Which URL would a customer identify better?

[josho]

I am in the proccess of picking urls for my site and I want your guys thought on url choices, heres what I have.

dupagecomputerrepair.com
dupagepcrepair.com
dupage-pc.com

My concern is length on business cards and identification on door magnets. What do you guys think?

 

[Rodrigy]

dupagecomputerrepair.com is much better for SEO.

 

[FoolishTech]

I am in the proccess of picking urls for my site and I want your guys thought on url choices, heres what I have.

dupagecomputerrepair.com
dupagepcrepair.com
dupage-pc.com

My concern is length on business cards and identification on door magnets. What do you guys think?

I would shop around for a few others...

Of these, I don't like the first one because it has two "r" letters in a row as in computeRRepair - something about the same letter ending one word and starting another right after that bothers me. When telling someone to go to your website over the phone they might try to get away with one R when they type it.

dupagecomputerrepair.com is much better for SEO.

Although he is right!

But personally I like the last one, it's very simple, CAPITAL BUT... coming from my last employer we had a hyphen in our domain name as well (cpu-store.com) and we frequently had to direct customers to our website to download our remote client software...

Here's the conversation I've had 100 times. Me: c p u dash s t o r e dot com. Client: c p u what? Me: DASH. Them: which one is that? ME: HYPHEN them: oh. which one is that? I don't see your website...

I eventually made my boss buy cpustore.net so I could quit having that conversation, but then we had people wanting to goto cpustore.com which wasn't our site no matter how I emphasized .NET then they wanted to go to cpustorenet.com *argh*

 

[josho]

Yes I was thinking about SEO as well and the double r bothered me as well. I like the last one but then I also had a issue with the hyphen in the url, since there is a large older population in certain areas, my fear is that they wouldn't be able to find the hyphen on the keyboard.

Here are a few other options.

dupagepcrepair.com
dupagecomputerfix.com
dupageit.com

Ultimatley i think the one that is most SEO and user friendly is duapagepcrepair.com and is what I think I am going to go with based on what you guys think.

 

[BryanLee]

I'm actually thinking of getting another domain just to send people to for remote support. It is so frustrating trying to spell out my domain (which is pretty simple) all the time.

 

[mraikes]

As the owner of a hyphenated domain ( darn-computer ), I too had concerns originally. So I registered a short name ( fixnm - meaning "Fix New Mexico") to use whenever I suspect the hyphen may be a problem. It's pointed back at the hyphenated name.

But the reality is I rarely need to direct anyone to my website. They Google for computer repairs and click on a link. Almost no one types it in directly.

I suppose if someone were typing my email address the hyphen might be a minor complication, but again most people click through the contact me link on my site.

So the bottom line, as long as your url is memorable the hyphen will very rarely be an issue. An obscure, non descriptive name with no hyphen would NOT be a better alternative.

 

[josho]

@mraikes, would you say of the urls I suggested are non descriptive? btw I checked out your site and I think the artwork on there is awesome!

 

[Xander]

I'm actually thinking of getting another domain just to send people to for remote support. It is so frustrating trying to spell out my domain (which is pretty simple) all the time.

That's the reason I picked up PCRepa1r.com (and pcf1x.com). It's not too bad giving them a nice easy URL and then saying "But instead of an I, it's a 1". I also put these on the back of my business card (and leave a shortcut to pcrepa1r.com on their desktop)

 

[Cambridge PC Support]

You could get the hyphenated one to use for Google's benefit - so www.dupage-computer-repair.com

Then maybe a short, non-hyphenated one which 301 redirects to the same website - ie www.dupagepc.com -for over the phone and on business cards

 

[josho]

I didnt think of doing multiple url's and then doing redirects. But then again im new to all of this. This is all really good feedback-thanks a lot.

 

[mraikes]

@mraikes, would you say of the urls I suggested are non descriptive? btw I checked out your site and I think the artwork on there is awesome!

No, not really. That was more of a general comment rather than targeted at your specific ideas. But I would drop "dupage-pc" from your candidate list. It's not very good. Your other two ideas are better.

 

[TechLady]

I think your best bet it to take the first two (or even all of them) and just have them both redirect to your site. Domains are cheap these days.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

I think your best bet it to take the first two (or even all of them) and just have them both redirect to your site. Domains are cheap these days.

Agreed.
Get the formal long one that you like. Also get a short one that is EASY to give out over the phone. Best thing to think about...make it easy to give out over the phone. Honestly I don't worry about what spelling/wording makes it better for SEO stuff...I'm not all that worried about SEO importance. People get you via word of mouth, and your direct advertising.