Google and Country Specific Sites

What is Google's attitute towards country domain names?

[madmal]

Hiya ,

What is googles attitude toward country specific domain names ,

i.e does google treat google.co.uk different to google.com

I am trying to creat a site that is available to anyone from around the world and was wondering what the difference the domain played

[mrMister]

It's probably best for your users to give the site a generic TLD (.com, .net, .org, .info, .biz etc). If they see .co.uk on the end, they will make the assumption that it is UK specific and perhaps not click on your link in the Google search results because of that.

There's more to SEO than just improving your positioning in the results pages.

[peewhy]

Mr.M is right, co.uk is a pretty good clue. If I see .it for example I ignore it ..although some creative types use the domain for I.T purposes.

Start with .com and work down for availability.

[vbweb]

One thing to bear in mind if your site is hosted in the US, and you are using a .com domain rather than a .co.uk one is that you won't be listed in the UK results for Google.

[peewhy]

Can I just add, because your 'host' is sitting at his PC in the UK it doesn't mean his server is not in the US. There's lots of virtual hosts around.

[WebWalla]

you won't be listed in the UK results for Google

Not true. Domains hosted in the UK or with a co.uk ccTld do get a boost in the google.co.uk results but that doesn't mean a .com can't be top.

[mrMister]

you won't be listed in the UK results for Google

Not true. Domains hosted in the UK or with a co.uk ccTld do get a boost in the google.co.uk results but that doesn't mean a .com can't be top.

I believe the original poster was referring to the "pages from the UK" option of Google.co.uk, not the main (all the web) search. He is correct in what he says. Non UK pages are excluded from these results.

[peewhy]

...and everyone scuttles off to prove the exception to the rule!

[WebWalla]

I believe the original poster was referring to the "pages from the UK" option of Google.co.uk, not the main (all the web) search. He is correct in what he says. Non UK pages are excluded from these results.

The original poster was also referring to domain names, not location of server, although I mentioned that because obviously it's also useful.

.com domains can be and frequently are top of the SERPs even when using the "pages from UK" option. However, you are correct in saying that pages hosted on servers outside the UK shouldn't appear here.