Living in Eugene Oregon I have seen how slow the great technology change is happing here vs a larger city. Eugene is more laid back, lots of face to face business, small local businesses, and even the wonderful Saturday Market where you can truly see the display of what this town is really all about: Community. They almost seem to resist  the change that is happening all around, or not taking it very serious. I have noticed a shift recently. The change is taking hold and more people are looking for a web developer with graphic design skills.

Now to the focus of this post. Being in the domain market for the past 8 years I have seen the power of domain names shift and grow. First it was big keywords like Cars.com, then long-tail-key-words LeatherCarSeats.com, (both still holding strong value) but Google and other search engine understood the shift happing too. People wanted to know how to find the local businesses. How to find what is offered right in one’s town and city, even a broad search to cover a whole state. So getting those types of domains was the next big kick to getting some addition rank to your website. Get the Keyword and your local town’s name together. Makes sense right?

 I prefer TownKeyword.com vs. KeywordTown because it has a logical sound that sticks in the brain. For example:
 AdvertisingEugene.com vs. EugeneAdvertising.com
The sound of putting the proper noun in-front of the adjective is the natural flow of the English Language.  Or take a product like Carpets. Would you type in Carpets Eugene into the search or address bar? Maybe, but the more natural flow is EugeneCarpets.com
Even greater than the natural linguistic flow of the domain name is the authoritative power that is conveyed.
It’s a  verbal demonstration that takes place in the brain that you are THE PLACE to go for your product and/or service. That you are THE Town’s or City’s resources when it come to that specific niche.

That being said, I’m happy to have watched my Local Advertising Domain name Eugene Advertising climb to the top of the ranks. It has taken around 5 weeks, including developing the domain, providing unique content, and working some linking strategies. I was happy before when people entered Eugene Advertising and I came up #1 UNDER the list of names displayed on the local map.  A few weeks later I got the top 2 spots, still UNDER that map. Now, a little over a month later working on it a few times a week, I am #2 on the map and hold the top 2 listings under the map. Nice

There is a certain amount of satisfaction that comes with dominating 3 spots at the top of the first page of google search results for Eugene Advertising   ( G says: Results 1 – 10 of about 3,140,000 for eugene advertising. (0.27 seconds)

The power of domains is really a something people may still be overlooking in my town, but I’m out there more and more doing my part to help the local small business understand the value of a good domain and website. I’m starting to get calls for a range of advertising services like BillBoards. Cool.

I took the below screenshot today and highlighted my placements:

Based on your URLs, the Search-based Keyword Tool displays a list of
relevant user queries that have occurred on Google.com (and on other
Google search properties, such as google.co.uk) with some frequency
over the past year; these suggestions can be found under the Keywords tab, in the New keywords related to (site) section. In the Keywords related to your search section, you can see a broad list of keyword ideas that are also relevant, but aren’t necessarily based on your site.

The keywords are also organized by category. Click any category
to expand and view its subcategories. If applicable, you’ll also see
the keywords organized by brand names.

Important note: We can’t guarantee that these
keyword suggestions will improve your campaign performance.
Additionally, we reserve the right to disapprove any keywords you add
to your campaigns. You’re responsible for the keywords you select and
for ensuring that your use of the keywords doesn’t violate any
applicable laws or our Terms of Service.

This information is taken from the google tools faq. Best of luck to you using the new offerings from google

From debating on using sub-domains, naming directories and even the very url of your website all will play a role in how the spiders rank, index and file your site.

If you have already built a site (or many) or you are getting ready to build out your site, take a look at what SEOmoz has developed for us.

Check out how SPAMMY your websites are.

Check it here —>

Googles full article

More from their Webmaster Central Blog – Here

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Search Engine Land has a very nice write up on the new technology of SE

Their’s is here

And on the topic of video might as well toss in the Official Google YouTube Channel – Here

There is a little more to it than just that. I am planning on getting down and dirty with my robots.txt file to block the spiders from getting to the duplicate content. Not sure exactly how to do it just yet, but hope to have it figured out soon.