Need Feedback On Domain Name Please

[Debra Conrad]

I agree with Tina - The first time you have to say your domain name using the word dash - the listener (who is not an Internet Marketer) will look at you like you are a total "edgit".

(don't even ask what "edgit" is LOL... let's just say - it's Not "A Good Thing").

I made this mistake on my first website (because someone said it was good for SEO purposes) - then everyone of my friends and family that asked me "What's your Website?" and I had to say the dash word 3 times.

I knew right then - I'd made a mistake (even as new as I was 5 years ago) and found a new domain name.

My advice is find a great keyword phrase without the dashes. Nuff Said... :0)

[russell]

depends on the marketing strategy you will be using too. If you plan on doing article marketing and other stuff to get it ranking well in google, which it looks like you have a good chance of doing, then I would worry about the dashaes that much.

If you plan on doing some offline promotion, podcast, radio, etc, then you may care more about pronouncing it, and being understood and remembered.

[sheriesmith]

Wow, such great ideas from everyone! Hope I didn't step on anyone's toes as I just now had a chance to read all of your comments. I needed to make a decision yesterday so here's what I did:

homeappraisaltips is already taken
home-appraisal-tips is ALSO taken

(Sherie now punts & checks option 2) home appraisal value gets a lot more searches than home appraisal tips anyway. That's the way I'm headed since my tips are all about things a homeowner can do to get the highest value possible out of their home appraisal. (cheap, quick, free or either low cost ideas, by the way)

I knew homeappraisalvalue was already taken too. So I bought home-appraisal-value.com (yes, I know - the all hated hyphens) I'm assuming the search engines will pick up on that one when they pick up on homeappraisalvalue owned by someone else. I will use the hyphenated version to hopefully grab some traffic from the homeappraisalvalue searches. Then redirect to my 2nd domain purchase yesterday and soon to be my main domain: homeappraisalvaluetips.com.

Decided against using Tennessee in the domain because my free information and eventual income product are appropriate nationwide. My videos will be on 2 Florida real estate sites and 1 Louisiana site, that I already know about. Hopefully I can get on some others two. Using Tenn will limit my visitors, I'm afraid, since they'll think the info is only applicable to Tenn residents.

My strength will be the videos on my website, supplemented also by written posts. I'm getting positive feedback on my video style and they seem to generate more interest than on my written blogs. Since the videos w/be my main marketing strategy, it also comes down to what I can say most gracefully (without being totally tongue-tied) on the video. Hyphens don't work if you are doing videos so I using it only as a redirect. It's still worth the $10 to maybe pull some interest from the other owners' unhyphenated version.

Still related to keyword phrases - other main related searches are:
tips for a good home appraisal
how to get ready for a home appraisal
how does a home appraisal work
what are home appraisals based on
prepare (your) home for appraisal
home appraisal process

So I'll make sure to have a video on each of these phrases. Will also do a written post on each phrase since I understand the bots can't 'read' video speak. That way I'll use videos for the people and the written posts for the bots.

Will make sure I have links from those 3 real estate websites and as soon as I get the blog moved to the main domain name, then I'll figure out how to add the watermark. In future videos I'll actually be saying my website name during the intro and at closing as well as have the watermark on the video.

How am I doing so far?

Sherie Smith
http://homeappraisaltips.blogspot.com

[lisamariemary]

Love your videos, Sherie! I'm excited to see you launch this on its own domain!!

[sheriesmith]

Thanks Lisamariemary, that's so sweet of you! (Yea, I'm excited too - once I figure out how to connect the blog to the domain & redirect! hehe) Then I can really start cranking the videos out.

[cindybidar]

I made this mistake on my first website (because someone said it was good for SEO purposes) - then everyone of my friends and family that asked me "What's your Website?" and I had to say the dash word 3 times.

And EMAIL. Completely forgot about email addresses. In my day job I work for a company with a dash in their domain name. So every single time I'm giving my email address over the phone (which is a LOT) I have to explain it. Company dash name dot com. No, it's not an underscore, it's a hyphen. Yes, I'm sure.

Bah!

[sheriesmith]

Hi Cindi, I absolutely agree. I purchased home-appraisal-value.com simply so I could redirect to homeappraisalvaluetips.com. Even though homeappraisalvalue.com is already taken, it gets a good amount of searches within this niche. So I wanted to grab the hyphenated version to hopefully steel a little traffic. No matter who visits, it will redirect to homeappraisalvaluetips.com after I have it all set up. Besides no hyphenated version rolls off the tongue easily and gracefully in a video, I don't care how cute, clever or powerful the words are. It's still clumsy to say.

Thanks again,

Sherie Smith
http://homeappraisaltips.com

[sheriesmith]

OOPS! Wrong link - NOT http://homeappraisaltips.com (They want $1500 for it -ha!)

I meant to sign as:
http://homeappraisaltips.blogspot.com