This is a interesting question. Does google prefer .com over say, .net or .info as far as search results go. If you are working your keywords into a domain name, does it matter which extension you purchase? Or is it just preference?

I think most of these questions came to me due to the cheap registration of the .info extension right now at google. So all you that are "in the know" out there, let me know please.

Thanks in advance for everyone input on this topic,


___________________
wasserbett
yellow pages directory

I have yet to produce my domain yet

Its a good question though, I don't think the search engines prefer extensions over one another, they like good content/keywords

But there's a lot of people not into their computing (fair play), they use their PC for website browsing and work for example, now a lot of them probably move towards .com when typing in URL's or searching because that's probably what they hear a lot and they know less about it

So yeah an extension can affect you when people are trying to find you but in terms of search engines I don't think it changes much

I'm sure I'm not entirely right there but someone will give you a more thorough correct answer

I think it all comes down to the content of your page, as well as keywords and description in your meta tags.

I think people in general tend to lean toward .com
If the just hear the name of the site, then they probably try .com first. I won about 70 domain names all ranging from .com, .net, .info, .us, .biz etc.

I think it's important if you have a good quality .com name, with good content, good PR and a good alexa ranking then protect your domain franchise. Buy the .net, .org, .us etc for your domain name and then set them up as a redirect to your main site.

There is a Canadian upstart that is going to release a huge plethora of new top level dot names after the first of the year.

Read the story here

These names will be regional and industry oriented, with examples like: .health, .movie, .sports, .paris, .chicago, .boston, .africa and much more.

They are actually taking reservations, first come first serve, with no payments due until you actually lock in a name.

I reserved a huge amount of names the day they first were offered, so it will interesting to see if I actually get any. It will also be interesting to see if any of these names will be worth anything down the road.

Another thing is that they don't tell you how much they will cost to reserve them. When the .us, .biz etc first came available they were very expensive.
But I guess I would pay a decent amount for a name like food.chicago, or hotels.nyc etc.

Any thoughts on these new dot names?

Rod

__________________
Tickets For Profits: Your Guide to Making Money on the Web
Sell-it4u.com: Resources for eBay and the Web

It actually depends on what market you compete.
If you want to rank high in Google.ca, for example, you can do that a lot easier if you have a .ca domain.

There is no evidence that any extension is better than another when it comes to global SEO. The only advantage of a dot com name in this scenario is it's what people naturally type in to their browser. You don't want traffic trying to find your dot info domain name all ending up on your competitors dot com extension of the same domain name

With regards to Geographic or regional SEO, it would appear that the extension does make a difference to performance in the search engines. So if you are targetting UK audience then dot co dot uk would be a better option.

__________________
On Page Search Engine Optimization
The Internet Marketing Library

I have seen this question posed several times on various forums...
The fact is there never has been any reason to believe through any argument that one TLD does any better than any other.

The one exception I believe does carry a bit more weight is .edu domains.

Other than that, I highly doubt the search engines give preference...

I think the main advantage with having a .COM domain name is that people always assume a web address is .COM first. Even when you tell them it’s a .ORG or .NET address there will still be a proportion of people that will forget and go to the .COM version of your site which of course can be a totally different site.

I don’t believe Google prefers one extension over another, it’s just you want to eliminate any possible ambiguity with your domain name which will prevent any people seeking your page out yet accidently going to a competitor’s page.

In fact I have seen a business buy a number of domain names very similar to its competitors with the obvious purpose of stealing business from customers that type their competitors’ address wrong in search. Very Sneaky!

Niche made a good point regarding local marketing in respect to graphical SEO, where you don’t want to have a .COM address if your target market lives in the UK, great point!

In respect to .edu domains, the buzz is that Google is looking at cracking down on sites that backlink to these .edu domains purely for pagerank purposes.

So it looks like the free ride might soon be over!

__________________
Create a Souped up Ping List for Your Blog!

Free Web Dev Cheat Sheet Downloads

Completely agree with you bluefox.

I could be mistaken, but it seems I read somewhere that Google scans the dot coms first, and then goes after the rest. But don't bet the pooch on that.

I was always under the impression the bot scan them as they find them. I can only imagine how jumbled the database must become after scanning the web after all of these years...

__________________
Printable Anniversary Gifts | Family Name Origins | Personalized Horoscopes | Name Origins

It shouldn't matter, but I have read an article where it was saying that Google was treating .info domains differently from .com domains due to a lot of people making spam sites with them. I would stay away from .info domains, but the other ones should be fine. .com is always the best choice out of all of them because it is the most professional looking.

all the search engines look at all the domains the same way. The extension doesn't matter it values your site on the information you provide. The .info extension a few years ago was looked at different due to it was supposed to be used more as a wikipedia style domain. However, the guide lines for all extensions have changed and they are now valued the same. The only extension that does make a difference is .US as the restrictions on obtaining one is a little stricter.

__________________

Nazreeric Asks: Does google prefer .com over say, .net or .info as far as search results go. If you are working your keywords into a domain name, does it matter which extension you purchase? Or is it just preference?

Google absolutely prefers dot COM.

Here's a related post that explains why, along with some additional information you'll find useful:

websitebabble (dot) com/website-ideas-brainstorming-before-you-begin/7047-com-net-org-2 (dot) html#post53397

replace (dot) with "."

I also heard that about .info domains. And yes...there are a lot of spammy .info sites.

__________________
~ Affordable Ohio Health Insurance ~
~ Affordable Pennsylvania Health Insurance ~

Google does not prefer any domain over another. However, as most of you said; .com is more popular because people tend to remember .com more.