How many hyphens is too many

[coder]

I'm curious how many hyphens is too many for a domain name. I've searched before and found domains with a hyphen, rank just as well as those without hyphens. Primarily through ssome decent SEO and IBL's.

But the question is how many hyphens is too many for a domain name. Can it be that longer domain names can have more hyphens than shorter domains and that short domains shouldn't have any hyphens?

I bought a new domain last month and have just recently been adding content to it. I did a quick search and found that there have been at least 2 previous owners. Obviously the domain didn't work for them, else I wouldn't have it.

The domain is Halloween. (HALL-O-WEEN.COM)

Either way I think it is a decent domain and plan on still developing it, just was curious what other people thought.

[Dubbya]

As far as usability is concerned, it's best to avoid hyphens when choosing a domain name.

From an SEO standpoint, the domain name is just another piece of the puzzle. If you're planning to use hyphens, try to use short, natural sounding text (think "search phrase") so that when the SE's parse the text and strip out the hyphens (replace them with spaces), it still reads naturally.

For example:

Hall-o-ween.com = "hall o ween" (That's probably not the most natural search phrase)

Cheap-Halloween-costumes.com = "cheap halloween costumes" (Definitely a natural search phrase)

"Super-cheap-best-halloween-costumes-wigs-makeup-hats-masks-and-great-gag-gifts.com" is pretty much over the top and even if it to show up in the search engine results pages, I doubt it'd get many clicks. It just looks spammy.

How many hyphens are optimal? None. If you're going to use them, do so within reason. Use only as many hyphens and as few words as possible to target a particular search phrase.

.02

[coder]

Doing a search on google right now for "hall-o-ween" with the quotes brings up 19,300 results. So obviouly other people spell halloween that way.

so are you saying that the search engines will never see hall-o-ween.com as a result for hall-o-ween but only as hall o ween? It may be me, but that logic seems a little messed up.

I would like to target the people who spell it both ways, with and without the hyphens.

[google junky]

This pretty much sums up what the consensus is on the web as far as using the hyphen version for your word in an url or domain.

Doing a search on Google for both version in an Url
113 for inurl:hall-o-ween
4,170,000 inurl:halloween

If you really want to use the other version(Hall-o-ween) then save it for a side page and name it that.

[Martinscholes]

Originally Posted by coder

I'm curious how many hyphens is too many for a domain name. I've searched before and found domains with a hyphen, rank just as well as those without hyphens. Primarily through ssome decent SEO and IBL's.

But the question is how many hyphens is too many for a domain name. Can it be that longer domain names can have more hyphens than shorter domains and that short domains shouldn't have any hyphens?

I bought a new domain last month and have just recently been adding content to it. I did a quick search and found that there have been at least 2 previous owners. Obviously the domain didn't work for them, else I wouldn't have it.

The domain is Halloween. (HALL-O-WEEN.COM)

Either way I think it is a decent domain and plan on still developing it, just was curious what other people thought.

That's an interesting story on the site about the Hotel Conneaut. Just one little "where's my red editor's pen?" moment... If the fire was caused by a lightening strike, it wasn't arson. Or was there a subsequent arson attack I failed to pick up on in the story?

Nice site. But I see the points made about the name.

A blog pointing to it might help, with lots of Halloween posts.

[Dubbya]

Originally Posted by coder

Doing a search on google right now for "hall-o-ween" with the quotes brings up 19,300 results. So obviouly other people spell halloween that way.

so are you saying that the search engines will never see hall-o-ween.com as a result for hall-o-ween but only as hall o ween? It may be me, but that logic seems a little messed up.

I would like to target the people who spell it both ways, with and without the hyphens.

If your search phrase is encapsulated between quotes, you're telling Google to search for that "EXACT" phrase. Realistically, most users would never search with quotes. That's why you're only seeing 19,300 results.

Targeting people who search with or without hyphens is always a great idea. Just consider where those hyphens appear between words. Try to make them appear like natural text and don't string together 14 words as that's likely to be counterproductive simply because it looks spammy and makes it difficult for users to remember.

Is hyphenating your URL going to bring in droves of traffic? No.

Is hyphenating your URL a bad thing? Not necessarily, just don't overdo it.

Does hyphenating a URL provide additional options with regard to domain names? Yes.

Is the URL just a small part of the SEO pie? Yes.