Could different domain extensions negatively affect the brand?

when using .com for main site and other extensions for other smaller sites

[federico2005]

Hello everybody,

I have a 7 y.o. established website registered with domain extension .com .
In order to protect the brand I also registered other domain extensions -- .org, .net, .biz -- they currently are parked domains.

Now I am planning to use these parked domains to build a few niche websites. I would like to use them to take advantage of their remarkable domain age -- 7 y.o.

These niche websites would cover topics not strictly related to my main site .com .
As an example of what the relationship between the websites would be:

- main site (.com) is a large portal covering "Travel to a Destination X"
- niches websites (.org, .net, .biz) would cover topics such like: "Local Food Specialties in Destination X", "Craft Products in Destination X", "Shoes you need for Traveling to Destination X" , etc...

Could they (niches websites) negatively affect the brand of main site?

Thanks

[rocker]

Could they (niches websites) negatively affect the brand of main site?

www.google.org did not negatively affect www.google.com

[federico2005]

However google.org is strictly related to google.com

On the homepage it reads: "Google.org uses Google's strengths in information and technology..."

[bwnbwn]

federico2005 this sounds like a good idea really. Couple questions How would building these sites help you?
Would you then be linkng the sites together on a per page level to provide more information to a user for specific information related to their tlavel destination?
Or would you be better off adding this information within the main site to build a better site, provide more information, add new pages, and increase the traffic to the main site by developing content to target more search terms.

Me I would really have to think about it before I spent my time on a new site and took away that time from my main site.

Whatever decision you make I would 301 the parked domains that are not being used to my main site.

[federico2005]

How would building these sites help you?.....Or would you be better off adding this information within the main site to build a better site

The main site offers a lot of information covering generic issues about "destination X".

The point is it is getting too generic. If I add more specific content it would become a too much large website. At this time I have already found it is losing visitors because they are not finding answers to their specific needs -- even when such answers can be found in the current main site.

I feel niche websites covering more specific targeted needs must be created for a couple of reasons:
1. in order to offer users a better experience
2. to monetize such niches -- I am currently not able to

My doubt is, once mydomain.net,...biz etc. are online, if people will stop to mentally associate mydomain with the main brand ("travel to destination X") as they will be hearing about mydomain --with extensions .net, .org. etc...)-- is covering other stuff (local food, craft products, etc...).

I'd like to use these parked domains because, as told above, are 7 y.o.
Domain age is important for SERPs, isn't it?

[bwnbwn]

Domain age is one of the factors yes, but you will still be starting out new since there hasn't been any history and no links to the sites your a brand new puppy.

Me I would first find out what I missed. If your losing customers because they can't find information on the site you have a problem with how your site delivers to the user.

At this time I have already found it is losing visitors because they are not finding answers to their specific needs -- even when such answers can be found in the current main site.

I would first investigate why. Then I would fix my content delivery, search, navigation or whatever you use to move a customer around the site. If you got something broke don't ya think it is worth fixing before moving on.

[HuskyPup]

Could they (niches websites) negatively affect the brand of main site?

Not if they are not duplicates. If they are as you say they will help each other.

I started doing this more than 10 years ago with my main B&M site a .com however I also have my .asia/cn/co.uk/in/biz/info/etc all with more in-depth information and all linked to each other with identical lhs navigation so that people can easily move between the various sites.

It also makes updating each site much easier if any changes need to be made...that's assuming you use CSS incs.

[choster]

I would recommend using subdomains instead, or possibly registering new ones. Using different top-level domains for related but not identical content would sow confusion if you plan to promote them separately.

For instance: suppose my friend tells me about a great site about hotels in Examplestan at examplestan.net , I check it out and like it and plan to book on the weekend. But when the weekend comes, I don't exactly remember the URL, so I try examplestan.com . Well, the logo is the same, the visual style is the same, but this definitely isn't the site that I saw a couple days ago. I have to click around to find what I'm actually looking for.

Using examplestanrooms.net or hotels.examplestan.com would sidestep this issue neatly.

[federico2005]

HuskyPup says:

Not if they are not duplicates. If they are as you say they will help each other

example.com offers general content about travel to (and lifestyle in) destination X.

example.net, example.biz, example.org would offer in-depth information and e-commerce on: product A, product B, product C.
These products are manufactured only in destination X (the products can be associated to "travel to destination X", think to souvenirs etc...).

My doubt is if users hear about example.net first, they can associate "example" only to product A, that would mean negatively impacting on "example" brand as a whole -- even if I would place a large image link to example.com on each of the niche websites hp.

choster says:

I would recommend using subdomains instead

The reason because I would not go for subdomains is they are making the website huge in size (I have some subdom.).
Also it is hard to monetize. Adding to example.com affiliate links/catalogues for each of the issues covered -- not in-depth -- would result in a Yahoo-like website with huge shopping areas. Something I suppose small business can't deal with.
So example.com would offer info -- in-depth -- on travel and very generic on products related to travel to destination X, with links to more niche-like websites where users would complete their experience with more in-depth info and shopping capabilities about the products.

When it comes to SERPs -- maybe SEO experts could find it a silly question -- would the launch of example.net, ...biz...org... impact in any ways on example.com?

[maximillianos]

Subdomains are actually treated like separate domains by google (essentially). You can even host them on separate servers. Matt Cutts has said there is a little juice passed from the root domain, but they should be viewed as separate domains.

I would agree with the subdomain recommendation.