hyphen question

[seeker]

friends,

in the event you have a 2 word domain that ends and starts with the same letter, is having a hyphen better (visually and for the brandability/memorability)?

example.
businesssource or business-source? (here it is a triple s)

or

largeeagle or large-eagle etc...etc...

would love to hear some opinions on this.
Thanks.

 

[katherine]

As a rule it's better not to have hyphens in the name.
If the name you want is available with AND without hyphen I would register BOTH. Think of it as a defensive registration

 

[aldwin]

I agree with sdsinc.. however if I'd have to choose I'll go without the hyphen.

 

[seeker]

very true and good point.
However here, the case is that the words have the same letter in the end and start, and I am worried about which is better 'looking' in a browser, on a page, in a link etc... and which one of the 2 versions (hyphen non hypen) actually is better to use (assuming you own both).

which looks better below?
confusinggames or confusing-games?

 

[DNjet]

for brandability I think its better to use the one without the hyphen , a Logo usually looks fine using caps , ConfusingGames.com.

 

[DNGeeks]

I believe for search engines that a hyphenated name may be better. If you take a look at all the pages that get SEO done to them they are done with hyphens or underscores.

www.yoursite.com/this-page-is-about-this.html

This helps a page to be descriptive to the search engines, why shouldn't it work the same way with a domain name? Of course content makes the page and name descriptive, but I think the naming would score higher.

This is some opinion, some fact, I don't know whether hyphenated domains would do better or not. If I were you I would register both and forward the non hyphenated name.

 

[seeker]

Thanks guys for all the feedback.

I will be going for the non hyphenated version.
I own both, but since this site will have a lot of exposure in the local printed media, I was wondering if the hyphenated version was more logical (same letter end start).

Thanks again.

 

[namewaiter]

good choice ... i would always say just register the hyphenated as protection, but if the hyphenated was already registered and a developed site - it would most certainly send traffic your way.

 

[seeker]

one more Q regarding this topic.

now, as far as typos are concerned, where there is an overlap of 3 letters (like businesssource), after the full version, would you reg or buy from the current owner this version business-source or this typo businessource ???

Thanks.

 

[prose]

If you really want to be proactive I also suggest registering, in your example, businessource.com

One too few S's will be a common type in error.

 

[Rarethings]

I think the SE take the hypens just the same.