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Domain Selection (.com vs country extention

by 2big
7 replies
Hello,

I am in US and wanting to start a blog. I will be targeting a particular country and I intend to do that by the headings, keywords, long tail keywords. I am wondering if I should make my domain to be .com or the country's domain extension. The site will be hosted in US too and I know/read somewhere that it will be hard to rank if you use dot com; target a geographic location. I know Google has changed a lot in ranking and I know content is the key. Also, does the location of hosting server affect the ranking too?

Any advice will be appreciated

Thank you
#country #domain #extention #selection
  • Profile picture of the author kk075
    Generally, you want to buy the .com if you are in the United States. If you're targeting another country though, then why not just buy both the .com and the .<country>? That way you're definitely covered either way.

    As far as where the serving host is located, that shouldn't be a factor...there are tons of powerhouse sites that are hosted in countries that you've never even heard of. As long as the uptime and the bandwidth is there, I don't think that's an issue.
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    • Profile picture of the author 2big
      Originally Posted by kk075 View Post

      Generally, you want to buy the .com if you are in the United States. If you're targeting another country though, then why not just buy both the .com and the .<country>? That way you're definitely covered either way.

      As far as where the serving host is located, that shouldn't be a factor...there are tons of powerhouse sites that are hosted in countries that you've never even heard of. As long as the uptime and the bandwidth is there, I don't think that's an issue.

      Thanks - so you're saying instead of registering .com alone. I can register the target country extension too, but use the dot com as the main domain URL; while i can do re- direct the country extension to the main? or have the domain URL as an example like this one "2big.com.au?
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      • Profile picture of the author kk075
        Originally Posted by 2big View Post

        Thanks - so you're saying instead of registering .com alone. I can register the target country extension too, but use the dot com as the main domain URL; while i can do re- direct the country extension to the main? or have the domain URL as an example like this one "2big.com.au?
        Yeah, the redirect will work just fine. International businesses do that all the time without any issues.
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        • Profile picture of the author 2big
          Originally Posted by kk075 View Post

          Yeah, the redirect will work just fine. International businesses do that all the time without any issues.
          Thank you and i do appreciate your time. Bless you
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  • Profile picture of the author Michael Fuentes
    2big,

    Originally Posted by 2big View Post

    I will be targeting a particular country
    ...
    I am wondering if I should make my domain to be .com or the country's domain extension ...
    ...
    Also, does the location of hosting server affect the ranking too?
    I'm sure you know that only Google search engineers'll have technically accurate answers to your questions, BUT ...

    Since they probably won't give anyone these answers -- An option is to do the following things:

    1. Observe what Google's currently doing (you only mentioned Google, and not Bing or Yahoo!) ...

    Test your exact match keywords in Google Search, both desktop and mobile ...
    Do these tests as local searches in the country that you're targeting ...
    Also test out your exact match keywords in Google Video Search, Google Image Search and so on, both desktop and mobile, in case you're planning to have many of these content types in your site ...

    2. Study the top results ...
    Take note of the following things:

    Domain extensions;
    Trailing Web addresses;
    Host locations (based on their IPs);
    Supported languages of those page results;
    Backend Meta info like page titles, descriptions, keywords and tags;
    Frontend page titles, text headers, internal and external links and text anchors; and
    Backlink portfolio details like link sources, text anchors, titles and backend meta info along with frontend details of referring pages ...

    3. Using the data you've gathered at this point -- Formulate test campaigns, run your own tests, study your results, tweak your tests and so on ...

    Otherwise, if you don't want to get into all that trouble, THEN ...
    Just download and study Google's Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide; and
    Come up and test other good traffic sources and strategic ways to generate targeted traffic, so you won't be solely dependent on Google organic search traffic ...
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    • Profile picture of the author 2big
      Originally Posted by Michael Fuentes View Post

      2big,



      I'm sure you know that only Google search engineers'll have technically accurate answers to your questions, BUT ...

      Since they probably won't give anyone these answers -- An option is to do the following things:

      1. Observe what Google's currently doing (you only mentioned Google, and not Bing or Yahoo!) ...

      Test your exact match keywords in Google Search, both desktop and mobile ...
      Do these tests as local searches in the country that you're targeting ...
      Also test out your exact match keywords in Google Video Search, Google Image Search and so on, both desktop and mobile, in case you're planning to have many of these content types in your site ...

      2. Study the top results ...
      Take note of the following things:

      Domain extensions;
      Trailing Web addresses;
      Host locations (based on their IPs);
      Supported languages of those page results;
      Backend Meta info like page titles, descriptions, keywords and tags;
      Frontend page titles, text headers, internal and external links and text anchors; and
      Backlink portfolio details like link sources, text anchors, titles and backend meta info along with frontend details of referring pages ...

      3. Using the data you've gathered at this point -- Formulate test campaigns, run your own tests, study your results, tweak your tests and so on ...

      Otherwise, if you don't want to get into all that trouble, THEN ...
      Just download and study Google's Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide; and
      Come up and test other good traffic sources and strategic ways to generate targeted traffic, so you won't be solely dependent on Google organic search traffic ...
      Thank you, I like reading from Warriors like you. This is really helpful. I have SEO in mind already and getting ready for it. I have installed Wordpress SEO by Yoast and learning how to set it up accurately for best results.- But my question remains - Do i still need to Optimize each page for SEO since I already have this and each post will have SEO? I will try Bing, Yahoo and others as you have suggested. Thank you again for the detailed message/comments
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      • Profile picture of the author Michael Fuentes
        2big,

        Originally Posted by 2big View Post

        Thank you, I like reading from Warriors like you. This is really helpful.
        Always happy to help ...

        Originally Posted by 2big View Post

        I have SEO in mind already and getting ready for it. I have installed Wordpress SEO by Yoast and learning how to set it up accurately for best results.- But my question remains - Do i still need to Optimize each page for SEO since I already have this and each post will have SEO?
        In my opinion and based on our test results from 2006 to post Panda / Penguin / Hummingbird -- Yes ...
        The right manual onsite and offsite SEO strategies greatly help. Here's why:

        I think that's exactly what Google doesn't want -- They don't want an automated script of some sort to have significant positive impact in the results of a website's onsite and offsite SEO campaigns; and

        That's because Google wants to rank pages based on the natural timeliness, relevance, popularity and overall usefulness of its content for users (or at least that's what they hope to do) ...

        ... HOWEVER ...

        This doesn't necessarily mean that your site'd be penalized or devalued by Google when you use some of those tools. Instead:

        Some of those tools won't have as much positive impact as the right manual onsite and offsite SEO campaigns, so it won't probably produce positive SERP movement as much as the right manual ways ...
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