How to do this Growth Hack and what can it do for you?
This growth hack is worth several crates of this book if you do it right.
If you're looking for instant ROI, try this hack
Expected results of this Growth Hack
- Growth Hack Type: Hack the domain name on Adwords with better authority thanks to the htacess file
- Expected result: Increase in conversions (CTR of your ads)
Why do this Growth Hack?
If you're using Google AdWords, try registering a keyword-rich domain that accurately reflects your product or service.
Let's say, for example, you sell digital cameras, so register this domain which is free at the time of printing: www.www-digitalcameras.com and yes, it's NOT a typo.
Step by step approach to this Growth Hack
When you host the domain, ask your developer to modify the website's .htaccess file as follows:
- RewriteEngine On
- RewriteCond% {HTTP_HOST} ^www. (. ) $ [NC] RewriteRule ^ (. $) https://%1/$1 [R=301, L]
- RewriteCond% {ENV:HTTPS}! We
- rewriteRule ^ (.*) $ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [R=301, L]
Any competent developer will easily understand how to do this.
This will force your domain to hide the www section of the domain. So, in the browser, the domain will look like this: https://-digitalcameras.com.
Now look at the estate.
Only a very careful eye will be able to notice that the hyphen is at the beginning of the domain - look after the double slash and you will see it.
The benefit of this growth hack is that the “digitalcameras.com” domain is authoritative and will likely increase the CTR (Click Through Rate) of your ad.
If you prefer your paid traffic to take action on your “real site”, create a link to it using a button CTA (Call To Action) or something similar from the rigged domain I mentioned.
Another solution could be to say that the article that the user is directed to from the ad is a review page with information about digital cameras and that to get more information or to buy the product, they should go to your main site.
I would recommend having two sites (domains) in this example. The first would be the AdWords domain (i.e. with the hyphen) and your main “monetary domain” where you place your efforts to SEO.