Choosing an URL for Forum/Website

1st Official Post

    Hello Everyone :)


    I would appreciate feed-back (opinions) from anyone who has had experience with choosing a URL for a Forum/Website,

    particularly with regards to what is best for URL Ranking with search engines.


    Also: Is it okay to choose a URL that begins with a number or numbers rather than a letter?

    What are the Pros and Cons of making such a choice?


    What about using this (-) between words in the URL ?

    Example: "Totally-for-you"

    I have no clue about SEO. But from my past projects it seems beneficial to have the topic of the forum in the url. Like a forum about Porsche it would be good to have Porsche and forum in the url.

    Quote from >_ Tim

    I have no clue about SEO. But from my past projects it seems beneficial to have the topic of the forum in the url. Like a forum about Porsche it would be good to have Porsche and forum in the url.

    Thank you for your reply!


    I agree with you about .... "beneficial to have the topic of the forum in the url". :)

    But not so sure about the word "forum" in the URL.


    One website I recently visited: https://www.ryrob.com/domain-registrars/

    stated the best URL's are those which are kept short.


    I am attempting to come up with something that will meet that advice.


    However I noticed something which I don't believe I have seen before:

    He has a forward slash after .com and a hyphen between two additional words as well.

    That isn't in keeping with the suggestion that the URL be kept short. But perhaps his main

    website has a URL that is short, and this particular page URL was the result of directing visitors or members to this "sub-section"? :/

    • Official Post

    Neither the domain of your site nor its url structure have a meaningful impact on your ranking. Search engines like Google stopped caring about these things a decade ago, because they were commonly abused to artifically boost a sites rank. Content is king and the more relevant and organic content you can provide to search engines, the better.


    Instead you should start thinking about your visitors: What would they search for? What domain would look most promising to them? What description will make them more likely to click on your result rather than others.


    If you want your site to rank great, then you need to provide your visitors with valuable content that makes them want to stay on your site. Search engines like Google measure (among a lot of other things) the time visitors stay on your site before returning to the search result list. That is also the reason why a lot of sites stuff their pages with meaningless banter, because it causes visitors to stay longer to find the information they are looking for.

    Hello Alexander Ebert,


    Thank you for your comments and suggestions. They are most appreciated! :)

    Quote from Alexander Ebert

    Search engines like Google measure (among a lot of other things) the time visitors stay on your site before returning to the search result list.

    "time visitors stay": I believe the above statement is a very significant point.

    As for:

    Quote from Alexander Ebert

    That is also the reason why a lot of sites stuff their pages with meaningless banter, because it causes visitors to stay longer to find the information they are looking for.

    Particularly in point: "meaningless banter" - however with regards to a Forum which is directed towards / based upon a particular niche, would that not also "turn off" some visitors (or forum members)?


    Taking into consideration your comments (and others I receive), in the weeks ahead I will be working on what I hope to be a good Domain Name for what I intend to present; and keeping content relative to my "forum theme".


    One thing I hope to avoid (as with previous forums) is not to post too many subjects (Topics) at start up.

    • Official Post
    Quote from Ruff Seas

    Particularly in point: "meaningless banter" - however with regards to a Forum which is directed towards / based upon a particular niche, would that not also "turn off" some visitors (or forum members)?

    My apologies for being imprecise here. I meant that there are pages that claim to answer a question, but if you visit the pages there is like 90% text bloat at the top before providing the answer in the last sentence. Just look at recipe pages these days, they are usually stuffed with a few meaningless introductionary paragraphs at the beginning. They're basically padding their content to artificially increase the time visitors spent on their pages.

    Hello Alexander Ebert,


    Thank you for your clarification!


    I also want to ADD two comments here as relative to Post #3 above:


    FIRST:

    The particular URL given, and which I visited, together with comments I made in Post #3, were initiated by my desire to possibly finding a way around the one dislike I have about the Hosting Provider I have always used, e.g., 247-Hosting.com ..........

    In particular their policy of not providing an add-on option for Privacy Domain (as relative to WHOIS).

    Rather, they have always provided a way to purchase the URL I wanted, together with Hosting Type and Tier, then later adding the Privacy Option.

    That's not good because in the time period between those transactions (usually 24 hours), my private data (such as where I live, Phone Number, Etc., Etc,) is available to whomever may be interested in acquiring such data!


    SECOND:

    For anyone reading this, it is important to take notice here that I do not endorse nor recommend any data, program, or company one may find through clicking on the URL's mentioned in this thread/posts.

    As a matter of fact, in trying out the "top" recommended Domain Registrar (from the link which appears in Post #3), it was a disappointing and frustrating experience!


    I have since discovered another website which lists Domain Registrars (20 of them).

    I read the description of each one, and went to the website of one of them (NameSilo.com) - so far a much better experience.

    IF I choose this one, OR another Domain Registrar from the list of 20, and IF the experience is a good one, I will come back here to let anyone who may be following and/or interested in this Thread/Post.


    This is an UPDATE to Post #7 above.


    After carefully examining all the possible choices (those mentioned in my posts above, and other Domain Registrars and Hosting Companies contacted since my Posts above), I have decided to stay with the Hosting company used in previous forums/websites -

    that being 247-Host.com even though they are somewhat more expensive.


    With regard to 247-Host.com the reasons for my decision is based upon the following:

    Timely and detailed response to my questions.

    Services: (numerous and excellent list of services) - such as Shared, VPS, and Dedicated Hosting Plans (with several Tiers each).

    Helping me adjust, solve or correct various problems - nearly always without an extra fee. Most companies will not.


    The other Hosting Companies / Domain Registrars I have contacted were deficient in types of services offered;

    and sometimes completely lacking in properly or efficiently answering my questions.


    Also, I would again like to thank Alexander Ebert for his help, suggestions, and comments in Post#4 above.

    I believe he has helped me a lot in outlining and structuring my next Forum.


    Whether or not my next forum is "successful" depends upon many factors; however "success" is a term that cannot always be measured in terms of how many people visit a site or become members, but instead in knowing one has tried his (or her) best

    and is therefore at "peace" with one's attempt to do better than with previous projects.

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