Looking For A New Domain Name? A Quick SEO Tip
Sometimes, business owners (and others) want a new domain name in addition to the present one they are using. There could be many reasons for this – to promote a new product or service, or they have found a domain name that is available that compliments their existing website or domain.
When purchasing a new domain, you should always check to see if it might have been registered before and the previous registrants let it drop. Why? There are a few reasons and we’ll look at two of them – how previously expired domain could help you, and how it could hurt you.
How It Could Help:
A previously registered domain name may still rank well for some keywords and phrases. Even if it has been years since the domain name expired. I had a blog with a domain name that ranked very well for my name, ‘Ian Scott’, some years ago. Just over 4 years ago, I removed the website (although I kept the domain). Last week, I decided to put the domain name live again, and noted that when I did, a few days later my “new” website was ranked on page 2 for for my name, on Google. Previous to putting the domain live, it did not rank because the website had not existed.
Today, just a week later,my relaunched website is ranking on page 1 of google.COM (not .CA).
So, a previously registered domain name may already rank well for some keyword phrases that you might want to rank for, once it goes live.
How It Could Harm You
If a domain name was previously associated with a “bad neighbourhood,” Google may have de-indexed it. Perhaps the previous owners of the domain engaged in shady SEO practices like cloaking in order to try to game Google. If this is the case, it is quite likely you are going to have to do a lot of work to get Google to notice you again and to begin ranking for keywords you want to be ranked for.
Over the next couple of days, I’ll show you some ways you can research the domain names you are interested in using.
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