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SEO Google ranking Content VS URL

By Jim Odom

I have heard and read a lot about the importance of fresh content, original content, and back links for page placement. Don't get me wrong, all of the professionals who tell you this can't be completely wrong. I do think that it is important to have relevant content on your web site to get first page placement on Google. The relevant content is even better when the key words on your page are headlines. It's also important to have quality back links to your site. I have been told that back links to your site are like your bank account, it's better to have more coming in than going out, especially from page rank 3 and above sites. but:

I have always thought that the URL of your site was of more importance than all of the above. I started a web site about 10 years ago to help advertise our "brick and mortar" locations. At first we didn't even have a shopping cart on the web site. We wanted more of a billboard site that advertised our product but directed the visitor to call or come by the local location. We quickly developed a site that was very informative with lots of content. The content was updated almost every day day so it was always fresh. We made sure that we used good SEO principles on every page.

The frustrating thing was noticing that sites not nearly as good as ours, were higher in the Google rankings. I would check the rankings on a few of our key words and found that most of the competing sites who were ahead of us in rankings had one thing in common. Most of them had a URL with the key word IN the URL. I came to the conclusion that the URL had as much to do with Google ranking as anything else you can do.

I set out on a mission to change that. We had already spent considerable time and resources on a site that had a URL with no connection (or almost none) to the key words we most wanted to rank very high in. Here's what we did: We created file folders with the key words as the titles of the folders. The files were renamed to match key words as well. It hurt us in the short range, because now bookmarked pages would find a "404 Page not Found".

After some time had elapsed, we are now on the front page of Google for most of the key words we wanted to make the first page on. Just to be clear on what I am suggesting, let's take an example: If you are selling widgets, the best URL you could have is www.widget.com. The second best URL would be www.widget.net. If you already have a URL of www.imadeamistakewheniboughtthisdomainname.com, then you can try this, create a folder under your root directory named "widget". Now you can create web pages in this folder. Let's say the first page you create is bestbluewidget.html, you can put it in that folder you created. Now to call it up, you would enter: www.imadeamistakewheniboughtthisdomainname.com/widget/bestbluewigit.html. I hope someone doesn't actually have this on a web site. Oh well, free advertising for them.

Just to let you know how very important that this is, let me give a little example. I purchased a domain name that I had intended to do something with immediately. As procrastinators are so apt to do, I let it set without touching it for several months (probably a year). Keep in mind that it had no content at all. If you typed in the URL, you found "Under construction" as the only content. One day I did a key word search and there it was on Google as number 7 in ranking. I was flabbergasted. There were 27,800 results for this key word and there I was at number 7!

Now to reiterate, I do not discount the importance of all the things SEO experts tell you to do. Most of them, however, rarely discuss the importance of the domain name you select. I'm just saying to pay a lot of attention to having your key word appear IN the URL. Start your SEO before you even buy a domain.

Contributor's Note

Let me offer a bit of a disclaimer: I don't have credentials to be an SEO expert. These are observations from trying some ideas on my own.

How interesting and funny, too. Of course, I do not care about Google ranking or I would not be using PayPerPost to monetize my blog, but I still enjoyed reading this intel. I tried Adsense for a while, but am much happier with InfoLinks.

Janet,
Thanks for sharing...I would think that there would be a very small percentage of sites where the owner did not care how much traffic landed on their site. Most web site owners have a goal of being on page one of a Google search.

I visited PayPerPost.com after reading your comment, and I would bet that sites which get more traffic, get higher bids per post.

Bill,
Both of these two sites are perfect examples of what I am talking about. (I don't like the use of hyphens though) Of course, the reason you selected use of the hyphens, is because dogfirstaid.com was already taken. One of the reasons that domain is not on Google's first page is because they made the mistake of making it a redirect.

You may want to create a sub-folder of PETfirstaid and create a page in that folder of petfirstaid.html I know you already have a page "www.dog-first-aid-101.com/pet-first-aid.html". I certainly wouldn't move it to a new sub-folder now, (because of the "404 page not found" Issue)but it wouldn't hurt to create a second page in the sub-folder with a link from it to the page you've already created.

Thanks for sharing

One of the first rules to learn about ranking for key words is - THERE ARE NO RULES.

I have several domains that have been inactive for several years that are in the top five results of Google even though the sites have zero content. (My hope is to be able to work on them when I can see better).

If you want to create sites with the keyword in the domain, it is much easier and cost free to create sub-domains on a short url. This way you can clone a great content site and have it called up by the search engines more readily.

I will be doing this with askoldcoot.info although that is a bit long. A sub domain for, say, bread making would be breadmaking.askoldcoot.info or baby shower would be babyshower.askoldcoot.info

Of course, the position of the url in Google does not translate into traffic if nobody actually uses your chosen keywords when they search for a topic.

You are right, the sub-domain is probably even a better idea than using sub-folders. I make use of those in our web site as well.

I think I would revise your comment that "THERE ARE NO RULES". The reason it seems so, is that Google changes the rules a lot. I believe they realize that people figure out "the system" and begin to take advantage of it. When a Google search becomes less and less relevant, Google has to adapt. If their searches became too irrelevant, people would go to a different search site.

As always, I appreciate your comment

Thank you for sharing this design and marketing advise, Jim. It's getting tougher to get the key words into the URL with all of the action on the internet today.
Best wishes.
Frederick

Arthur's suggestion about using a sub-domain is a very good idea. EVERY keyword in a sub-domain is possible, if you have the time to do it.

Here is an example you can relate to:
If dartboard.com is already taken, you can use dartboard.dartsandsupplies.com/

Of course Arthur's other comment is certainly true too, if no one is searching for "dart board" on Google, you still don't get any traffic. But then again, if that is true, you may need to start selling a different product.

I appreciate your comment

If you search for "learn to play guitar", you find guitarplayerworld.com. I bet if you created a sub-domain (as Arthur mentioned) or a sub-folder called, "learntoplayguitar", you would rank higher at Google. Your site already is a page rank 3 and has lots of back links. I'm betting you could get to a page one on Google in short order with that change.
Jim

James Emery Vigh Apr 25, 2010 15:27

Good article, however I think this strategy works with small competition niches/keywords only. With highly competitive keywords it's more about backlinks and content rather than URLs and domain names. I loved your final advice: Start your SEO before you even buy a domain. That's for sure.

I appreciate you taking the time to reply since I went and solicited your comment. As I stated in the beginning, I have no credentials....just some observations of what has worked for me. I might comment though that one of the keywords we rank high on Google for is "Thomas Kinkade". Typing that into Google yields 1,690,000 results and we are #9. If you add a title of an image, ie "Thomas Kinkade Pinocchio", we turn up #1 on a Google search

I totally agree with needing back links and content. Links, Content, URL... It seems you have to have ALL. I think the one site that I had absolutely no content on, that ranked high was exactly what you mention, "small competition niche/keywords only.

Thanks again for your comment.

I wonder if this approach might help others. Do the proper research that should have been done first and see what you should have called the site then buy the new domain name. Direct it to the public_html folder on the wrongsite name and continue to own both names.
Best Wishes
Reg
More about my interests here.
Grab an ebook bargain before I replace the stock.

All very good suggestions. Too late for me. I just went in like a bull in a china shop and moved all my files to a sub-directory.

RE: 404 page re-write: We did that some time ago and included a Google custom search on the "404 Page not Found" page.

RE: "buy the new domain name. Direct it to the public_html folder on the wrongsite name" This is an excellent suggestion and what I was doing when I discovered the domain I had purchased had received such a high ranking. It does depend on what you mean by "Direct it to the public_html folder". If you just make a simple re-direct to the old domain, you won't get much benefit. If you instead create a landing page on the new domain or on the sub-domain, then you can have content there with clickable links to your OLD domain. (see my reply above to Bill about dogFirstAid.com" If you type dogfirstaid.com into the address bar, you get re-directed to: ohio-distinctive.com. That's an example of a URL that doesn't relate to the key words "dog first aid". Now go to Google and type in a search for "Dog first aid". You will find Bill's site at number one and ohio-distinctive.com's site at #72. That site has a page rank of 6 and 71 Google back links. It should dominate Google for these key words. Instead, Bill does because of his URL.

Thanks for your comment

ps Bill should pay for advertising on this intel

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