How long before a Geographic target is effective?

[eniac]

Hi,
How much time does it pass to be effective this setting ( Geographic target ) in webmaster tools
Thanks for help

[tedster]

I've heard reports that this is a slow one - from one to two months. But I haven't used it myself, and maybe someone else has first hand experience.

[tedster]

Here's one first-hand report of a three month wait, back in 2008: [webmasterworld.com...]

[scottsonline]

Why would you want to set it? Are there advantages?

[tedster]

One reason is to reduce search traffic from countries where you cannot sell something. It's also useful to create different directories on one domain that are each localized for different countries.

[eniac]

My website is hosted in Germany but its language is english and visitors come mainly from english spoken countries ( USA and UK for the most)
I am thinking 4 options:
1- leave it unselected
2- set to USA
3-set to UK
4- set to "Unlisted"

[Robert Charlton]

Do you have a "generic" TLD (like a .com or .net), or is your TLD geo-specific, like a .de?

I'm assuming, because you're asking this question, that it's got to be a .com or .net generic domain.

[eniac]

it is .com domain