jwm

This is a bit of a newbie question, but when looking at a product based domain name is the singular or the plural generally better.

For example, in .co.uk would you rather own

hat or hats
belt or belts

I would appreciate if you could give your reasons for your choice as well to help me understand.

(With apologies to the owners of the above domains for using them as examples)

patrickj

I'd be looking at both if the budget allows. I would say you are going to lose more traffic through typo if have the singular rather than the plural

retired_member6

It depends what the word is, some work better singular, others plural. Having both is always better obviously.

mat

In those examples id rather have hats and belts

People will be typing in and searching for Hats and belts.

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julian

I think some of the strongest domains are singular and can't be pluracised (is that a word?)

or have a ..ing..ed..'s etc slapped on the end:

e.g. fly,co,uk music,co,uk insane,co,uk, poker,co,uk

the bad news is there's not many of the above around.

as for product related I think about

mobile,co,uk or mobiles,co,uk
car or cars,co,uk
download,co,uk or downloads,co,uk

- i know which i'd rather have every time!

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jwm

So stupid question from me which would it be then?

ScottJ

I always prefer the plurals, you may search for a mobile but mobiles is by far more appealing as a company website to me, could be wrong.

Google are pretty good at dealing with plurals so it's no big hurdle to have mobiles and rank for mobile so for an SEO point of view the arguement for the singular if it is a product is not so strong as it was. So for me cars, tvs, boats, mobiles

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julian

imo for developing into site etc from the above type of domains i'd take the plurals.

from a search point of view singular might be better, from type-ins plural might be better ?

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jwm

My instinct was for the plurals too but looking at Google traffic estimator

mobile would get an estimated 11,293 - 12,618 clicks per day in spots 1-3

mobiles would get 432-540

That is a huge difference and would seem to suggest having the singular would be better. Or am I missing something?

tifosi

There's a difference between the keywords people may use and the desirable domain.

mobilephones.co.uk is better than mobilephone.co.uk, but mobile may be a better keyword than mobiles

Very subjective.