firefox five years ago?
How many people remember Netscape & AltaVista today?
Also – think again about those .co acquisitions…
There is far more value to keyword domains than just SEO. Keyword domains explain what products or services you offer, and provide a level of credibility.
A great domain is a brand in itself.
The bottom line is a quality keyword domain is never going to hurt you SEO wise. SEO value is very minor part of how I view domain value.
Brad
@jim Holleran
Perfectly said Jim. Couldn’t agree more
@mhb
Just for shits and giggles
Are you worried on the URL address issue in next 5 years?
Curious what you think
“Part of me was thinking what is seobook hidden agenda. Is he jealous of old timers and who have more cash then him? Seo this seo that. He missed the boat. … These seo experts are intimated with category killer names to advise to clients. Less work and pay for them imo.”
I do more SEO work for myself than I do for anyone else. I shared my thoughts on my own strategy…and significantly more than most do, I might add.
For what it is worth, I was one of the first in the SEO space to publicly promote .org or .net domain names (even when they were not seen as being particularly valuable by the marketplace … when you could spend $2,500 and get a better name than some of the stuff people want 6 figures for today).
So it is a bit rich/absurd to say that I both missed out on the way up (called the trend ahead of the market) and that it is sour grapes on the way down (seeing many signals of peaking), when I was publicly ahead of identifying a trend & was putting my money where my mouth was the whole time.
@wall I know your history and maybe I was wrong on couple issues. I know your history and your one of the best seo experts out there.
agree on .net and .org comments
Give you credit you get it compared to your peers for the most part
But I still question the intention some of the post.
Imagine if you had category killer.com and your seo smarts. Not just half the pie
Good luck on future projects.
Example from what I read and don’t know the private details with equity or revenue share but will say this
Candy.com and new owner is benefiting. Imagine the direct navigation.
Then its ranked well.
When owner is at a party and they I’m the CEO of candy.com, people realize they mean business. Or I’m the CEO of mycandybars.com. Which one are they going remember. Category names can be branded and business.
Fidelty needs to fire there seo experts and last time I checked, retire.com wasn’t even being utilized or URL redirect. Thousands of customers being lost. Why? It department, designers, whatever you call them want job security?? I think so. Look at newspapers. Same example. Look at magazines. Clueless.
Combination of 2 powerful thing. Google can change things tomorrow and candy.com will still have direct navigation each day.
Its also easy to remember and category killer name.
now I will say this not every name is like this and powers of things.
I have spoken to lots of seo experts. Its becoming a joke more and more. They collect your money and run. There intimated by solid domains.
2 cents.
Exact match domains have been shown to have a higher click through rate and carry enormous credibility to the searcher’s eye. Whether or not this article is correct there will always be value in an industry specific domain name.