Do Hyphens in Domain Names Really Suck for SEO?
Stephan Says:
Hyphenated domain names are best for SEO. As in: san-diego-real-estate-for-fun-and-profit.com. Separate keywords with hyphens in the rest of the URL after the .com, but not in the domain itself.
Comments Include:
Hyphens in domain names are less than ideal for flagship businesses because they’re hard to communicate, but you better believe Google ranks domains with keywords in them highly, even if they contain hyphens. Again, it’s less than ideal (a hyphen-less .org or .net is preferable to a hyphenated .com), but if the top choices aren’t available, a domain that includes a hyphen can be a decent substitute.
Don’t make a blanket statement that having hyphens in your domain hurts your potential. This is just fallacy. Yes, hyphens suck for direct traffic, as the domain is more likely to spelled incorrectly. But when it comes to search, domains with hyphens in them do just fine.
My Opinion - They suck. Yes, I realize that technically, they may not have a formal algorithmic component (though I'm guessing part of Google's spam filter early warning system does look at hyphens, particularly when there's more than one in a domain name). But, they certainly correlate with worse branding value, which means fewer links and citations, less reputation in the eyes of visitors and potential business partners, less viral spread through word-of-mouth and, as the comments note, lower type-in traffic.
All of those are going to have a 2nd-order impact on rankings through metrics like inbound links, social mentions and usage data (to whatever degree you believe that mya be a signal). Thus, hyphens in domain names do, indeed, suck for SEO (and lots of other stuff). I've never liked SEO practices that operated in a vaccum or didn't consider usability, virality, positioning, branding or other basic marketing techniques. Going back to the analogy above, it's like the aeronautics engineer who doesn't consider seats a necessity. Sure, it flies, but who exactly will pay for a ride?
