richADZ's Site Build It! - Profitable Web Business or Bust

Hi James and Garrett,

While I may not be a self-proclaimed SEO expert (but is there really such thing as a true SEO expert?), based on my past experience, the hyphened domain name will only be one of many factors in getting high SERPs. Other factors such as your site's Meta Tags (e.g., Title and Description), high-value in-coming links, and of course, great optimized content, are the more crucial elements.

But if branding is one of your online objectives/strategies, then it has been well documented that it is better not to use any hyphen (if possible), and the shorter the domain name the better (if still available). On this subject, refer to an interesting comment from Stephen (from luxury-new-zealand.com) on how one may still be able to brand (existing business/store name) using SBI!

Ken also briefly commented about the hyphens or dashes in domain name in the MYCP! (i.e., Make Your Content PreSell!):

"I like dashes for word seperation within domains, both for humans and engines, but it's not a critical point (unless the lack of dash could create ambiguity)."

To sum it all up, we must be clear that the fundamental of SBI! is essentially about helping the very-small-small-business like yours and mine succeed online against the well-funded big boys. For this reason, B is only for the BB, and there is no B in C->T->P->M (i.e., B = Branding; BB = Big Boys).

Good luck,
Richard from Borneo