Did Anyone Else See the Google EMD Downgrade Coming?

[acceleratoraccelerator is verified member.]

I have to say I always thought that at some point Google would downgrade the EMD boost, but that hasn't made it any less painful for me business-wise.

Just because you have the EMD does not mean you should be ranked on the term. I still think EMDs are good for marketing, but losing the EMD boost has certainly made things more challenging.

Did others see it coming?

Rgds

 

[boxfish]

I'm surprised it took so long. Matt Cutts mentioned it in one of his videos in early 2011 that the benefit would be dialled down.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=rAWFv43qubI#!

 

[bermuda]

This is one hundred percent accurate these days, and simply search Google for some hot keywords and you will find lots of EMDs not even appearing among the first fifty sites. Although it might be argued that using keyword-rich domains is still one smart strategy towards maintaining an ultimate site, but Google has totally decided not to be biased towards the syntax of the addresses, especially when it got aware that domain auctions are full of webmasters buying and selling EMDs simply because of SEO purposes.