SEO - Domain name age/duration

Search Engine Optimisation is a huge and continually evolving field; with hundreds of factors being taken into account by the likes of the Google, Yahoo, Bing and Ask search engines. These search engines fight a continuous battle against 'web spam': websites that deliberately aim to deceive in order to reach the top in the search engine results.

One factor that the search engines use to help filter out these types of sites is the age of a domain name: basically they have a higher trust for sites that have been around for a while. This explains why your new website may take longer to establish itself that you might have hoped (and why some people buy well established domain names to build their internet businesses around).

However, another signal to search engines that you are not just "here today, gone tomorrow" web spam, is the length of time over which you have renewed your domain name for. For a .co.uk you're limited to 2 years, but if you are using a .com domain then you can choose from 1 to 10 years. Choosing a longer renewal is a clear signal to search engines that you are in it for the long term and this factor is even mentioned as an example in one of Google's patents.

It's a very minor point, but good Search Engine Optimisation is the sum of many such factors. Contact us to find out more.