information Google says keywords in the TLD part of your URL are ignored for ranking purposes

[sutharshan]

Google’s John Mueller confirmed yesterday in a Google Hangout that keyword-rich TLDs, such as the new top-level domains that have keywords in them — like .LIVE, .NEWS, .ATTORNEY and so on — do not count for ranking purposes. Mueller said Google completely ignores that for ranking purposes.
http://searchengineland.com/google-says-keywords-tld-part-url-ignored-ranking-purposes-251971

 

[dordomai]

a while back someone did a study on exact matches and found that most of the exact match advantage was seen in .com and .net but not so much in domains like .ws, .info etc.

If you think about it there is a good reason for that. Google does not want to be manipulated by SEOs easily.

If anyone could boost their ranking by buying one of the thousands extensions that are now available mostly spammers would benefit. It would be foolish for them to boost any keyword domain.

Would just help to get low quality sites on top. Something they clearly don't want.

 

[frank-germany]

I'm not saying that Google is downright lying about this but I am not saying I believe them either.

I can't believe that you say

they at least "don't do evil", right?

 

[daica85]

Totally agree with folks above. What G says may be truth and may be lie. Like 50/50. They always tell us how we should do in order to make them happy.


So what? Showing something in bold doesn't mean higher rankings, huh? Correlation does not imply causation. But here it's not even correlation.

It's correct, maybe we will wait for a time to see the change. However, I think those TLDs are just extensions and do not count in SEO factors.

 

[GBA]

Mueller said Google completely ignores that for ranking purposes.

If it proves, that's a checkmate.

 

[Messiah]

Not sure if this means anything with how it works as I'm not an seo/Google pro but my gTLD site is listed #1, left keyword and right keyword without the dot. And of course #1 with the dot too.

Now if I key in just the left of the dot I'm on page #6. I never wanted to be known as just DN therefore page #6 doesn't bother me that much so IMO I'm being ranked where I want to be I guess.

In short I'm #1, keyword name and keyword extension without adding the dot and that's what I wanted.

You would need to understand the volume of traffic where your website is ranking. That means if your website is ranking first, how many search volumes does the keyword have for the month.

Here is your gtld website volume search/month:

It doesn't mean that because of new TLD you are ranking, it might mean that you are ranking because of your anchor text.

 

[GBA]

Maybe Google are right and do not consider the TLD by now. But secondary, this IS clearly an important factor for all established websites.

Go to google.com. Search for "com.space". Check the 1st spot. Oh wait..

 

[elevator]

If G says it does not give a special consideration for the keyword in the domain for ranking; it does not mean that the domain can not rank. And.if keyword domains or emd ranks it has more advantage than irrelivant domains and it has more clicks tendencies

 

[Dotword]

Possibly true now but does not make sense to prevail long-term.

As has been said, there are examples on the web claiming this kind of SEO information does not always bear out when tested independently.

Also I question the use of the phrase "confirmed" in the OP as in the video John Mueller says "Um as far as I understand it is pretty much completely." and in a way which IMO doesn't shout out that he is the authority on this.

 

[Fancy.domains]

I would disagree here.... By actually typing within the double quotes and mentioning tld next to the keyword

I did NOT use quotation marks when I searched this. Please, try without.

I can agree on the links and anchor texts. However, the result will be the same for new gTLDs, so the TLD will have an important role for developed sites. At least secondary = in reality. Eg. not many will link to Coffee.club with only the keyword "coffee", they will use "coffee club" as the anchor text.

 

[HotKey]

Or just optimize your page for it!!
It isn't all about domains. It isn't that simplistic.
Pages can and do rank for hundreds of keywords - they don't have to be in the domain.

Agreed. Page content should always be one of the crucial factors in considering search results. I think moving forward though in the search industry, where perhaps folks are looking for specific results in say, a title or business name rather than the actual content (because content does not always reflect a brand), it's time for a new algorithm to be developed. An algorithm that displays varying results, perhaps in two seperate columns, such as keyword title/domain name results and keyword content results.

 

[Bullock]

@doubleU

I searched: on Google in this way:

bankaccount.com = 60.400.000
bankaccount.net = 60.400.000
bankaccount.org = 60.400.000

account.bank = 29.300.000 (extension .bank)
account bank = 487.000.000 (without dot)

bank account = 133.000.000
"bank account" = 59.200.000


In conclusion, the results show that Google doesn't consider the keyword extension, rather, it represents a negative factor!

 

[Messiah]

As my previous example shows this is simply not true and the proof is below :

Example Search :
site:.vision pulsevision
Search Result :
No.1
https://pulse.vision/

How many people type Pulse Vision in Google? The keyword search volume is Zero. Do you see its title "Pulse.vision" in Google search results?

With zero search volume, it is pretty easy to rank any website at #1. When the search volume increases, you would need a lot of authority to rank higher. If I had PulseVision.com (or .org /.net any gtld) as developed website and I create a great content,I would rank better than Pulse.Vision pretty easily.

 

[doubleU]

How many people type Pulse Vision in Google? The keyword search volume is Zero. Do you see its title "Pulse.vision" in Google search results?

With zero search volume, it is pretty easy to rank any website at #1. When the search volume increases, you would need a lot of authority to rank higher. If I had PulseVision.com (or .org /.net any gtld) as developed website and I create a great content,I would rank better than Pulse.Vision pretty easily.

Operating from a .com will not give you an SEO advantage or rank you higher than any other TLD for the same keywords.

New gTLDs are not in any way disadvantaged form ranking in search results.

Google recognizes keyword/s both left and right of the dot with the search query.

If search engines operated with this kind of bias then they would be subject to 'Unfair Competition Laws' in particular the EU.

 

[dordomai]

Operating from a .com will not give you an SEO advantage or rank you higher than any other TLD for the same keywords.

New gTLDs are not in any way disadvantaged form ranking in search results.

If search engines operated with this kind of bias then they would be subject to 'Unfair Competition Laws' in particular the EU.

Not true. In the past .info and others were shown to rank less well than .com and .net. They can discount them like they want to. It's just one of many factors though.

Some years back experienced affiliate marketers tried to acquire as many exact match .com for their niches and spent a small fortune doing it.

 

[doubleU]

Not true. In the past .info and other were shown to rank less well than .com and .net. They can discount them like they want to. It's just one of many factors though.

Where are you sourcing this information from ?

 

[dordomai]

Where are you sourcing this information from ?

There were SEO studies done on this in the past. .com and .net exact match did rank better than the "lesser" ones like .info. Not surprising as Google does not want their results to be manipulated and obtaining a .com or .net can be quite costly for good keywords. If anyone could get a boost by buying one of hundreds keyword.whatever it would soon be abused.

if anyone can easily have an exact match it's not worth anything.

what sense would it make to give vacationrentals.com the same weight as vacationrentals.top?

The former is incredibly hard to obtain for a spammer and carries a certain authority the latter could have been bought for $1. Why would an algo not take that into account?

I don't think they have the attitude to invite everyone with their $1 keyword.whatever site and treat it the same as keyword.com when ranking for that keyword.

 

[Bullock]

This has very little to do with the topic here.

The topic regards "ranking". Yes, I know!

 

[Bullock]

I think it's best you actually learn about how Serps work before conducting "research" and coming to a conclusion.

My thought is simple. When EMD isn't available in .com, I wouldn't suggest a nTLD with a EMD keyword in the extension. Or, perhaps, change domain/URL hoping to get a boost in ranking with new extensions.

 

[golan]

Not true. In the past .info and others were shown to rank less well than .com and .net.

There were SEO studies done on this in the past. .com and .net exact match did rank better than the "lesser" ones like .info.

Not true. Good whitehat .info's and others were always as good as .com's. There were no any such "SEO studies", they were merely SEO myths invented by fucking "SEO Gurus" in order to confirm their greatness in the eyes of their flocks and to sell them more $7 WSO's full of bullshit on fucking dumpsters like WaFo, BHW, DP etc etc.

 

[doubleU]

It's very dangerous for such a dominant search engine to comment on their search algorithm.

No information is the best policy as one wrong comment could open up a can of worms followed by a decade of law suits and mistrust.

The weight placed on keywords in a domain name for ranking purposes has declined a long time ago and has been partially replaced by other criteria, so much so that it may be more worth while concentrating on your domains branding potential.

 

[doubleU]

In fact @loredan it has everything to do with search algorithms and this is far from common sense. The average person has no idea how they work.

Keywords in TLDs is now so commonplace that it can't be left ignored by users.

 

[doubleU]

I've found actually an older statement by Matt Cutts, 2012, software engineer at Google, also disproving the fact of taking the new gltds into special account:

https://plus.google.com/+MattCutts/posts/4VaWg4TMM5F

All that's saying is that all TLDs are of equal importance and .com will not be giving a preference over other TLDs.

 

[doubleU]

No TLD is greater than other unless you are using a specific TLD for your branding purpose. I can use WowBlog.com the same way you can use Wow.blog for your branding purpose.

But saying a Keyword TLD is given more importance than other TLD is just a myth. We are not Google insiders but we usually believe what they are saying. When they say there is a penguin update, we see our sites getting heart attack and they go down in search results. Did they lie? nope. When they say there is Panda update, we see our sites getting lower ranked and only high quality sites are displayed in Serps. I don't think they are lying about TLD thing.

You can choose whatever TLD you want. It is not giving a special treatment to rank you higher.

If you think Travel.Agency has better chance than Travel.biz, then it's wrong. Because if you don't do your SEO for Travel.Agency and if I do good SEO for Travel.biz, my site would rank higher than yours. This is just vise versa. It all depends on your SEO and not on TLD.

When it comes to the user perception, it usually depends which place your website is ranking. The first spot gets around 33% of clicks, while the second spot gets 17% and then 8% for third spot.

I have to agree with most of what you said but has I mentioned earlier the search is never over when google reply's with a result set for a particular query. Searchers will choose which link is appropriate from the results they are given. This is where the power of exact match left and right of the dot comes to into play.

Also if google finds that more people choose a lower ranked search result then I'm sure it will take notice and increase it's rank in the future.

 

[Daniel Mac Sweeney]

Google dont give a shit about the tld, it's all about good
Content with them

 

[doubleU]

Google dont give a sh*t about the tld, it's all about good
Content with them

This has being the case for a long time now, years ago you could rank high for 'exact match' even No.1 spot by simply parking your domain names.

In an effort to improve search results Google demoted most parked domain names and penalized websites that over optimized or contain to many affiliated links.