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"-" inbetween urls and html files

  • Thread starter Thread starter MASSEY
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MASSEY

Take this domain

www.thisisanexample.com

you then add onto it in your pages eg services

www.thisisanexample.com/Our-Example-Services.html

Why is the dash "-" needed to seperate the words in the html files, but the whole url can be without the dash,

Is it not better to register domains with the "-"

im gonna be reg'ing a few names and i cant work out weather it would be better to - them or no spaces,

weather or not they are easier or harder to remember is irrelevant as they will be linked to from an easier to remember advertised name,.

i just want to know form an seo point of view,

thanks ;)
 
Irrelevant towards SEO, hyphenated domains make it hard to give your domain name verbally and falls down on being easy to remember or type.
 
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Seo wise, a hyphenated domain looks good cos other wise it can look gobblygook e.g.

www.mydesignstudioisthebest.com could be www.my-design-studio-is-the-best.com

I always put my pages in a website using a "-" as it's easier for seo e.g. www.mydomain.com/website-design.com.

Another poiunt for seo is that you have keywords seperated e.g. www.electrician-solihull.co.uk, rather than www.electriciansolihull.co.uk.

A website address should be easy to remember but also easy to pronounce so longer domains should be hyphenated,
 
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Faevilangel said:
Seo wise, a hyphenated domain looks good cos other wise it can look gobblygook e.g.

www.mydesignstudioisthebest.com could be www.my-design-studio-is-the-best.com

I always put my pages in a website using a "-" as it's easier for seo e.g. www.mydomain.com/website-design.com.

Another poiunt for seo is that you have keywords seperated e.g. www.electrician-solihull.co.uk, rather than www.electriciansolihull.co.uk.

A website address should be easy to remember but also easy to pronounce so longer domains should be hyphenated,
Click to expand...



Seo wise, a hyphenated domain looks good cos other wise it can look gobblygook e.g.

How can it be good for SEO for a domain to look good?


I always put my pages in a website using a "-" as it's easier for seo e.g. www.mydomain.com/website-design.com.

Shouldn't the be www.mydomain.com/website-design.html? And why would it be easier for SEO? The only reason to have a hyphen in a file URL is to avoid having %20 spaces, i.e: www.mydomain.com/website%20design.html



Another poiunt for seo is that you have keywords seperated e.g. www.electrician-solihull.co.uk, rather than www.electriciansolihull.co.uk.

Not anymore, maybe when Search Engines where in there infancy, but not now.
 
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Hyphenated domains are bought either out of personal choice, or because the original domain name you wanted has already gone.
 
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Faevilangel said:
Seo wise, a hyphenated domain looks good cos other wise it can look gobblygook e.g.

www.mydesignstudioisthebest.com could be www.my-design-studio-is-the-best.com

I always put my pages in a website using a "-" as it's easier for seo e.g. www.mydomain.com/website-design.com.

Another poiunt for seo is that you have keywords seperated e.g. www.electrician-solihull.co.uk, rather than www.electriciansolihull.co.uk.

A website address should be easy to remember but also easy to pronounce so longer domains should be hyphenated,
Click to expand...

I had a feeling it was no seo value, i think the only reason the html docs are hyphened is to be "user friendly",
 
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Faevilangel said:
Seo wise, ...

www.electriciansolihull.co.uk.
Click to expand...

I've often wondered does electriansolihul benefit on two counts -

if someone searches for electrician solihull it does well as a phrase match,
and if someone puts in electricians

electriciansohlihul is better than electriciancoventry because the search engine reads electriciansolihul - gaining you a perfect match on electricians,

but electriciancoventry only matches electrician and not electricians?

Probably splitting hairs, and difference is minuscule, but I'd be interested to know!

Thanks

Jeff
 
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I actually had a site on page one for solihull electrician above the keyword domains, but i used the site to link to something else so it has tailed off,

But i think that is my next mission :cool:
 
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What you'll normally find is that a non hyphenated domain has more value than a hyphenated one. Yes a hyphenated domain will have more readability if you see a long url but in terms of SEO (and this is based on experience) something like

gamingforums.com would have more value than gaming-forums.com.

In the long run after you take into account age and linking the difference maybe negligible but certainly in the short term gamingforums.com will in most cases rereive a good boost. Googles always fancied keyword domains and despite the ability to purchase both hyphenated and non hyphenated domains as keyword domains you'll find the non-hyphenated has an edge.

Certainly from a domainers perspective non hyphenated are worth more. That's why for most keyword domains (i.e. 2 words or more) you'll mostly find the hyphenated dot com available yet you'll see the non-hyphenated .com, .net and maybe even .org gone.
 
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DotNetWebs said:
How is it easier to promounce if it has a hyphen in it? :|

Regards

Dotty
Click to expand...

There are same infamous domains that probably work better with a hyphen eg

powergenitalia.com

compared with powergen-italia.com

expertsexchange.com

(compared with experts-exchange.com)

or course this one doesn't need a hyphen

therapist.com

:)
 
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MartCactus said:
There are same infamous domains that probably work better with a hyphen eg...
Click to expand...

lol yes.

What I meant, for example, was the hyphenated domain would be harder to pronounce over the telephone. e.g "electrician, solihull" would be easier then "electrician, hyphen, Solihull" or "electrician, dash, solihull" etc.

It would also be harder to remember and you would risk people landing on the (competing?) non-hyphenated version.

Regards

Dotty
 
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DotNetWebs said:
lol yes.

What I meant, for example, was the hyphenated domain would be harder to pronounce over the telephone. e.g "electrician, solihull" would be easier then "electrician, hyphen, Solihull" or "electrician, dash, solihull" etc.

It would also be harder to remember and you would risk people landing on the (competing?) non-hyphenated version.

Regards

Dotty
Click to expand...

The point of the hypen for one site I'm making is because it's got seo relevance,

I won't be advertising that name I will use a different name as yes they might land on a competitor,
 
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Why is the dash "-" needed to seperate the words in the html files, but the whole url can be without the dash,
Click to expand...
The whole url can be without the dashes. The practice of formatting dashes to make urls more legible came about with the use of CMS systems such as WordPress, that use templates to generate the pages stored in databases and have the option to use a substitute that displays "a friendly url", the actual active url is usually one long string. As far as formatting real HTML file names with capital letters, dashes etc it is not recommended by developers. These friendly URLS are considered more legible by search engines and by the user bookmarking a page.
 
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If a domain is ambiguous then there are positive SEO benefits to using Hyphens.

Also gains in page names as stated by Matt the Rat.

Earl
 
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WOW. What an expert on the Internet. On another post the OP was claiming that he could tell anyone how to earn $20,000 dollars a month. Now he is aking basic advice.

Make no mistake Massey. If you make extravant claims people will look at your previous posts and form an opinion as to wther you are a sensible player or a plonker.

I have formed my own opinion.
 
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oldeagleeye said:
WOW. What an expert on the Internet. On another post the OP was claiming that he could tell anyone how to earn $20,000 dollars a month. Now he is aking basic advice.

Make no mistake Massey. If you make extravant claims people will look at your previous posts and form an opinion as to wther you are a sensible player or a plonker.

I have formed my own opinion.
Click to expand...


Excuse me ....... Link please, and then when you read it you can take it back
 
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oldeagleeye said:
WOW. What an expert on the Internet. On another post the OP was claiming that he could tell anyone how to earn $20,000 dollars a month. Now he is aking basic advice.

Make no mistake Massey. If you make extravant claims people will look at your previous posts and form an opinion as to wther you are a sensible player or a plonker.

I have formed my own opinion.
Click to expand...

What is your favourite kind of cereal?

Get it?
 
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You appear to have made a bit of cock up there eagle eye, you took the medicine they gave you today.........
 
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oldeagleeye said:
WOW. What an expert on the Internet. On another post the OP was claiming that he could tell anyone how to earn $20,000 dollars a month. Now he is aking basic advice.

Make no mistake Massey. If you make extravant claims people will look at your previous posts and form an opinion as to wther you are a sensible player or a plonker.

I have formed my own opinion.
Click to expand...


Come on, where's the proof " plonker "
 
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caeteez said:
Anyway, bringing the topic back to where it should be, as a rule of thumb we register all our TLD's without hyphens (if available) but in the directories and file names we tend to use them. For example:


http://www.netwisehosting.co.uk/

and

http://www.netwisehosting.co.uk/servers/entry-level/index.html


In addition, maybe someone could confirm this, but from an SEO standpoint I believe it is better to use hyphens rather then underscores?
Click to expand...

I think you confused yourself, you mean is it better to use forward slashes than hyphens,

I myself do not know its a good question, i would hazard a guess at it not mattering,
 
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MASSEY said:
I think you confused yourself, you mean is it better to use forward slashes than hyphens...
Click to expand...

No he's not confused. Hyphens vs Underscores is an old and ongoing debate.

Popular opinion tends to favour Hyphens. But, as I have posted many times before on this forum, I personally am not convinced there are not currently any major SEO differences between the two.

I also believe there are good reasons to use underscores where you have dynamically-rewritten URLs based on user content.

Regards

Dotty
 
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