advice Google’s John Mueller Cautions Against Keyword-Rich Domains

[News]

Keyword-rich domains may harm a website's long-term success, warns Google Search Advocate John Mueller. Here are five reasons why.

Keyword-rich domain names were once thought to be an effective way to increase a website’s visibility and improve search engine rankings.

However, there are several reasons why keyword-rich domain names can be detrimental to a website’s success.

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[bhartzer]

You need to know the history of EMDs (exact match domains) in Google's results so you can fully understand what's going on.

Before Sept 2012, Google gave a "boost" in the rankings to domains that were EMDs. So if you had Keyword.com you were given a boost if in rankings if someone searched for "keyword".

In Sept 2012, Google rolled out the "EMD Update" algorithm update, which got rid of the boost. So, rather than getting a boost for using keyword.com for 'keyword', there was no boost available. Every domain supposedly is now created equal.

But, Google has a lot of ranking factors, one of which is related to 'anchor text' of links pointing to your site.

If you have Keyword.com, then there is a VERY good chance that other sites linking to you will think of you and mention you as being "Keyword", thus you actually get an indirect ranking boost. The anchor text of links pointing to you include "keyword" or "keyword.com", which helps your rankings.

That is why it's still important to buy and use a keyword rich domain name. It helps your rankings in Google 'indirectly', not because of the fact that Google is giving you a boost for having the keyword in your domain name.

By the way, it's important to note that Bing appears to give you a boost in rankings for "keyword" if you're using something like keyword(.com) as your domain name.

 

[bmugford]

Here's what he said literally:

I'm not a fan of keyword-keyword domains, but YMMV. Random thoughts:​

• everyone thinks you're a spammer
• changing business focus, or even expanding, is harder
• you have no brand name, there's nothing that people can search for which "obviously" should show your site. You're always competing, you're not building value with long-term users.

Source:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SEO/comments/10xxog9/_/j7w15ks

This is a pretty awful take by John Mueller.

I will go ahead and let Hotels.com, Cars.com, and others know that they don't have a "brand".

In all seriousness, not everyone wants or needs a brand. If you just sell a product or service sometimes it is just more efficient to advertise that.

It can cost a lot of money to build a "brand" from scratch. In many, or most, situations an end user is likely better off just buying a relevant domain.

A quality domain does a lot of the work itself when it comes to establishing credibility.

Brad

 

[AEProgram]

Everyone thinks you're a spammer? He sounds like another angry person that couldn't afford a good keyword name.

 

[Future Sensors]

Here's what he said literally:

I'm not a fan of keyword-keyword domains, but YMMV. Random thoughts:​

• everyone thinks you're a spammer
• changing business focus, or even expanding, is harder
• you have no brand name, there's nothing that people can search for which "obviously" should show your site. You're always competing, you're not building value with long-term users.

Source:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SEO/comments/10xxog9/_/j7w15ks

 

[Future Sensors]

Yep. What this Mr. John Mueller does believe in is Google+, which he links to in his Twitter bio. However, that Google+ profile stopped working several years ago, because the service was discontinued by his employer.

Nothing to see here folks.

 

[VadimK]

That's a very lame and simply a wrong statement.

Best-Running-Shoes.com vs Nike - is he for real, seriously? Three words, 2 hyphens?? )) First of all, it's pretty pathetic to strawman the opponent's idea like this. He should've take it one step further and compare The-Very-Best-Running-Shoes-Ever.com vs Nike.com

Secondly, I guess he should have an idea how many billions Nike invested in its name before a sports brand pops up in everyone's hand once you utter these four letters? You take most of similar short names, again - before they are branded vs RunningShoes.com - and RunningShoes will beat them by a country mile, in all aspects (SEO, memorability, sounding)

Nothing against brand words (I have a few dozen myself) but generally all these ''get your own non-keyword cool name'' points - yeah, again, any idea of an investment needed to develop your own brand, even on a smaller scale? Let alone Nike or Apple...

 

[KTC]

You need to know the history of EMDs (exact match domains) in Google's results so you can fully understand what's going on.

Before Sept 2012, Google gave a "boost" in the rankings to domains that were EMDs. So if you had Keyword.com you were given a boost if in rankings if someone searched for "keyword".

In Sept 2012, Google rolled out the "EMD Update" algorithm update, which got rid of the boost. So, rather than getting a boost for using keyword.com for 'keyword', there was no boost available. Every domain supposedly is now created equal.

But, Google has a lot of ranking factors, one of which is related to 'anchor text' of links pointing to your site.

If you have Keyword.com, then there is a VERY good chance that other sites linking to you will think of you and mention you as being "Keyword", thus you actually get an indirect ranking boost. The anchor text of links pointing to you include "keyword" or "keyword.com", which helps your rankings.

That is why it's still important to buy and use a keyword rich domain name. It helps your rankings in Google 'indirectly', not because of the fact that Google is giving you a boost for having the keyword in your domain name.

By the way, it's important to note that Bing appears to give you a boost in rankings for "keyword" if you're using something like keyword(.com) as your domain name.

Very well put. In the scheme of things for SEO, it can be good to build brand awareness around a name for branding purposes. That's where the comparisons truly end though with branded names vs EMD names, IMHO.

Keyword-rich domains may harm a website's long-term success, warns Google Search Advocate John Mueller. Here are five reasons why.

Keyword-rich domain names were once thought to be an effective way to increase a website’s visibility and improve search engine rankings.

However, there are several reasons why keyword-rich domain names can be detrimental to a website’s success.

This is a pretty awful take by John Mueller.

I will go ahead and let Hotels.com, Cars.com, and others know that they don't have a "brand".

In all seriousness, not everyone wants or needs a brand. If you just sell a product or service sometimes it is just more efficient to advertise that.

It can cost a lot of money to build a "brand" from scratch. In many, or most, situations an end user is likely better off just buying a relevant domain.

A quality domain does a lot of the work itself when it comes to establishing credibility.

Brad

Here's what he said literally:

I'm not a fan of keyword-keyword domains, but YMMV. Random thoughts:​

• everyone thinks you're a spammer
• changing business focus, or even expanding, is harder
• you have no brand name, there's nothing that people can search for which "obviously" should show your site. You're always competing, you're not building value with long-term users.

It makes total sense on why he'd say this publicly. He works for Google, the place where their biggest money maker is in paid advertisement and not so much on the SEO side. It might as well say, "don't spend your money on a EMD domain, but do spend money with our ad platform, so you can build your brand that way."

Unless there are case studies that actually correlate what he is saying that EMDs are actively harming organic placement or even causing higher rises in cost with Google Ads, I'd hypothesis that this is more of a self-serving tactic that helps the hand that feeds him. Not mad at that, but at least that's what I'm seeing underneath the surface or else why would some people pay for exact match EMDs for large sums of money to build a brand around?

Just my personal opinion, but this is a take with a grain of salt until proven otherwise.

 

[bmugford]

For small businesses it can be a good to implement the service and location into the brand. But even then I get the impression that it was more of a brand-decision than a a way to get ahead in web-searches.

But even then I'd say Mueller's two points stand, it's difficult to expand, and it doesn't give you an advantage in SEO.

That is a mistake he makes with his comments. People are not buying domains only for SEO ranking.
That is a very Google centric mindset.

These domains go on business cards, vehicles, local advertising, etc. It can help establish instant credibility.

As far as expanding, I am sure they will do fine with roofing in a metro area or around 5 million people. Not every company has their sights set on world domination.

This is just one of many real word examples from my own sales.

With many domains the product or service itself is the brand.

Brad

 

[DealMaker1]

I personally have no problems with EMD or brands. I own and sell many of each.
You will probably notice my brand is "DataCube" and not an EMD in the field.

However, I do have a problem with a poorly worded, disingenuous argument about the negatives of EMD.
It is not that simple. I would have expected more from someone like John Mueller.

Brad

Basically he was speaking for the sake of speaking and lacking in substance. Shame because all he accomplished is getting some people frazzled and nothing more.

 

[Sutruk]

I've never seen the phrase "keyword-rich suggestion tools" in my life, In fact Google gives me 0 results for it (it also gives 0 results for keyword-rich suggestion tool")

Check it again. For "keyword rich domain suggestion tool" Google gives 47,700,000 results to me.
In fact at the first results page, every site has the title "keyword rich domain suggestion tool".

 

[Business Brands]

Google warns? Whatever... flowers.com is flowers.com no matter what Google warns.

 

[bmugford]

I would say there is some truth behind the original statement, but John Mueller's comments go down the path of hyperbole.

His "best-running-shoes.com" example is a classic false dilemma logical fallacy. He is comparing what is objectively a terrible domain to a theoretical "brand" which is not named. That is not a fair comparison.

It really depends on the field and type of domain. There are endless case studies of end users upgrading their domains to generics and doing very well with them.

Some types of generics are far easier to "brand" than others.

I agree that "Dental Surgery" would be a questionable company name. It is very broad.

But at the same time you probably still want some suggestive term in your domain vs some random "brand" that is not connected to dental or surgery in any way.

Brad

 

[bmugford]

No, not if you read the reddit post and the article referred to in this threads.

The advice his gives are as follows:

• Don't buy an EMD for SEO, because an EMD won't help you with SEO.
• EMD:s can make it difficult to expand your business, because it can lock you into certain keywords.
• "Keyword-rich" (long) EMD:s are unprofessional and often identified as spam sites.

This is all sound and justified advice.

By misconstruing this as "EMD:s are all garbage, avoid them at all cost," you're missing the point, because that's not what he's saying.

His first point is quite literally - "everyone thinks you’re a spammer".

That is like a dumb take you would find from some random idiot on Twitter.

Brad

 

[VadimK]

I already wrote on this, but just to be even more clear, if he really wanted compare a keyword-rich domain vs brand, he should have compared Nike not vs ridiculously awful 2-hyphenated 3-words name, but vs Shoes.com (but important - where Nike is not a brand developed as a result of an investment of billion dollars - but just a random 4 letter name which only has chance to become a brand - imagine, you don't know what Nike is, no such company, no trademarks exist, nothing - it's just a random 4 letter domain name).

So, now, would you take nike.com or shoes.com?
(If nike is hardly imaginable as such, imagine a word rike.com vs shoes.com)

To me, the answer is obvious.

 

[VadimK]

No.


No.

"Rich" means "an abundance of".

If you're "rich in money" (wealthy) it means that you have an abundance of money.

If you're "rich in love" then that means that you have an abundance of people that love you.

By the same line of reasoning, "rich in keywords" or "keyword-rich" means to have an abundance of keywords.

For a domain, neither 1 or 2 keywords can be considered an abundance of keywords.

Consequently, neither shoes.com nor runningshoes.com are not keyword-rich domains. Because they both contain a relative meager amount of keywords compared to other domains

Talking about proper English grammatics - yes, but it's definitely not the case from the domaining standpoint.

Do yourself a favor, go and check across different online ''keywords-rich suggestion tools'' - where for any given keyword numerous combinations of two words will be suggested.

 

[DealMaker1]

Prove it.

Google's Search Advocate, John Mueller, has made it clear in no uncertain terms that the SLD has no effect on SEO.

You're saying that he's wrong. But you have no evidence to back it up. It's all baseless speculation on your part.

So post the source you're basing your claim on, because I have no interest in indulging you on your conspiracy theories in this thread as well.

Are you paid an endorsement fee for this Mueller guy (aka 15 minute Mueller)?

In any case the burden of proof is on your shoulders. By virtue of Cutts and Mueller speaking toward a "cutback" in keyword domains (the SLD side) IS the proof that the SLD has always factored into their ranking equation. That equation is being refined but the keyword side is NOT being expunged.

Isn't that proof enough that SLD have ALWAYS factored into the ranking? That these Google guys come right out and say it has been a factor?! They have just implied weighting will be refined , that's all.

 

[bmugford]

No. You basically don't have a brand name.

Call yourself "dental surgery" and your company isn't identifiable by that name.

But a term like BostonRoofing.com can be.

In fact I sold that domain years ago, and the end users have done very well with it.
It explains where you are. It explains what you do.

That type of domain gives instant credibility in the area that some random "brand" is not going to.

EMD terms work better for some fields than others.

It can be extremely expensive to build a "brand" from scratch if there is no suggestion in the domain what you do. This is simply not feasible for many mom & pop type companies, which represent the vast majority of potential end users.

In certain professional fields like medical, law, etc. people tend to use their own names as brands more than EMD or made up brands.

Brad

 

[Future Sensors]

This is Google's official advice / opinion, and confirms that Mueller is talking nonsense.

https://domains.google/learn/how-to-come-up-with-a-good-domain-name/

 

[bmugford]

I already wrote on this, but just to be even more clear, if he really wanted compare a keyword-rich domain vs brand, he should have compared Nike not vs ridiculously awful 2-hyphenated 3-words name, but vs Shoes.com (but important - where Nike is not a brand developed as a result of an investment of billion dollars - but just a random 4 letter name which only has chance to become a brand - imagine, you don't know what Nike is, no such company, no trademarks exist, nothing - it's just a random 4 letter domain name).

So, now, would you take nike.com or shoes.com?
(If nike is hardly imaginable as such, imagine a word rike.com vs shoes.com)

To me, the answer is obvious.

Yes, the terrible example domain was clearly by design. It was to diminish EMD as a viable option.
Quality EMD are a viable option. Shitty ones are not.

Brad

 

[MKA]

Uhm... Isn't this old news? I mean, it's common knowledge emds don't help your ranking from a SEO point of view.

The reason this question, and these stupid answers I may add, keep popping up is because in the past you could use any shitty 5 word dashed emd and you would have a lot of ranking benefits. Times have changed. People are quite stubborn when they were taught something which has now become outdated knowledge.

The gist of his statement is: this is no longer the case. Content is king. Everything else is just discussing semantics.

Mueller's revelations are fairly new, roughly a year old.

But a lot of domainers have issues with it. Which makes sense, because if you own a lot of EMD:s and you want to sell them in the near future you need to be able to convince your clients that EMD:s are valuable, and main selling-point of an EMD:s is that it will generate free traffic by giving an SEO bonus, which functions a bit like free advertisement.

It's important to understand that Google (or any other search engine) have no interest in promoting your portfolio of domains, their goal is to provide the end-user with relevant sites.

Take carinsurance.com which sold for $49.7 million in 2010 (one of the most expensive domains ever sold). Its site doesn't even rank on the first page of Google for the search [car insurance]. You could always make the argument that the owner is an idiot that hasn't done proper SEO structuring, but I can't find any blatant SEO errors, and you'd think someone who could blow $50 million on a domain would be able to spare a bit of money to keep his business site relevant.

You could of course always make the argument that boats.com ranks first for boats. But the question is: Is that because of the domain, or is it because the site-owner has spent a lot of money on ads and SEO to keep the site relevant? After all, if they had the money to buy boats.com then they should have money to invest in ads and SEO. As outsiders to the site we don't really know, which muddies the waters quite a bit, and it allows domainers to propagate this idea that using EMD:s give you preferential treatment in the Search Engines, without knowing if it really does.

But if what Mueller says is true:

There’s no secret (or public) SEO-bonus for having your keywords in the domain name.

searchenginejournal.com/google-no-seo-bonus-for-keyword-based-domains/438324/

Then it's clear that it doesn't.

 

[Future Sensors]

Let's say this again. Mueller included the hyphen in his example (keyword-keyword domains, he said. Not keywordkeyword.). The SEJ article made this broader, and a lot of confusion ensued. Also here in this thread.

 

[bmugford]

Because it wouldn't matter. His point is that EMD:s don't help with SEO and that it might also be difficult to expand your business in the future. The point stands even if you go with runningshoes.com.

RunningShoes.com is certainly a viable option, especially if a company does not have the millions or billions to build a brand in a highly competitive field.

On what planet is Best-Running-Shoes.com a viable option?

There is no point when you present an option that would never be viable vs. another option.

There are generic domains in use all over the place. GunBroker.com for instance.
That is another EMD, and one of the biggest websites in the field.

Does everyone think they are a spammer, as John stated?

That is a viable choice. Some double hyphenated turd EMD is not.

People might think "Best-Running-Shoes.com" is a "spammer" because the domain sucks, not because it is an EMD.

Brad

 

[bmugford]

Brad I always value your input. My argument would be that Boston Roofing can be a trademark and could identify a single entity, however you're always going to be competing with other brands that offer the same service in Boston.

True, but you are always competing regardless of your domain.

If their domain was BostonRoofing.com, RoofDoctors.com, RoofDoctorsInBoston.com, etc.
Boston Roofing is the perfect type of domain in that field when it comes to credibility.

You don't need to capture 100% of the market share.

I guarantee all things being equal, most customers are going to choose BostonRoofing.com over RoofDoctorsInBoston.com or some terrible "brand".

Brad

 

[DealMaker1]

No one is trying to win any arguments, we're trying make sense of what Mueller is saying.


You're conflating site keywords with SLD keywords. Keywords on your site will affect your SEO, keywords in your SLD won't.

Personally I'd say that EMD:s are some of the least valuable in general, above alpha-numeric. But I'd also limit my definition of EMD:s to be two words or more. Any one-word domain I classify as a generic domain because they're more consistently valued that way.


I agree. But people aren't reaching out to Mueller for help on semantics, they're reaching out to him to figure out how Google's search engine works.


Nowhere does this say that keywords in the domain help with SEO or even mentions EMD:s.


Because it wouldn't matter. His point is that EMD:s don't help with SEO and that it might also be difficult to expand your business in the future. The point stands even if you go with runningshoes.com.


No, it was a good choice because it emphasized the point he was trying to make: EMD:s don't help with SEO, and it makes it difficult to expand your business in the future.

A great example is zenpayroll.com who had to rebrand to gusto.com since they couldn't secure zen.com when they wanted to expand into different services. Now zenpayroll.com is a brand and not an EMD, but the point stands.

Well, if I'm conflating, you are splitting. It's obvious an SLD is just a fancy term for the part that comes before the dot. That's all. Let's not fall in love with our intellects now...

So an SLD can be a keyword or a brand. Google search will always take a look at what is to the left of dot and rank accordingly. And sometimes that is generic keywords. So it is not just for page SEO. Keywords in the domain WILL affect SEO. If it didn't, there would be no reason for Cutts or Mueller to come out and talk about keyword domains. Would there?

You will never divine what Mueller says ( it's called good old-fashioned protection of trade secrets). They never say anything straight forward because they don't want people trying to game the system. It's all open to wide interpretation, much like blue chip stock earnings conference calls.

So if there is something to be learned, I suppose it just has to be done by experimentation and observation and then to adapt.

 

[branding]

Uhm... Isn't this old news? I mean, it's common knowledge emds don't help your ranking from a SEO point of view.

The reason this question, and these stupid answers I may add, keep popping up is because in the past you could use any shitty 5 word dashed emd and you would have a lot of ranking benefits. Times have changed. People are quite stubborn when they were taught something which has now become outdated knowledge.

The gist of his statement is: this is no longer the case. Content is king. Everything else is just discussing semantics.