Old domains

[chimaera]

I've seen marketplace threads asking for 'old domains' - ie those that have been registered a long time. And recently I saw a domain on ebay that was 10 years old (which it makes a big deal of).

How does the age of the domain add to its value? It is a backlink thing, or do SEs index older domains better perhaps?

 

[EbookLover]

Because supposedly using old domains will keep you out of the Google Sandbox.

 

[smub]

also if you have sites developed more links will be on search engines probably better PR if progress is great

 

[Kate]

You need to check for traffic and backlinks. Just because the name is old doesn't mean it has a lot of links. Old vintage is a bonus but the value of the name does lie elsewhere.
IMO what makes an old name desirable is that it allows the owner to suggest it's been established for a long time.
It's basically the same thing as off the shelf, ready-made companies.

 

[faisj]

You need to check for traffic and backlinks. Just because the name is old doesn't mean it has a lot of links. Old vintage is a bonus but the value of the name does lie elsewhere.
IMO what makes an old name desirable is that it allows the owner to suggest it's been established for a long time.
It's basically the same thing as off the shelf, ready-made companies.

I agree, but mostly old domain names have 'some' traffic.

 

[cache]

if multi-year domain registration helps the ranking, I would assume the SE would also favor the old domains. Am I right?

 

[EbookLover]

You'd think so. But then, I don't think there is any solid evidence that shows that multi-year regs actually do help your site's indexing and rankings in the SEs?

 

[netzilla]

That theory would make sense because the SE'S would probably think that if a domain is regged so more than a year then that must mean that the website must plan to stay around for sometime. I would highly doubt though that any weight would be given to that factor.

I think that the future of SE'S is leaning more towards becoming more "human-like" with the ability to comprehend what good copy is.

 

[cache]

if it were "human-like", I would imagine that it can not judge the quality of the contents, rather it evaluate the quality based how OTHER people's vote on the particular domain. If we invent the term man_year quantity to rate the domain, then 4 man_year may mean 4 people for 1 year or 1 people for 4 years:
case 1. one newly registered domain has 1 man_year because only one person thinks that this domain is worth one year's life.
case 2. one newly registered two year domain has 2 man_year because one person thinks that this domain is worth two year's life.
case 3. a one year domain with one backlink has 2 man_year because two people think that this domain is worth one year, which maybe ranked the same as case 2.

That theory would make sense because the SE'S would probably think that if a domain is regged so more than a year then that must mean that the website must plan to stay around for sometime. I would highly doubt though that any weight would be given to that factor.

I think that the future of SE'S is leaning more towards becoming more "human-like" with the ability to comprehend what good copy is.

 

[netzilla]

I see your point cache but just because a domain has aged doesnt mean that its any better than a new domain. Either one could be a junk spam or adsense site. That is why I mentioned content. I have heard many things about Google working on the ability to evaluate actual content without it having to be viewed by humans.

 

[bquast]

well i thought google was changing the way they calculate pr? Meaning they are not only ranking on content but the age of the domain as well, I seen a post about this somewhere, cannot remember where but *supposedly* they were changing it.

 

[EbookLover]

well i thought google was changing the way they calculate pr? Meaning they are not only ranking on content...

But I don't think content ever did raise G**gle PR. PR is mostly based on backlinks and on-site page interlinking more than anything, if anything else at all. I could be wrong.

I submit that about 70% of the stuff you read about G**gle and ranking is false, anyway.

 

[WhiteWebServices]

Age of domain / length of registration is a sign of quality in that a higher proportion of old domains / those registered for a long time have quality sites attached to them. That's just to say that this is a statistical guide; Google will never put much weight on it, if any at all. There are far better ways of determining quality, and they will always be more important to Google.