There is an interesting and oft repeated debate taking place on the front page of WebmasterWorld. The debate resides in the thread entitled “Why does Google give so much weight to keyword domains?”

I’ve read similar threads on a variety of webmaster and domaining websites discussing “keyword in domain and search engine ranking” and, after my own consideration of a) the Googles SERPs, that is “what I can see with my own eyes”; b) reflection on the back-and-forth in the threads, including the general lack of concrete evidence/data to back up the assertions of a specific significant advantage; and, c) my own experience as registrant of keyword domains I’ve come to the following conclusions:

• Once upon a time, some years ago, keyword domains plus anchor text briefly rocked the SERPs, which is why a) you saw so many versions of buy-cheap-blah.com URLs in the SERPs; and, b) why that phenomena was abruptly dispatched by Google to the archives of SEO history
• For a time, if you were the potential seller of keyword domains and you posted in forums, you had a lot to say about the benefits of keyword domains, likely adding at least to the perception of an advantage
• Some webmasters, particularly new or inexperienced ones having a tough time ranking, may have a tendency to want to report, by any means available, any and all SERPs ranking disadvantages they believe they are suffering from unfairly. Ergo such threads provide an opportunity to at least anecdotally report on the issue
• I have yet to see any form of public heavy data lifting that would demonstrate that any given website is, in fact, benefitting “from a lift solely attributable to the keywords in the website’s domain”

Do I believe that “keyword in a domain offers some small benefit, like the benefit afforded by a “plus sign” attributable to 1 of 200+/- ranking variables? Yes. Sure. Why not? Why shouldn’t a website’s domain name have some significance in sorting out where the website belongs, what its theme is, what purpose it serves? A keyword based domain name offers another tiny bit of (semantic) data, so why not afford it some slightest of weight?

Likewise, when keyword domains are viewed from the perspective of ranking, it is possible that some keyword domains may rank a bit higher not because of the keywords alone but because the juicy keyword domain was registered a long(er) time ago, when such keyword domains were available, and therefore the site may a bit older, as well as any inbound links being a bit older.

Do I have any empirical evidence or data to back up my assertion that having keywords in a domain and having the benefit of an older domain offers little concrete advantage, especially in competitive SERPS?

Sure I do.

Ladies and gentleman of the jury, on the subject of the ranking weight of keyword domains, I give you Plaintiff’s Exhibit Number 1:

http://Internet-Marketing.com

Do you see this old keyword domain crushing the SERPs for the search phrase “internet marketing“? I don’t. It would be nice, but that’s life. I’ve got my work cut out for me. :p

Might the invisibility of Internet-Marketing.com in the SERPs be because “internet marketing” is a highly competitive field? Might ranking in competitive SERPs require a bit more?

Go ahead and register a keyword domain or pay a premium for a keyword domain in the aftermarket. Then you, too, can move beyond anecdotal evidence that keyword domains have an unfair advantage in ranking in the search engine results and reach your own conclusions.

IF it really is true, as if often argued, that keyword domains have special ranking juice then I, too, have a complaint I  wish to file with the Mt. Kilimanjaro-plex Search Quality Engineering Department:

Yo! Up there! Matt! Where’s my ranking advantage?

God I love this whole internets thing. :p

Curious phenomena.

From what I’ve read there is reason to doubt the “consumer of information value” of postings found at RipOffReport or ROR.

It’s not hard to mine the Web discussion about ROR so I won’t repeat the reason’s to harbor doubts about the consumer value or merits of “consumer reports” on ROR.

I’m not saying that all ROR posts are BS. Clearly there are complaints on the ROR site that relate to companies that are, themselves, selling BS, delivering BS and which deserve the bad rap they get in return.

Despite evidence that Rip Off Report isn’t the new ConsumerReports.org the posts on ROR manage rank highly in search results for company names. Quite unlike ConsumerReports.org, offers – as a service (cough, cought) – to help companies improve their consumer reputation “for a fee”. Translated: We know what gets posted on ROR will rank in Google’s results for searches connected to your company name so, if you want to repair any harm that does, pay us and we’ll see what we can do.

Hmmm . . . Sounds like a credible approach to consumer advocacy.

Here’s what bugs me.

I assume that Google “lends rank” to ROR due to its algorithms that are supposedly looking for signals of “trust” and “authority”.

Now, to me, trust is synonymous with “trustworthy”. However, for some reason I keep gagging when asked to swallow the idea that ROR meets my definition of “trustworthy consumer guidance”.

And what other role is ROR supposed to be fulfilling as it’s primary goal than guiding consumers?

Do a little research yourself and tell me about ROR’s signals of trustworthiness.

And authority? Well, that’s a topic for another time.

But really, I have to ask myself: IF Google’s search engineers are supposedly hard at work on equations that will determine both trustworthy and authoritative information – and this would include trustworthy and authoritative information about companies – do you think something might be broken as evidenced by the presence of ROR “information” in such close proximity to a companies name?

Would you feel at ease knowing that your company’s reputation might be in the hands of an operation like ROR?

Is that as good as it gets, Google?