Thread: Best Domain Extension for SEO

Originally Posted by mixke

And what about other country specific TLDs like .co.uk, .in, .com.ph?

I just got a correction from Aaron Wall.

Apparently ccTLD's do receive an exact match domain bonus -- but not all of them. In particular, .us does not.

Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

I just got a correction from Aaron Wall.

Cool, Thanks for confirming

Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

Apparently ccTLD's do receive an exact match domain bonus -- but not all of them. In particular, .us does not.

Yep! I observed the bonus given to ccTLD's. Then I created the other thread since I was not sure.

It seems exact match ccTLD's are great when targeting a specific country for a term local to it. I'm not sure about .us but it seems .co.uk and .in get some bonus for exact match. Just wondering which ccTLD's do not receive exact domain match bonus.

Thanks again!

Originally Posted by mixke

Just wondering which ccTLD's do not receive exact domain match bonus.

Maybe countries without a local market, .hm for example or countries where Google is not present.

Originally Posted by Will.Spencer

There is an exception to that rule.

Google gives a significant bonus to exact match domains with com/net/org extensions and no hyphens.

If the search term is "silly putty", then Google will give a bonus to:

• sillyputty.com
• sillyputty.net
• sillyputty.org

But not to:

• silly-putty.com
• sillyputty.us
• sillyputty.info
• sillyputty.cc

MSN has a similar exact match bonus, and my guess it that Yahoo does also.

Originally Posted by Shenron

Yahoo does it too, at least from my own experience, but they give that bonus to .info also.

hi buddy, are you sure that .info is not included in the bonus list? While doing some rare keyword searches I got .info sites too among the top results. Thanks for the information though.

I always prefer .com domains.

I just bought one info to test how it will perform, since I dont have any infos

I really haven't noticed that the exact match domains tend to rank better. But that happens on Bing, and I've tested it.

Originally Posted by dmi

I really haven't noticed that the exact match domains tend to rank better. But that happens on Bing, and I've tested it.

I can confidently say that exact match .com/.net/.org domains rank very high on google with relatively much less effort than is required for a non-exact match domain. Have tested this with several sites and saw consistent results.

Its a hard thing to test. Your site name is the exact match keyword, and many links will include your site name for the anchor text, so you can't discount this fact.

Originally Posted by Hellas

I just bought one info to test how it will perform, since I dont have any infos

I have exact match .info domains which rank very well. If the keyword is suitable for a .info I actually really like the extension (moreso then .net/.org) if I can't get the .com of course.

Originally Posted by dcristo

Its a hard thing to test. Your site name is the exact match keyword, and many links will include your site name for the anchor text, so you can't discount this fact.



I have exact match .info domains which rank very well. If the keyword is suitable for a .info I actually really like the extension (moreso then .net/.org) if I can't get the .com of course.

I dont ment to test exactly, I think that is almost imposible.
But I started site on info domain. So I will see how much effort will I need to do to get certain level. Off course again it depends on niche.

I think I will be satisfied with my personal feeling