I run a site, http://www.haloreachbeta.com. It ranks 1st on google for the keywords “halo reach beta”, which is great.
However, my real goal is the keyword “halo reach”. Here, my site ranks 37th. Meanwhile, a competitor site (haloreachinfo.com) ranks 3rd for that keyword, and I’m a bit miffed as to why.
Our domain names are similar, both containing but not exactly the keyword, so they shouldn’t be gaining anything there.
We’re both basically the same pagerank.
We’re both basically the same age.
We both have similar content.
According to the backlink checkers I’ve run, it looks like I have about twice as many backlinks including links from a couple PR8 sites in the same category. I see no backlinks from high PR content related sites for my competitor’s site.
According to the backlink checkers I’ve run, it looks like I have about twice as many backlinks including links from a couple PR8 sites in the same category. I see no backlinks from high PR content related sites for my competitor’s site.
That should tell you that PR is not the be all - end all.
We’re both basically the same age.
Age of the site has little to do with SERPS other than the fact that because it’s older it would have had more time to accumulate links.
I have about twice as many backlinks
The total number of backlinks only tells a small part of the story. It’s the total “link profile” you should perhaps consider. Are a good number of the the links from relevant pages? Do the links have your keyword phrases as the anchor text? Do you have a variety of different anchor texts?
Maybe your competitor has a better keyword density or maybe it is more used (the keyword) in title tags or in H1 tags or your competitor uses the keyword in the first paragraph or in bold more often than you do. Another possibility could be the social bookmarking popularity (links from sites like Stumbleupon)
My backlinks are from more relevant, higher ranked pages, but I think the difference here is the second part of what you mentioned. My anchor text is typically “halo reach beta” whereas his is typically the exact “halo reach” phrase.
Your domain name won’t effect your ranking. People think it will and I did until not long ago but it doesn’t. Your domain name could be ldfudgherigh.co.nz and it wouldn’t effect your rankings.
It’s probably to do with backlinks that they have.
I can tell you with 100% certainty that this is incorrect when it comes to exact keywords matching your domain name.
I created this site and almost instantly became ranked #1 on google for the keywords “halo reach beta” (which is my exact domain name) even though at the time there were far more established sites with 100x more backlinks than I had (I had almost none) for the same thing.