How does one make a strong portfolio for a new SEO agency?

TL;DR -> Yes you will risk it if you don't perform a proper audit and migration from the original platform. Any type of architecture changes can 100% ruin your SEO if you are not migrating content and topics correctly. Many people assume this is limited to URI structure but underestimate the power of Topical hierarchy and the content, internal linking and URI structure which play a crucial role into any migration effort. If you have any questions about the migration process, give me a shout. Decent free migration checklist: https://searchengineland.com/site-migration-seo-checklist-dont-lose-traffic-286880

Neither domain name option is a very good idea. I'll explain why in a second, but first I'll answer your actual question. Although there might arguably be some slight advantage in having an exact-match domain of the form Name.TLD as opposed to a domain with additional keywords alongside the name, that advantage is probably negligible. Google algorithm updates, as I understand them, withhold that exact-match-domain advantage until a website has many other reinforcing signals of authority. (Their goal has been to downgrade spammy, low-quality websites.) Whichever domain version you might choose, Google will find the brand name CUJO mentioned all over your actual website and in the referring links. Those signals will be plenty for search engines to pick up on and hence plenty for SEO, and I'd expect them to overshadow the tiny difference between the 2 domains. Your choice shouldn't be based on SEO. Stop trying to please search engines, and start paying attention to your actual human audience. Really, your decision ought to be made based on the memorability and first impression of the domains. Is the extra keyword in .COM better than a name without that extra keyword in .IO? For humans, that is. Either way, you'll run into competition from CUJO.com. And that's a potential problem. Another problem would be pronunciation ambiguity. Spanish and English speakers will see the name very differently, based on that "J". Spelling isn't altogether clear either – Koojo, Kujo, Coojo, Cujo? The main problem I see, however, is that Cujo is a murderous dog in a Stephen King novel. Since most searches for Cujo will aim at that meaning, your site will be perceived by Google as usually irrelevant in comparison with searchers' intentions. And that doesn't help SEO.

If you got 5000 sites to link to your site using the same keyword you'll likely be flagged for spam and attempting to manipulate the search results. That is an old-school attempt at SEOing a site that Google and the other search engines have already developed algorithmic answers to. There are three aspects to building up your search rankings. 1) On-Site Optimization: Your site has to be coded in a way that is search and mobile friendly. You need to optimize your content for searcher's topical interest's (keywords), and give your visitors a great on-site experience by focusing on usability issues. 2) Content: You need to create and publish awesome content that fills the needs of the audience you're trying to reach. Write blog posts and create other forms of content that answer questions, provide tips, and map out solutions that truly illustrate that you are an authority on the topic. 3) Social Engagement / Links: Links are an important part of the algorithm, but getting a bunch of sites to link to you using keywords is the wrong approach. You need to be engaging on social media and (to a far lesser extent) socializing your content above. But the more you engage, the more others will socialize your content for you, which is where authority is really built.

We work with one of the big cruise sites in the UK and it's all about making the site deserve to rank higher by continually improving the site via design & content. Google wants to rank popular sites so you need to (as Simon points out) figure out ways of getting influential sites to talk about you and link to you. PR is the only real way to build links these days.

Hi there - There are two parts to the answer. First, it's very important to have a site map that is both current and does not have any URLs in it that return a status code other than a 200. Even 301 redirected URLs should not be in there. Also, the site map should not have more than 50,000 URLs. If it has more, then create multiple site maps and list them in an index site map. Second, site maps are a great way to get content *discovered*, but they won't necessarily rank well. You need the URLs to also be easily discoverable on your site through internal linking. I hope this helps. Feel free to book a call with me if you'd like to discuss more. John