Is there anything wrong on buying .info domains?

[bay37]

Originally Posted by Alexa Smith

With apologies, very few successful niche marketers here, in non-IM-advice niches, are willing to disclose their niches, for obvious reasons.

I don't really mind disclosing mine... I go by many different names though, so it would not make much of a difference to me. But I certainly see how it could cause trouble in some cases/to some marketers.

I wasn't really asking you for niche info though. I'm more interested in your target demographics and customer "type".

Perhaps not the right place to discuss this - on a public IM forum

Thanks for your reply!

[bay37]

Originally Posted by Martin Luxton

BTW, travel.com.au - Cheap Flights, Hotels, Holiday Packages, Cruises, Tours - one destination. endless possibilities. ranks higher than TRAVEL.com*® - Worldwide Travel Reservations for the keyword "travel". This means that you should never buy a .com because the .com.au, is obviously better.

I'm pretty sure those rankings are very region-specific.

Surely it's not as simple as just saying "all is always equal".

[Devid Farah]

They can work well to keep the costs down if you are just, as an example, needing a website name to use as a landing/squeeze page.

Low cost and effective.

Also they are far more often available than corresponding TLD’s.

[paulgl]

The whole argument is moot when getting back to the OP original question,

Do you find a big disadvantage from the SEO point of view

Of course not. We are not talking branding, remembering, feel-good, touchy-feely
warm fuzzy feeling one gets down their leg at the mere mention of a dot com.

SEO, the SE part, search engine, does not list sites by feelings. This is my line for
the day: This is not 1997. Web surfers are attuned to different domains from
.biz to .tv.

I have no idea why price seems to be an SEO thing. I get .coms as cheap as .infos.
If price mattered, guess what? You all would be paying up the wazoo for a .co

Paul

[craigcdz]

Originally Posted by ninomc

Hello,
Do you find a big disadvantage from the SEO point of view (and Google I guess) when you run blogs using .info domains?

Any Suggestions?

no i don't think its a big issue but yes you can't get that much results which you can get from .com domain.

[seomelbourne]

.info domain is generally meant by an educational or informative site. But from the SEO point of view the extension doesn’t matters a lot. The SEO work done on a particular site matters.

[Gunedat]

You should be ok with .info. I have a few sites with .info that are sitting pretty on the top of Google page 1.

However, .info domains does have a little bit of disadvantage, in terms of SEO. The major 3 TLD's are easier to rank. To combat this, I only use .info if I get exact match domains to it, and the competition is not too stiff.

[DireStraits]

*Give me strength.*

Originally Posted by Gunedat

However, .info domains does have a little bit of disadvantage, in terms of SEO. The major 3 TLD's are easier to rank.

Why do you say this? Can you prove it? Where is your evidence? Please show us it.

Google themselves openly state that there is no difference in the way they treat different TLDs for ranking purposes.

What would they gain from stating this if it weren't true?

A smarter question would be: what would they lose from stating this if it weren't true?

The answer: a lot of potentially high-quality, useful, relevant and informative websites ranking highly in their SERPs and helping their business - all because they'd stupidly encouraged quality site owners to base their sites on "inferior TLDs", which stacked the odds against them from the start.

Google wants to rank good, relevant websites; they can't afford to be misleading people in any way that would inhibit them from doing this. At least, it'd be wholly illogical for them to do so, wouldn't it?

Openly and aggressively lying about their algorithm in this way, and luring site owners into a false sense of security, would only hurt them and the quality and integrity of their search results in the long run.

They would not (and do not) do this for the sake of "preventing spam", because that tactic would not work, either. Spammers, armed with the knowledge that .info TLDs are useless, would simply use other TLDs instead. Then what would Google do - penalise every other TLD in the same way?

Secondly, how do you profess to have measured this alleged "slight" SEO disadvantage in a way that is meaningful and accurate?

[thecableguy]

Originally Posted by Gunedat

You should be ok with .info. I have a few sites with .info that are sitting pretty on the top of Google page 1.

However, .info domains does have a little bit of disadvantage, in terms of SEO. The major 3 TLD's are easier to rank. To combat this, I only use .info if I get exact match domains to it, and the competition is not too stiff.

Have to agree, IMO they are a bit harder to rank, I don't care what Matt Cutts or anyone else says. I'm not saying you can't get it ranked, but it requires more work. Judging from searches of thousands of EMD domain others seem to think that also, lots of times the .info is taken (usually after the .com, and .net). Just curious have those who disagree actually tried to rank an info domain? Or is it hearsay or what Matt Cutts says? I tried dozens of .info domains when EMD domains were kinda magic back in 2006, while some did get ranked it wasn't with the same frequency of .com, .net and .org (I've tried with biz, mobi, us, tv as well but not enough to form a positive opinion). I let dozens of .info domains I registered expire untouched after not getting the com, net or org to get anywhere near the first couple of pages in the SERPS. Like I said IMO. But if price is a factor as mentioned it works out to about 2 cents a day difference for the first year only.

[paulgl]

Originally Posted by thecableguy

Have to agree, IMO they are a bit harder to rank, I don't care what Matt Cutts or anyone else says. I'm not saying you can't get it ranked, but it requires more work. Judging from searches of thousands of EMD domain others seem to think that also, lots of times the .info is taken (usually after the .com, and .net). Just curious have those who disagree actually tried to rank an info domain? Or is it hearsay or what Matt Cutts says? I tried dozens of .info domains when EMD domains were kinda magic back in 2006, while some did get ranked it wasn't with the same frequency of .com, .net and .org (I've tried with biz, mobi, us, tv as well but not enough to form a positive opinion). I let dozens of .info domains I registered expire untouched after not getting the com, net or org to get anywhere near the first couple of pages in the SERPS. Like I said IMO. But if price is a factor as mentioned it works out to about 2 cents a day difference for the first year only.

Here's a challenge for you. Start a dot com that goes for the niche of pagerank or
pagerank checker. Then come back when you have defeated prchecker.info
with your dot com. Using the logic here, it should be very, very, very easy with that
magical dot com.

Paul

[thecableguy]

Originally Posted by paulgl

Here's a challenge for you. Start a dot com that goes for the niche of pagerank or
pagerank checker. Then come back when you have defeated prchecker.info
with your dot com. Using the logic here, it should be very, very, very easy with that
magical dot com.

Paul

Where did I say that it would be very, very easy with a com, net or org to beat ANY site that is ranking? I just said IMO it's more difficult to get an .info site ranked. You're entitled to your opinion and I'm entitled to mine. I'm not saying everybody that says there's no difference just because Matt Cutt's may say so and taking his word for it could be mistaken. But have you ever tried getting the EMD and putting basically the same content on both and seeing if there is a difference? Well it doesn't matter, you don't have to "convince" me of anything, and I'm not trying to convince you of anything, like I said JMO. But you could pick ANY site that's ranking in the SERPs and it doesn't matter what TLD you have it would be tough to beat. Like I said it's not that you can't rank with an .info domain, but IMO it just takes more work. After searching thousands of EMD's apparently I'm not the only one that feels this way. Maybe it does matter maybe it doesn't, but unless you're actually registering it for a specific purpose , for $6 for the first year only given a choice I'd go for the com, net or org every time. Like I said IMO.

[TZ]

.info is no problem. It's ALL based on the content. If it's "seen" as original by Google, Yahoo, etc. then "Bob's Your Uncle".

We have 2 .info domains that have been making an average of $15 bucks a day in Adsense - these are just auto-blogs keep in mind.

Many of our auto blogs run on .info domains.

You can DOOOOOO it sparky!

[bgmacaw]

Originally Posted by thecableguy

Just curious have those who disagree actually tried to rank an info domain?

Yes. I have several that rank well. I have some that haven't done so well. The same is true of .com and .net domains I've purchased and used the same promotional techniques on.

Now, I do often go for less competitive keywords (westernhorsesaddle.info) and brand+keyword (bobshorsesaddles.com or myhorsesaddle.info) rather than high competition exact match keywords (the same is true of other domain types I buy). What I've noticed is that people who complain that .info's are hard to rank or that their new exact keyword match .com domain is 'sandboxed' are those going after rather competitive terms.

[thecableguy]

Originally Posted by bgmacaw

Yes. I have several that rank well. I have some that haven't done so well. The same is true of .com and .net domains I've purchased and used the same promotional techniques on.

Now, I do often go for less competitive keywords (westernhorsesaddle.info) and brand+keyword (bobshorsesaddles.com or myhorsesaddle.info) rather than high competition exact match keywords (the same is true of other domain types I buy). What I've noticed is that people who complain that .info's are hard to rank or that their new exact keyword match .com domain is 'sandboxed' are those going after rather competitive terms.

Yeah I agree and have had .info TLDs rank as well, but they seemed to be more difficult and take longer. And yes ANY competitive keyword is difficult to rank for But I thought the "sandbox" was a myth Kidding aside it could also have been that the .info sites were more affiliate sites than informational, I heard someone mention that that played a part as well.

[paulgl]

Originally Posted by thecableguy

Where did I say that it would be very, very easy with a com, net or org to beat ANY site that is ranking? I just said IMO it's more difficult to get an .info site ranked.

That's exactly what you are saying. A dot com is easier to rank than a dot info.
So, do it. Beat said dot info with your dot com. Since dot coms are so much easier
to rank, as you say, it should be a piece of cake.

FYI: Every new site you are creating is competing with established sites that rank.

So, all things being equal, a dot info that is #1 should be easier to beat with a dot
com. After all, the dot coms have more seo juice, right?

Because if you are conceding that there is no juice for a dot com to beat
a dot info on just the dot com, then the argument vanishes.

Paul

[bgmacaw]

Originally Posted by thecableguy

it could also have been that the .info sites were more affiliate sites than informational, I heard someone mention that that played a part as well.

Having a keyword targeted content rich site is always a big plus. The more original the content, the better, although if you're primarily targeting numerous long tail searches less than original content will work too.

[drvn4eagles]

Originally Posted by ninomc

Hello,
Do you find a big disadvantage from the SEO point of view (and Google I guess) when you run blogs using .info domains?

Any Suggestions?

Someone may have already mentioned this, but I have noticed with my sites that the .com and the .org and the .net Always out rank anything that I have tried to rank for if I don't have those extensions. It is just easier to find a close name to it with either a word before your domain or after. You can still rank for those keywords, just in a different way.

[thecableguy]

Originally Posted by paulgl

That's exactly what you are saying. A dot com is easier to rank than a dot info.
So, do it. Beat said dot info with your dot com. Since dot coms are so much easier
to rank, as you say, it should be a piece of cake.

FYI: Every new site you are creating is competing with established sites that rank.

So, all things being equal, a dot info that is #1 should be easier to beat with a dot
com. After all, the dot coms have more seo juice, right?

Because if you are conceding that there is no juice for a dot com to beat
a dot info on just the dot com, then the argument vanishes.

Paul

Who are you trying to convince? Hey go ahead and beat ebay.com or google.com with your .info domain if it's SO easy. You pick a particular domain to beat then yeah it's going to be tough, but what's the point? Just so I can prove a point. Do you understand what IMO stands for?

I'm outta here.

[JSProjects]

Originally Posted by ninomc

Hello,
Do you find a big disadvantage from the SEO point of view (and Google I guess) when you run blogs using .info domains?

Any Suggestions?

Absolutely nothing wrong with .info domains. I love 'em. Cheap and effective. Find a product or buying phrase, register the .info with the product or keywords you're targeting, optimize, profit.

[howinfo]

My main site is on info domain and not because .com was not available but the site was supposed to be informational so .info was the most logical and appropriate choice and it also has that nice flow and look to it and as people who are looking for information do prefer to click on .info

The site was kind of an experiment at the beginning but now as it has been doing so well I have left all the other sites and mainly work on this one now. I must say that I have not seen any negative effect using .info extension. No problem with ranking or people confusing it to .com It rather has positive effect as the domain name stands out and is easy to remember, just the perfect extension for informational website and lot of people looking for info on internet so it has worked out really well.

[fabiobr]

the very good tip, this post!