Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
NEw domain extensions, are they worth it seo wise?
-
Hello I am curious if all of these new extensions for domains are worth it?
So say you are a home builder and you bought homebuilder.construction - where as construction is a new extension, does this help seo? Or is it all just a big sales gimmick?
Thank you for your thoughts
-
Hey Dr. Pete,
Sorry for the late reply.
I will see you in July. I just did SerchLove Boston and immediately after that purchased tickets for SerchLove San Diego in September.
The ROI on going to those events is fantastic and they are awesome to attend.
I have to wait have to purchase my MozCon tickets on Wednesday because might have a second person coming with me.
I will see you in Seattle at MozCon.
All the best,
Thomas
-
Unfortunately, no - still pretty limited on travel - if I take a trip, it's usually to the Moz office. Speaking at MozCon in July and then in the Czech Republic in November.
-
Hi Dr Pete,
Thank you for the list of universal TLDs they are getting more popular every day.
Will you be at search love San Diego?
Sincerely,
Thomas
-
Google has been non-committal on this, other than to say the new TLDs won't get any special preference (which is a bit vague). We don't really know yet if those domain keywords will provide SEO benefit. I think most of these will be treated generically, and the keyword in the domain may carry limited benefits.
Personally, if you have a choice between a lousy domain on a traditional extension and a really memorable domain on a new extension, I might lean toward the new extension. I'm talking about homebuilder.construction vs. great-homebuilder-construction-company.org or something like that.
There's the usability aspect, too - I think it's going to take people a while to adjust. If you owned chicago.attorney, people might pick up on that, but they're still used to thinking in terms of .com, etc. There's going to be an adjustment period.
If the price is right and there's a good one out there, it may be worth buying, but I don't think there's going to be much of a gold rush on these new domains.
-
Thomas is generally correct here, although Google has since begun treating .co as a "generic" TLD, which is to say they no longer geo-locate it to Colombia. See this reference:
https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1347922?hl=en
So, the Colombia association won't hurt, but it won't be geographically connected to Colorado, either. There is some chance that you could pick up the "Co" on a keyword match, if someone searched "Denver, Co" and you owned "denver.co", for example. That's speculation on my part, though. I certainly wouldn't count on any benefit.
-
HI Berner,
thank you for the kind words.
I agree with Jimmy on what he said about .net & .org
remember there are many powerful .net's .org's out there for instance SEOmoz.org was the old URL for Moz.com sum of the best marketing companies in the world like distilled.net uses .net
it really comes down to the website itself being better but why would think about is how many phones have .com built-in to the handset. If you are giving someone your URL and you tell them the name they are going to assume most likely that it is .com and less you had to constantly correct them which would not help in the long run because one day you and be there to remind them.
however if you cannot get the .com for your brand I would strongly recommend either looking for a new name depending on how attached or powerful name is or using a.net/.org
Remember if you are going to go up against a existing website with a .com you have the possibility of serious competition in order to rank for your own name. You should always audit the company containing the domain with .com you wish you use the exact same domain name except for the TLD watch out for trademarks as well.
My best advice is taken a look at all the places where you can purchase a domain if you cannot find the one that you want. You can most likely find it on places like https://flippa.com/ , http://www.namejet.com/ & https://www.sedo.com/us/home/getting-started/ to name a very few.
Definitely do a back link check and run them through http://www.removeem.com/ just to be certain that they have not been hit by a penalty. Which unfortunately if the domain is not new would be passed on to you. Some more information.
Sincerely,
Thomas
-
Hi Jimmy,
just so you are aware.co originally was Columbia and still is the country code for Columbia Neustar the second largest domain registrar to VeriSign purchased .co to use as an abbreviation for company it was simply a collaboration between the Columbia and Neustar
Here is Matt Cutts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=k0sCnzzVtNs
SEO & .co
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.co
"Neustar has always been a partner with .CO Internet, providing registry services and infrastructure support for .co extensions, the top-level domain assigned to Colombia."
http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/03/21/4009212/miami-tech-company-co-internet.html
Just wanted to make sure that you knew and actually was a country based TLD and they went for the money.
Sincerely,
Thomas
-
.com is the best by far, followed by .net and .org... I would get the .com if possible and if not, get the .net or .org... I wouldn't write them off.
-
You are correct in regards to the .co not helping rank for Colorado. However .co is not for the country Columbia and made to work for everyone. The .co extension is for company names and branding your name. It is a global extension. .co = company
-
So last question I promise
As a rule of thumb, although .com is king, would you shy away from a .org? or .net?
Or basically its .com or nothing type of thing?
-
Great read, thank you for the suggestion
-
No .co will not help you rank in the state of CO
its Columba but was made to work for everyone.
Hope that helps,
tom
-
Read this as well
-
ok thank you.
On a weird note if I may ask.
I live in Colorado. many times people use the words CO to represent a city, like Colorado Springs, CO
Would a domain like example.co be worth it if the search engine look at CO possibly as a abbreviation for Colorado?
Or is this just stupid to think that way?
Thank you
-
The TLD you use can be worth money as far as SEO I would take .com homebuilder.com over a homebuilder.construction every day.
the power to point a .com .net .org at the country of your choice is a big SEO plus
if you can get the .com it is still #1 in the US at least.
Tom
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Using a Reverse Proxy and 301 redirect to appear Sub Domain as Sub Directory - what are the SEO Risks?
We’re in process to move WordPress blog URLs from subdomains to sub-directory. We aren’t moving blog physically, but using reverse proxy and 301 redirection to do this. Blog subdomain URL is https://blog.example.com/ and destination sub-directory URL is https://www.example.com/blog/ Our main website is e-commerce marketplace which is YMYL site. This is on Windows server. Due to technical reasons, we can’t physically move our WordPress blog to the main website. Following is our Technical Setup Setup a reverse proxy at https://www.example.com/blog/ pointing to https://blog.example.com/ Use a 301 redirection from https://blog.example.com/ to https://www.example.com/blog/ with an exception if a traffic is coming from main WWW domain then it won’t redirect. Thus, we can eliminate infinite loop. Change all absolute URLs to relative URLs on blog Change the sitemap URL from https://blog.example.com/sitemap.xml to https://www.example.com/blog/sitemap.xml and update all URLs mentioned within the sitemap. SEO Risk Evaluation We have individual GA Tracking ID and individual Google Search Console Properties for main website and blog. We will not merge them. Keep them separate as they are. Keeping this in mind, I am evaluating SEO Risks factors Right now when we receive traffic from main website to blog (or vice versa) then it is considered as referral traffic and new cookies are set for Google Analytics. What’s going to happen when its on the same domain? Which type of settings change should I do in Blog’s Google Search Console? (A). Do I need to request “Change of Address” in the Blog’s search console property? (B). Should I re-submit the sitemap? Do I need to re-submit the blog sitemap from the https://www.example.com/ Google Search Console Property? Main website is e-commerce marketplace which is YMYL website, and blog is all about content. So does that impact SEO? Will this dilute SEO link juice or impact on the main website ranking because following are the key SEO Metrices. (A). Main website’s Avg Session Duration is about 10 minutes and bounce rate is around 30% (B). Blog’s Avg Session Duration is 33 seconds and bounce rate is over 92%
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | joshibhargav_200 -
When creating a sub-domain, does that sub-domain automatically start with the DA of the main domain?
We have a website with a high DA and we are considering sub-folder or sub-domain. One of the great benefits of a sub-folder is that we know we get to keep the high DA, is this also the case for sub-domains? Also if you could provide any sources of information that specify this, I can't see to find anything!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Saba.Elahi.M.0 -
SEO implications of moving fra a sub-folder to a root domain
I am considering a restructure of my site, and was hoping for some input on SEO implications which I am having some issues getting clarity in. (I will be using sample domains/urls because of language reasons, not an english site), Thinking about moving a site (all content) from example.com/parenting -> parenting.com. This is to have a site fully devoted to this theme, and more easily monitor and improve SEO performance on this content alone. Today all stats on external links, DA etc is related to the root domain, and not just this sub-department. Plus it would be a better brand-experience of the content and site. Other info/issues: -The domain parenting.com (used as example) is currently redirected to example.com/parenting. So I would have to reverse that redirect, and would also redirect all articles to the new site. The current domain example.com has a high DA (67), but the new domain parenting.com has a much lower DA (24). Question: Would the parenting.com domain improve it's DA when not redirected and the sub-folder on the high-DA domain is redirected here instead? Would it severly hurt SEO traffic to make this change, and if so is there a strategy to make the move with as little loss in traffic as possible? How much value is in having a stand-alone domain, which also is one of the most important keywords for this theme? My doubt comes mostly from moving from a domain with high DA to a domain with much lower DA, and I am not sure about how removing the redirect would change that, or if placing a new redirect from the subfolder on the current site would help improve it. Would some DA flow over with a 301 redirect? Thanks for any advice or hints to other documentation that might be of interest for this scenario 🙂
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Magne_Vidnes0 -
Does having multiple Domain aliases hurt SEO rank ?
Our company having multiple domain aliases (DIfferent TLD) like example.com, .net, .org, .club, .win to one site (Same Content). We do this because our country ISP is blocking a few of the domain aliases. Question: Does this hurt the SEO rank? What approach is the best for us to gain SEO Rank?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | missionunpossible0 -
Unique domains vs. single domain for UGC sites?
Working on a client project - a UGC community that has a DTC model as well as a white label model. Is it categorically better to have them all under the same domain? Trying to figure which is better: XXX,XXX pages on one site vs. A smaller XXX,XXX pages on one site and XX,XXX pages on 10-20 other sites all pointing to the primary site. The thinking on the second was that those domains would likely achieve high DA as well as the primary, and would passing their value to the primary. Thoughts? Any other considerations we should be thinking about?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | intentionally0 -
Buying Expired Domains with Decent DA/PA for SEO Purposes
Hey guys, i've seen some stuff about this before but I recently found an opportunity to put it into action and wanted to make sure I knew what I was getting into! I am looking at buying a domain (expired and now only 10 dollars) that has a decent domain authority and has some keywords in it related to my clients practice. I plan on using a 301 redirect to pass "link juice" because this client is looking for a quick bump in rankings. Thoughts? Benefits? Problems with this?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | RickyShockley1 -
Multiple stores & domains vs. One unified store (SEO pros / cons for E-Commerce)
Our company runs a number of individual online shops, specialised in particular products but all in the same genre of goods overall, with a specific and relevant domain name for each shop. At the moment the sites are separate, and not interlinked, i.e. Completely separate brands. An analogy could be something like clothing accessories (we are not in the clothing business): scarves.com, and silkties.com (our field is more niche than this) We are about to launch a related site, (e.g. handbags.com), in the same field again but without precisely overlapping products. We will produce this site on a newer, more flexible e-commerce platform, so now is a good time to consider whether we want to place all our sites together with one e-commerce system on the backend. Essentially, we need to know what the pros and cons would be of the various options facing us and how the SEO ranking is affected by the three possibilities. Option 1: continue with separate sites each with its own domains. Option 2: have multiple sites, each on their own domain, but on the same ecommerce system and visible linked together for the customer (with unified checkout) – on the top of each site could be a menu bar linking to each site: [Scarves.com] – [SilkTies.com] – [Handbags.com] The main question here is whether the multiple domains are mutually beneficial, particularly considerding how close to target keywords the individual domains are. If mutually benefitial, how does it compare to option 3: Option 3: Having recently acquired a domain name (e.g. accessories.com) which would cover the whole category together, we are presented with a third option: making one site selling all of these products in different categories. Our main concern here would be losing the ability to specifically target marketing, and losing the benefit of the domains with the key words in for what people are more likely to be searching for (e.g. 'silk tie') rather than 'accessories.' Is it worth taking the hit on losing these specific targeted domain names for the advantage of increased combined inbound links?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Colage0 -
Migrating online store to subdomain using shopify and effects on seo and energy down the road for seo
I'm looking for some clarity... Looking at using Shopify for an existing online store that we have to migrate. Setting up the store with shopify means we will be using a subdomain such as shop.mywebsite.com instead of mywebsite.com/shop. The following are points to consider when responding The client currently has an online store, however it's a proprietary shopping store and CMS that has since gone defunct and they need to migrate to an alternative in order to survive online against new CMS systems that allow the site and its content to be better optimized. There is a lot of existing SEO done on the current site that we don't want to loose PR on. There is roughly 2000 products Client has a fixed budget, dealing with checkout issues, custom work and various other "bugs" seems to be easier controlled with Shopify...thus budget can be used more on content/strategy and migration We want to run the main site in Wordpress and are wanting to use Shopify since it supports a gateway, has great features and seems like it would allow us to get more bang for the buck and can focus more on the main site and content strategy and drive traffic to the subdomain store if needed Or main concern is the effort of migrating 2000+ products to shopify and the traffic and PR it gives the current site will have a negative effect on the main domain itself. Should we really be considering this path? The domain is diveidc.com One main benefit to the subdomain is the ability to clearly segment products from the service portion of the site in the analytics and focus 2 clear strategies and track it in a very defined manner. We're really on the fence with this...any thoughts are welcome.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | MAGNUMCreative0