I need more exposure in google.com - doing well in .co.uk

[stevelibby]

Hi my sites appear really well in the .co.uk engine, but the complete opposite in .com, why is this?

[tedster]

There are many possible factors - including your site's TLD, hosting location, country location of backlinks, and more sites actively competing for a spot in google.com compared to .co.uk.

[vordmeister]

A year or two ago Google got big on geotargeting.

I've got a .co.uk hosted in the UK, and while the majority of earnings from the site are from the UK, the content is useful to everyone no matter where they live.

Referrals from google.co.uk are double those from google.com.

It works the other way too. In the UK results I can thrash a good .com hosted in the states even on the odd occasions when their content is more appropriate or better than mine.

On both counts I feel geotargeting is too severe, but my topic is informational and international. For shops that have to send things in the post it's good. But Google isn't good at differentiating between the two.

You can decide where you want to do best by choosing a .com extension and hosting in your target country. Personally I'd not give them any clues such as country targeting in webmaster tools. I've not noticed a lot of influence from links (mine are international).

If you are a .co.uk then that's where you'll be targeted.

[HuskyPup]

why is this?

Are you an international informational site or a product site aimed at the UK?

Are you on a .co.uk extension?

When one is on a ccTLD it can take time (2/3/4 years) to climb through their .com SERPs and even then it is not guaranteed.

Sometimes it seems to be easy and other times downright impossible.

[bleached]

Hi stevelibby. I have the complete opposite situation to you. I have .com domain and rank well in google.com and worse in google.co.uk. My main target market is the UK. I want better rankings in the UK. I put it down to that all the link building comes mostly from US IP, .com domains . I have tried getting one ways from .co.uk sites or from sites hosted in the UK, this has helped.

My suggestion is obtain more one way links from the US and you will increase position. But be warned if you start building links in other countries I have seen that you begin to loose ranks from the countries you were ranking well before. It is as if google is saying you can not be number one everywhere.