Exact Match Domains Can Double Clicks on PPC Ads (study)
 

http://searchenginewatch.com/article...cks-on-PPC-Ads

We've been focusing on exact match domains in both adult and mainstream for eons and sell a lot of them - mostly to buyers getting them on SEO basis or domainers getting them to resell on that basis, but as this study showed, they help in other ways too. :)

I think even with more and more spammers/scrapers trying to abuse them and people running into exact match domains with crappy sites, when they see exact match, they subconsciously think "relevant" (Google's bolding of them probably helps too).

Matt from google has a tube video on this and he admits that this issue is always in debate. Having the exact keyword in the domain name does produce higher serps.

That's the thing - he had that recent video where he said Google had "received complaints" from people about the rankings of exact match domains (who tf would be complaining to Google about that?) and he said they were considering lowering the weight given to them. People reacted like "holy shit, they're 100% sure lowering the weight on them tomorrow to nothing and they're going to be worthless!"

No...he clearly said they would CONSIDER making the change, and I think when they look at it deeply, they probably won't do it. Why? Even if exact match domains are a significant factor, if the benefit is kept high on the extensions that would cost more for the better domains (com/net/org, some ccTLDs) and not as high on the ones that wouldn't, it would still be prohibitive for MOST spammers/scrapers to use them extensively. That and CTR being better on them may be something Google likes even on serps so that there's a nice traffic flow. The only thing worse than a visitor to Google clicking results and bouncing off due to the site not being good is not clicking them at all.

what a surprise. I advertise cookies and my domain is bestcookie.com, i bet the clickrate is higher on that domain then advertising cookies with the site xyz.com You dont need a study for that.

You advertise cookies on keyword chocolate chip cookies. Your domain is BestCookie.com. I also advertise cookies on the same keyword but my domain is ChocolateChipCookies.com. You don't think it's interesting that mine would get 45% higher CTR than yours with the same ad? (if it followed the results of the study)

A lot of small businesses using Adwords might be paying hundreds of dollars more per month on Adwords than they would if they bought an exact match domain and used that for the ad instead, which in the case of a .net or .org, would probably see them recoup the expense in 1-2 months.

"Although CPC was also lowest for the ElectricBicycles.co.uk domain, the difference was not statistically meaningful."

so you wouldn't save any $$$....:2 cents:

In that case it wasn't significant, but "the ad also showed more frequently and had a higher quality score" is more often than not going to lower the CPC...at least in my experience so far it's panned out that way more often than not.