Will a .co TLD pose any significant problem with SEO?
steven wrote:I'm curious if a .co TLD would pose any problem with SEO efforts? Recently we purchased quite a few REALLY good domains with the .co TLD. The .co TLD had a lot of noise surrounding it (which I suspect was just that, noise) but in any case we did buy them and didn't really think about the problem with it being a ccTLD for Colombia (even though the registrar says- ".co like company"... I figured that it may or may not be an issue. So, 2 part question:
1. Is the .co TLD (or any ccTLD for that matter) going to pose a problem in United States SERPS? I realize that sites with incredible authority really don't need to worry (i.e. ma.tt or the like), but what about sites that wouldn't garner as many links? Would direct match matter with a ccTLD the way it does with a .com?
2. Has any of you ever expierimented with ccTLD's and if so, what kind of results/data did you produce?
Thanks in advance for the input.
Hi there,
I seriously doubt that the TLD will be a problem for ranking in places like the US (or anywhere outside of Colombia, for that matter), as quite a few "ccTLDs" have gone "mainstream" in this manner. Both .fm and .tv were ccTLDs and are now used commercially. An exact-match domain with this TLD likely has as much chance given its name as a .net, .org, etc, in the same position, although I would say that we've seen more .com exact match sites perform remarkably well than other TLDs.
I don't know of any formal experiments with ccTLDs: of course, .co.uk and .org.uk domains (etc) rank very well in the UK and usually not elsewhere. The same goes for .co.nz, .com.au, .ca, etc. This is really a "given". However, I don't know of any work done surrouding ccTLDs that are now used commonly everywhere, such as .tv.
