Are members of this forum currently buying domain names or not?

[kate-brownhill]

I'm sorry, but if you're paying more just because the domain was registered 16 years ago you're throwing away money.

Please research into it more, think about it logically and save yourself some money.

I would really like to see that dropped domain that is ranking well for a competitive term. You must have an example of this right as you used it as evidence to back up your theory?

I won’t even bother telling you what my day job is as you will obviously just think its waffle as it can’t possibly be better than you. Trust me on this, in this case, it’s not me who needs to do the research. More than willing to PM you my credentials.

 

[Murray]

I would really like to see that dropped domain that is ranking well for a competitive term. You must have an example of this right as you used it as evidence to back up your theory?

I won’t even bother telling you what my day job is as you will obviously just think its waffle as it can’t possibly be better than you. Trust me on this, in this case, it’s not me who needs to do the research. More than willing to PM you my credentials.

What would you consider competitive terms?

I'm sure your day job has prestige and you earn a lot more than I do, more power to you, but never the less domain age is still insignificant to SEO.

 

[kate-brownhill]

Well, i tried my best. maybe one day you will actually try it out and see the results yourself and come back to this thread and admit you just might have been wrong. Regards, Kate.

 

[pugyrob]

http://www.searchenginejournal.com/domain-age-how-important-is-it-for-seo/7296 sums it up fairly well

Like a lot of Seo it is subjective but my view is that people confuse site age importance and domain age. Domain age may be one of a few hundred signals google uses but probably so negligible it's probably not worth worrying about.

Say person a registers imacrapdomainer.com in 1996, why should that rank better or have more trust than a newer registered name? Especially as a lot of people speculated and just sat in domains for years.

Site age however gives google years of data about user interaction on the site, linking practices, quality of content etc and is a far more useful metric.

 

[Edwin]

Domain age has been an SEO signal almost since SEO was invented. However, it is one signal among many, and it has been dialled down quite a bit recently. That said, it is still of tangential reference - ALL other things being equal, if you launched a site on an old domain or a brand new domain, you'll find it very fractionally easier to rank the site on the old domain.

Is that worth a big premium? Doubtful.

Is it worth SOMETHING (especially for the more valuable domains)? Certainly.

Muddying the waters still further, there is plenty of evidence that Google sets out to "penalise" parked domains. So a domain that was recently parked, caught the Google algorithm's attention for a "penalty", dropped and got re-registered is going to start at a disadvantage compared to a name with no baggage.

In brief:
(old domain) > (new domain) > (new domain that was previously ONLY a parked domain, dropped and was caught again)

We're not talking huge effects in any of this, but the above has been demonstrated by sufficient people in sufficient numbers of tests that I believe it to be "true".

Beware of "confirmation bias" when Googling this - there are millions of sites that purport to be about SEO out there, so you will find evidence to support ANY position you like if you specifically set out to find that kind of evidence! However, if you have read widely in the SEO field for a decade or more, you should have come across a sufficiency of "credible" sources over the years that confirm the above progression.

 

[kate-brownhill]

There are several ways that people get their opinions about SEO. Some from reading around and some from direct experience. My experience, tells me that the effect is much more than "fractional". As you say, taking anything you read on the Internet, including this post, as some sort of written law is a mistake and in my opinion there is nothing better than carrying out small tests where these theories can be tested. Yes, the tests are never 100% right, but overall, you get a feel for what is working and what is not. Same as working on a large number of sites gives you a better overview of the signals that Google looks at as important factors. In my opinion, that is what SEO is all about.

 

[Edwin]

The effect used to be more pronounced than it is now. It's currently fairly low in the hierarchy of SEO factors. That's based on my experience of being involved with the SEO for over 150 developed sites (admittedly none in the last 18 months).

 

[kate-brownhill]

The effect used to be more pronounced than it is now. It's currently fairly low in the hierarchy of SEO factors. That's based on my experience of being involved with the SEO for over 150 developed sites (admittedly none in the last 18 months).

Well, it seems that we have differing experiences. We still see it as a strong signal which we use quite often to a very good effect. If you are interested, I will show you an example of one site but only through PM.

 

[pugyrob]

There are several ways that people get their opinions about SEO. Some from reading around and some from direct experience. My experience, tells me that the effect is much more than "fractional". As you say, taking anything you read on the Internet, including this post, as some sort of written law is a mistake and in my opinion there is nothing better than carrying out small tests where these theories can be tested. Yes, the tests are never 100% right, but overall, you get a feel for what is working and what is not. Same as working on a large number of sites gives you a better overview of the signals that Google looks at as important factors. In my opinion, that is what SEO is all about.

This was from direct experience of being in the industry for many years and working on many sites,all my own and of varying ages, combined with common sense and taking other opinions on board from what i have read too.

 

[Bailey]

I'm neither SEO expert or even knowledgeable.

But from a bystanders point of view. It would difficult to imagine Google attaching much weight to domain age (in this day and age) Sure in the early days it probably was a significant metric and I'm sure if the domain/site has significant and regular updates - this is all captured

However I think we are coming back to the domains that are listed in the sales columns that often point to the age of the domain as some 'overriding' consideration in the value of the domain - Which I think most agree it Isn't

 

[donton]

There are several ways that people get their opinions about SEO. Some from reading around and some from direct experience. My experience, tells me that the effect is much more than "fractional". As you say, taking anything you read on the Internet, including this post, as some sort of written law is a mistake and in my opinion there is nothing better than carrying out small tests where these theories can be tested. Yes, the tests are never 100% right, but overall, you get a feel for what is working and what is not. Same as working on a large number of sites gives you a better overview of the signals that Google looks at as important factors. In my opinion, that is what SEO is all about.

I would agree strongly with this. I used to read as much as I could about anything SEO related, but after a couple of years of doing so I realised experience counts more than research, at least for me. What worked for others never worked for me, so I've just forged my own path and concentrate more on what works for me than what works for everyone else.

In this thread people have stated that they find EMDs with single hyphens relatively easy to rank. I've experienced the exact opposite to this on four or five new sites. As a result I will no longer touch hyphenated domains no matter what their TLD. That's just my experience.

Someone else on here said they don't bother with .net or .org domains any more. I used to think like that, but as I don't bother with hyphenated .coms any more, I've turned to .net/.org EMDs. They're much cheaper to buy than .coms and a lot easier to obtain. For generic phrases I find .net/.org EMDs really easy to rank, even in medium competition niches.

As for domain age, I've never really paid much attention to it. Most of my domains are 5+ years old though - but the odd (new) hand reg that I've developed has never stood out as being a pain to rank.

In answer to the original question: I'm still buying domains, but avoiding hyphens altogether. The majority of my recent premium purchases have been .net/.org though.

 

[Bailey]

I like you thinking donton. Actually your reply here could fit nicely into another active thread regarding hyphens.

I agree with you regarding .nets and .orgs. And outside of development and strictly as an investment the same can be said for those domains standing-up as a good investment providing some care is taken regarding the word/subject matching