Saturday’s guest post about keyword alternative domain names seems to have hit a nerve. I wanted to follow up and give my view on the topic.
The best way to express how I feel is by sharing my previous successes. I owned two real estate companies, one used a keyword domain name and the other did not. I sold both of these companies in the early part of 2008.
PropertyMitigation.com – Keyword rich domain name that says exactly what it is, a short sale company. Ranks #1 in Google for the term “property mitigation”. I spent nothing in advertising this company. All business was based off of referrals from my primary company Mr. 3 Days.
Mr3Days.com – No keywords. Without knowing the slogan “We Buy Houses, Cash In 3 Days”, it wouldn’t make sense. I owned the toll free number, domain names and corporation. I spent thousands in advertising every month.
Both domain names were picked before any of my knowledge of the domain industry. I had no idea what a keyword domain was and why it mattered. I’m assuming the rest of the world is the same. Sometimes, ignorance is bliss. There was no pressure to picking the perfect domain name based on what the domain industry says is good or bad. Honestly, if it was not for the domain industry I would not care what a keyword domain name is.
Here is my logic without considering our industry, and I will say this is an odd concept, to some at least. I look for the best possible domain name based on people. That’s right, I pick a name based on what my customer could relate to and/or understand. More often than not it brings me to keyword domain names. If the keyword domain name is not available I do get creative. Mr3Days.com was not the first choice for my real estate company, that would have been RealEstate.com, WeBuyHouses.com or SellMyHouse.com. These names were taken and not for sale, so I kicked in with some creative thinking, created my slogan, cartoon character and then the name came to me. Very similar to my current branding, Chef Patrick. I started with DNKitchen.com, realized all kitchens have a head chef, created the character and re-branded as ChefPatrick.com.
Which do I believe was more successful of the two, Mr3Days.com (made up) or PropertyMitigation.com (keyword)? Mr3Days.com hands down!
Closing thoughts:
- Keyword domain names are most important to online only businesses.
- Keyword domain names are important if radio advertising is in your marketing plan.
- Keyword domain names are not the end all for SEO. ChefPatrick.com ranks very well for “Domain News and “Domaining”, most days on the first page of Google.
- Being creative with a domain name is OK!
- Some of the most successful companies have “made up” names. Examples – Google, Yahoo, Twitter, Facebook, Starbucks, Publix, YouTube, MySpace, eBay and so many more.
- Visit Alexa.com and view the top 100 sites. The majority of them have no keywords related to the site itself.
