Does age of domain name affect search engine ranking?
Domain name has lately become an important factor that affects page rank of a website. The age of domain is directly related to the longevity of the website. Because of this reason, Google search engine gives weightage to the age of a domain. Many spam websites on the internet pop up in a thriving manner and then vanish in a few days. Compared to these websites, aged websites are considered credible by the search engines. Many online business companies buy a domain even before starting the website design to show their involvement in the business.
Age of domain name is characterized by two factors. Actual age of website and length of time the domain was registered by the owner. Age of website is determined by the amount of time for which the web pages were present on the internet. Efforts taken by webmaster to promote website and age of incoming links are also considered. Search engines determine age of domain by finding out the actual date of domain registration. Less known fact is that the search engines also check the number of years of registration to assign weights to a domain name. If you have registered domain for five or ten years, it shows that your business website will be present on internet for five or ten years. Search engines rank websites based on this factor also.
Spammed by many websites, search engines have updated their ranking algorithm to stall ranking of a website for a few months. This period is called sandbox during which search engines give three to four months time for the website to grow. This clearly reveals that search engine optimization for a new website takes a few months to show results. Webmasters can effectively use sandbox period to show that their website is a reliable one. Website promotion and off-page SEO can be done during initial months to increase page rank. These activities during initial months will improve reputation of your website. So, when search engines consider ranking your website, there will be more incoming links to your website which increases page rank.
While registering a domain name, make sure that you register it for a longer period of time. It is better to buy a domain name prior to website planning in order to grab keyword rich domain name. Pre-owned domains are viable options if you cannot wait for search engines to rank your website. However, such domains will be costlier. Some people even say that search engines will void previous page rank information when domain owner information changes for a domain name. To obtain high search engine ranking, you should take full advantage of weight given to domaining.
The connection between domain age and search engine ranking is critical to understand at first. As websites become old, there are weighted differently by search engines. This in any way does not mean that all old websites are ranked high. When you type keywords in search engines, you can find several new websites listed on the top of search engine results. If you are able to deploy right SEO tactics, you can easily improve page rank of the website.