Should You Buy a Hyphenated Domain Name?

Ten years ago I might’ve said yes. Webmasters were hyphen crazy back then, believing that being able to stuff keywords into a domain name separated by hyphens gave them a competitive edge.  And this may have been the case, but this wasn’t the only reason hyphenated domains were favoured. Brands also thought it made a domain easier to read, and therefore looked more attractive to the consumer; for example, “Nike-air” would have have been preferable to “Nikeair.” It took people a little while to realize, however, that hyphenated domain names are a nightmare to remember.

Imagine reading your domain name out on the TV or radio with four hyphens in the mix; don’t expect many visitors to your website. That said, hyphens can serve well if a domain name is connected by two words where one ends with the same letter as the next starts, for example, “reviewsshuffle” might look better as “reviews-shuffler.”

So What About Buying Hyphenated Domains Today

If the domain is well sought after then why not. But I don’t know of many domain names that have more than one hyphen in the mix that are well sought after. I personally would steer clear of domains with more than one hyphen; anything more than that and the hyphen isn’t brandable enough for a business in the modern cyberspace climate. It’s an entirely different story if you’re buying an existing successful website with a hyphenated domain name, because you are buying it for the traffic and profit, not for the domain.

This is not to say you won’t profit on a domain with a hyphen in the mix. Often the demand for a variation of a domain is so high that a hyphen is forced into play, like “solar-panels.com” or similar. But as a rule of thumb I like to buy domains without hyphens, unless I get that instinctual feeling that a business will overlook the hyphen just to secure those particular keywords in their domain.

What Does Google Think?

Because of the history of keyword spamming in domain names back in the day, Google isn’t what I’d call “friendly” toward excessive hyphenation in domain names. One wouldn’t be a problem, but three might hinder the progress of a site built on the domain. I don’t know this for a fact, so don’t take it as gospel, but a number of Internet marketers have said they won’t buy domains with multiple hyphens for the very reason that they look spammy.

So, my verdict is to leave hyphens alone unless absolutely necessary. Be weary of paying big money for domains with hyphens in the mix, but as I said before, if a domain with one hyphen separating two words looks irresistible and you know the demand is there, don’t let it stop you taking a calculated risk.