I have a few domain names registered for my future site. The key word I am targeting is home rentals Korea.

I have registered:

rentalskorea.com
homerentalskorea.com
koreahomerentals.com

I know Google and other search engines way heavily on the domain name when assigning a PR value. I know this is one of 100+ factors, but in many ways it is one of the most important.

Is short better (rentalskorea.com) than exact, but longer (homerentalskorea.com)?

Thanks!

Mike

i think short is better, but I am not sure

SEO wise it makes no difference. marketing wise something memorable is best.

I know Google and other search engines way heavily on the domain name when assigning a PR value.

The domain has nothing to do with PR. Backlinks alone cause PR.. So with the same backlinks www.z.com would get exactly the same PR as www.zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.com

The advantages of long domain names is you can have targeted keyphrase in it and when people in blogs/forums discuss about your site you tend to get the anchor text. Apart from that there is no advantage of long domain name. So apply the brain and get a domain which is easy to remember in the context of the content.

Even though the advantages of having a shorter domain are more than that of having a longer domain, in your case I think the longer domain is more precise to the theme and content of your site and business and makes more sense than just korearentals.com

Out of the three choices, I would prefer koreahomerentals.com

This domain will capture all the keywords you are targeting and easy to remember for the users, which is important also besides SEO.

Originally Posted by stOx

SEO wise it makes no difference. marketing wise something memorable is best.


The domain has nothing to do with PR. Backlinks alone cause PR.. So with the same backlinks www.z.com would get exactly the same PR as www.zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.com

Are you sure? Is that really the case?

Originally Posted by tiandrive

Are you sure? Is that really the case?

Motion seconded with this comment. Domain name has nothing to do with PR but backlinks does.

Regards,
Real Estate Directory | Agent | Broker | Realtor - EstateRound.com

Originally Posted by tiandrive

Are you sure? Is that really the case?

It's better than sure.

It's absolutely 100% positive that only backlinks create the imaginary number we all know and hate.

I 100% disagree that domain name means absolutely nothing for PR.

I have read several books on the subject and read dozens of articles. I am not an expert, but your domain does affect your PR. Yes, backlinks are one of the top reasons for a high PR, but domain has a something to do with it.

I have sub-pages on my sites with 4 PR that have almost no inbound links.

I would say the most important PR factors are (not any any order).

-domain name
-back links
-keyword density
-compliant websites (I once went from a 5 PR to a 3 PR because of this!)
-content
-domain order (the more folers you create, the les PR you will get)
-Activity
-low # of outbound links

It is silly to think that domains like the ones below would have the same PR, everything else being equal for the key word of "flowers" with a market being the flower industry.

flowers.com
zipywigsstore.com

Domain has a lot to do with PR. You are fooling yourself to thing otherwise. If two sites have the same backlinks and everything else I would prefer to have the flowers.com and would bet it will have a higher PR. Yes it is easy to remember, but Google also takes this into account.

If you can prove otherwise please post some proof.

Mike

Mike

It's absolutely 100% positive that only backlinks create the imaginary number we all know and hate.

This statement couldn't be more wrong. Backlinks are one of over 100 factors that Google takes into account when coming up with PR. I listed a few in my last post.

Originally Posted by mikesilvia

I have sub-pages on my sites with 4 PR that have almost no inbound links.

Mike

May I know what is the domain you are refering? So that we may provide some concrete analysis

One of the reason for your PR4 sub-pages may due to the passing of PR values from your other PR pages (cross-links etc).

crap!

The domain name has absolutely NOTHING to do with PR.

read it straight from the horse mouth The Anatomy of a Search Engine

section 2.1.1

mikesilvia I think you're mixing up ranking in search results with page rank. Page rank (PR) is just a measure of backlinks to a page and the associated PR of the page linking to your page. There is no other factor involved.

There are many factors that go into determing where a page will rank for a given search query, with PR being one of them. So your domain might be a factor in where your page will rank for a search, but it will have nothing to do with PR.

As for your original question. I think your domain does have a small effect on seo, but that effect is small and you're generally better to choose a domain name that's easy to remember. Ideally one that you won't have to spell for people. Just say it to them and they remember it.

Originally Posted by stOx

SEO wise it makes no difference. marketing wise something memorable is best.

Exactly, I don't think that search engines really care about the length of the domain names.
But, for your visitors to remember a long domain name and have to type it all on the browser address bar without any typo will be a real challenge.

Ok, thanks for all the inputs!

Weather I have PR correct or not, I still stand by my points. I want a domain that helps me get the best result in Google. I could care less about having a PR of 10 if my site does not show up in the first few pages. As far as SEO, domain name is very important in getting your site ranked high in Google.

If PR is simply a backlink count, then PR is one of a hundred factors that determine your relevance in a search result for your keyword.

Thanks to everyone for your inputs. Special thanks to vangogh for helping explain the differences between PR and search results.

domain name is very important in getting your site ranked high in Google.

No it isn't