undefined
Skip to content
Moz logo Menu open Menu close
  • Products
    • Moz Pro
    • Moz Pro Home
    • Moz Local
    • Moz Local Home
    • STAT
    • Moz API
    • Moz API Home
    • Compare SEO Products
    • Moz Data
  • Free SEO Tools
    • Domain Analysis
    • Keyword Explorer
    • Link Explorer
    • Competitive Research
    • MozBar
    • More Free SEO Tools
  • Learn SEO
    • Beginner's Guide to SEO
    • SEO Learning Center
    • Moz Academy
    • SEO Q&A
    • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
  • Blog
  • Why Moz
    • Agency Solutions
    • Enterprise Solutions
    • Small Business Solutions
    • Case Studies
    • The Moz Story
    • New Releases
  • Log in
  • Log out
  • Products
    • Moz Pro

      Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

    • Moz Local

      Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

    • STAT

      SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

    • Moz API

      Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

    • Compare SEO Products

      See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

    • Moz Data

      Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
    Moz Pro

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

    Learn more
  • Free SEO Tools
    • Domain Analysis

      Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

    • Keyword Explorer

      Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

    • Link Explorer

      Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

    • Competitive Research

      Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

    • MozBar

      See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

    • More Free SEO Tools

      Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

    What is your Brand Authority?
    Moz

    What is your Brand Authority?

    Check yours now
  • Learn SEO
    • Beginner's Guide to SEO

      The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

    • SEO Learning Center

      Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

    • On-Demand Webinars

      Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

    • How-To Guides

      Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

    • Moz Academy

      Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

    • SEO Q&A

      Insights & discussions from an SEO community of 500,000+.

    Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
    Moz API

    Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

    Find your plan
  • Blog
  • Why Moz
    • Small Business Solutions

      Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

    • Agency Solutions

      Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

    • Enterprise Solutions

      Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

    • The Moz Story

      Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

    • Case Studies

      Explore how Moz drives ROI with a proven track record of success.

    • New Releases

      Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

    Surface actionable competitive intel
    New Feature

    Surface actionable competitive intel

    Learn More
  • Log in
    • Moz Pro
    • Moz Local
    • Moz Local Dashboard
    • Moz API
    • Moz API Dashboard
    • Moz Academy
  • Avatar
    • Moz Home
    • Notifications
    • Account & Billing
    • Manage Users
    • Community Profile
    • My Q&A
    • My Videos
    • Log Out

The Moz Q&A Forum

  • Forum
  • Questions
  • Users
  • Ask the Community

Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

  1. Home
  2. SEO Tactics
  3. Local SEO
  4. Local Website Optimization
  5. Can PPC harm SEO results, even if it's off-domain?

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.

Can PPC harm SEO results, even if it's off-domain?

Local Website Optimization
7
12
3.4k
Loading More Posts
  • Oldest to Newest
  • Newest to Oldest
  • Most Votes
Reply
  • Reply as question
Log in to reply
This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
  • Treefrog_SEO
    Treefrog_SEO last edited by Nov 12, 2015, 7:41 PM

    Here's the scenario. We're doing SEO for a national franchise business. We have over 60 location pages on the same domain, that we control. Another agency is doing PPC for the same business, except they're leading people to un-indexable landing pages off domain. Apparently they're also using location extensions for the businesses that have been set up improperly, at least according to the Account Strategists at Google that we work with.

    We're having a real issue with these businesses ranking in the multi-point markets (where they have multiple locations in a city). See, the client wants all their location landing pages to rank organically for geolocated service queries in those cities (we'll say the query is "fridge repair"). We're trying to tell them that the PPC is having a negative effect on our SEO efforts, even though there shouldn't be any correlation between the two. I still think the PPC should be focused on their on-domain location landing pages (and so does our Google rep), because it shows consistency of brand, etc.

    I'm getting a lot of pushback from the client and the other agency, of course. They say it shouldn't matter.

    Has anyone here run into this? Any ammo to offer up to convince the client that having us work at "cross-purposes" is a bad idea? Thanks so much for any advice!

    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
    • Dr-Pete
      Dr-Pete Staff last edited by Nov 16, 2015, 7:26 PM Nov 16, 2015, 7:25 PM

      Please be careful invoking the names of Google employees, unless you can provide an exact quote or verifiable source. Many of us have contacts at Google, and it's easy to misinterpret what they say, either publicly or privately. A statement like "JM has told me personally..." creates an air of false credibility that can lead people to the wrong conclusions, especially when you're paraphrasing.

      I do agree that cross-channel awareness is important and there are many indirect ways in which paid search campaigns can influence (both positively and negatively) organic campaigns, but I don't want people to read this as meaning that paying for ads automatically boosts your organic ranking. That's a myth that too many people rush to believe, IMO.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
      • Dr-Pete
        Dr-Pete Staff last edited by Nov 16, 2015, 7:23 PM Nov 16, 2015, 7:23 PM

        I can believe, in theory, that the location extension point is possible - even if the organic algo doesn't take your direct paid search data into account, they may share data sources, including location data (since that shared data doesn't bias one system based on the other). That said, I've met way too many AdWords reps that had no idea what they were talking about and yet, somehow, were happy to spout off misinformation. No offense to your particular rep, but again, I've had too many bad experiences. It's important, for many reasons, that your location data be consistent and accurate, but I don't think location extensions are a huge cause for concern.

        There is an argument to be made, though, that working with the rep has benefits, even if the rep isn't always right. Reps tend to dig in, and if you aren't solving something they think is an issue, they may not help you get to other issues or positive traction. I recognize, though, that it can be hard to work across multiple parties, and your options aren't always ideal.

        The off-domain landing page issue is a lot more complex. One common impact we see of paid search is the indirect boost it has on organic, based mostly on perception. If I see your brand in organic and the same brand in paid, and if the message is consistent (and, of course, appeals to me), my odds of clicking one or the other go up. This isn't an algorithmic bias, but a human one. Broadly, it also means that your paid ads are contributing to brand-building and name recognition.

        If you're using a separate domain and if that domain is visible (and especially if it's confusing) to users, then you may be cannibalizing yourself. It's especially problematic if you've got two domains sharing a common message - this could confuse searchers about which domain is the "real" representative of your brand.

        As Andy said, it also means that any links/mentions/etc. you might get to that secondary domain aren't helping you. In most cases, it's rare for ad landing pages to accrue links, but if a landing page is integrated into a site, then people are more likely to click through to other content, which might be shareable, linkable, etc.

        Unfortunately, all of this is very speculative, without knowing more about your particular case. I think it's just important to note that there are many indirect interactions between paid and organic.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
        • AndyMacLean
          AndyMacLean last edited by Nov 16, 2015, 10:37 AM Nov 16, 2015, 10:37 AM

          Some points not mentioned (I think) yet...

          The number 1 way to get links to a website is traffic...the more people that see the site, the more chance of it getting links, social shares etc. If PPC traffic & organic traffic (& other types of traffic) are not going to the same domain they're likely to get less links per domain, which reduces their chance or ranking well organically, which is contradictory to what you are wanting to achieve. If I were the client and I were getting links to non indexable pages, I wouldn't be happy. I would investigate if those PPC landing pages actually do have links/shares and if so use that to support your case i.e. those links could have been pointed at the domain you are trying to improve organic rankings for.

          Remarketing via PPC is a huge opportunity via display and especially RLSA. If I was running their PPC it would really annoy me that the audience that I could remarket to is reduced  because the traffic is split over domains and not consolidated in 1.

          Analytics is really messy. I'm a firm believer that any web reliant business needs to understand and use the data available to them in order to grow, especially if traffic/online revenue is significant. Splitting analytics (GA or otherwise) and KPI's over multiple sites, analytics accounts etc is not conducive to managing and benefiting from that data.

          Sub domains - might not be relevant, based on why they want to use off domain pages but could you suggest they use sub domains instead of different domains? This way they can still promote/operate separate sites but you'd have the advantages of 1) capturing link equity 2) increasing your remarketing audience 3) having all your analytics in 1 place.

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 4
          • Treefrog_SEO
            Treefrog_SEO last edited by Nov 15, 2015, 6:41 PM Nov 15, 2015, 6:41 PM

            Thanks to all for your responses! It really is fascinating to see the exchange, and now I have a chance to offer more context.

            Interestingly, prior to working with our Google rep on PPC account optimization, I would not have said that PPC had any effect on SEO. But in the above case, our rep is adamant that incorrect location extensions are affecting the locations' placement in the Google My Business results, (the 3-pack) thereby impacting the organic webpage performance of those locations.

            The Google rep also states that by not targeting the company domain with PPC, we miss out on all of the engagement metrics that could be gathered from those sessions. Google maintains that PPC does not “drive” ranking, but what PPC does drive (hopefully) is users to a website. If those users have a positive experience on the site, (time on page, conversions) then that can ultimately increase trust, and even if it’s only in a general sense, potentially improve ranking over the long term. Is that not the case?

            There’s a lot of back story with this client. They’ve got franchises with external websites, some running their own PPC, multiple variations of business names… it’s a bit of a mess. We’ve worked very hard to bring everything up to par by claiming, branding and categorizing all of their GMB pages, as well as steadily working on organic ranking for all of their locations for their “money terms”, both geolocated and geomodified versions.

            The locations in question are in multi-point markets, where the business is essentially in competition with itself. In all the other single point markets where this business has a franchise, the main website’s location pages are ranking #1 for geolocated as well as geomodified queries for… “fridge repair” (ahem). However, in multi-point markets, we’re suddenly having problems with the locations organically ranking for their money keywords. The domain is still ranking #1 for the term, though it’s an article page, not the location pages for that city.

            In looking for answers as to why this might be happening, among other people, I also queried our Google rep. The external PPC was mentioned as a potential serious issue. We even arranged a Hangout with the client where the rep could explain the issue to the end client. I have to say, I was convinced that it could be an issue. But no one—not the client or my agency—is convinced that it’s the only issue.

            So, I posted the question here to promote discussion. I know that holistically, PPC does not affect SEO. But the comment regarding GMB location extensions coming directly from a Google Rep made me curious enough to bring it up.

            Additional thoughts?

            Thanks again for everyone’s input! I don’t weigh in as often as I should be, but I truly value the community and Moz as a resource.

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
            • jennita
              jennita last edited by Nov 14, 2015, 9:09 PM Nov 14, 2015, 9:09 PM

              Josh,

              Please do not throw TAGFEE around without fully understanding its meaning. It is fine to have a disagreement, and for the most part this is a wonderful discussion. You however are being quite condescending and not empathetic to others. I've warned you in the past, and this is a final warning.

              Jen

              1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
              • Eric_Rohrback
                Eric_Rohrback last edited by Nov 13, 2015, 7:04 PM Nov 13, 2015, 7:04 PM

                Josh,

                To prevent this thread getting out of control and getting to the point where everyone is name calling, let's step back and clarify a few things. While I respect your opinion that paid search could influence traffic from a personalization standpoint, your explanation leaves too many questions unanswered. I personally won't trust anything someone says without a valid explanation WHY they have the position they have. If you can produce a few links/references so we can take a closer look at what you're talking about, that would benefit this discussion way more than simply saying "because I talked with X, and they said it's true." Sharing more information can help educate everyone here, and help us all grow as professionals.

                I really don't care who feeds information to whom; the only thing I care about is the fact. The fact is (according to my knowledge) Google has stated paid search (Adwords) does not directly affect organic rankings.

                Google Forum thread disputing that PPC influences rank: https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/webmasters/tN5pIG8Qy0I

                Google's Search Console Help: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/35291?hl=en - "Advertising with Google won't have any effect on your site's presence in our search results. Google never accepts money to include or rank sites in our search results, and it costs nothing to appear in our organic search results."

                I agree that promoting your site through a variety of mediums will send a signal of trust that your site is legitimate, but that would be a macro view that everything helps a little bit. The question to this thread is, "Do you really think that them pointing their ads to the actual domain is going to increase your rankings?"

                That answer is No. Pointing ads to the actual domain will not directly increase your organic rankings. Will it help with branding and trust, sure. But that's not the question we're trying to answer.

                Now... If you have evidence that contradicts my points, I'd be more than happy to discuss and debate. I think opposing viewpoints are important to the development of the community/industry, and is really what makes it exciting. However, if the only thing anyone has to say is "I heard it from so and so" then this thread deserves to be closed if there's no additional facts to support an argument one way or another.

                1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                • garfield_disliker
                  garfield_disliker last edited by Nov 13, 2015, 6:55 PM Nov 13, 2015, 6:55 PM

                  Yikes man. I'm not saying you're lying or an idiot. I'm saying I think you may have made the wrong conclusions from what you were told. On top of that, it seems like you are incorrectly applying them here. That advice might be fine in other situations, but it didn't seem to actually address the original question here.

                  You don't have to be so defensive when somebody disagrees with you. I put scare quotes around "JM" and "personally" because for one, with just initials it's not fair for me to conclude you're saying John Mueller (though that seems to be what you're implying), and secondly, with the "personally" thrown in there that seemed like kind of silly name dropping.

                  Also, this is up for debate but I don't think John Mueller has reached a level of recognition that we can just call him JM and assume everybody knows what we're all talking about. Even if you said RF in here I'm not sure we'd know who you're talking about.

                  I think, like Eric said, rather than mentioning Mueller has personally given you some inside secrets that is counter to Google's public statements on the topic, it would be nice to provide a link to a study that supports the claim, because it is counter to what most of the community believes.

                  1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
                  • garfield_disliker
                    garfield_disliker @Eric_Rohrback last edited by Nov 13, 2015, 6:21 PM Nov 13, 2015, 6:21 PM

                    Yeah, I'm with you on this Eric.

                    It seemed to me he was talking about their PPC efforts—in particular where they host their landing pages—affecting their rankings across all their franchises on the whole.

                    We could possibly factor in how PPC affects organic CTRs here, but there have been a few studies that show PPC can actually benefit organic CTRs when the ad and organic result are both on the first page... and at any rate he didn't single out overlapping paid search ads and organic listings. He specifically focused on where the landing pages were hosted. Also, to my knowledge, CTR as a signal isn't going to be so significant it would cause problems for the franchise to underperform across multiple locations.

                    It also sounds like Josh here may have misinterpreted what "JM" "personally" told him. Paying attention to traffic on all your channels ≠ Google takes PPC signals into account in their organic algos. Sure, PPC can affect traffic from organic. Does it directly affect your rankings? No.

                    Another consideration here: Is that competitive ad space, i.e., are there multiple ads on those keywords? If that's the case then why vacate that space?

                    And again, I can't reiterate this enough, who would really think changing the domain of PPC landing pages is going to be the magic solution for the SEO campaign?

                    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                    • Eric_Rohrback
                      Eric_Rohrback last edited by Nov 13, 2015, 5:43 PM Nov 13, 2015, 5:43 PM

                      Paid traffic does not directly affect organic ranking. Those two elements are mutually exclusive when it comes to search. Click patterns will affect personalized results for the individual, but not as a whole. You're looking at this at a micro level, but I think (correct me if i'm wrong) Kevin is looking at this from a macro perspective to see how the two directly influence each other.

                      If you're suggesting that pointing an Adwords destination URL to any particular domain will positively impact organic ranking, then i'd like to see the proof. Making a blanket statement to say Paid does influence organic is sending an incorrect message. If you have evidence to support that claim then I'm sure this and many other communities would love to see it, but I stand by Google's official position that those two mediums do not directly influence each other.

                      garfield_disliker 1 Reply Last reply Nov 13, 2015, 6:21 PM Reply Quote 1
                      • Eric_Rohrback
                        Eric_Rohrback last edited by Nov 13, 2015, 12:46 PM Nov 13, 2015, 12:46 PM

                        PPC will not effect SEO efforts. The biggest reason I would suggest sending someone to the actual domain is because the user would be more likely to return and convert later. It usually takes a few visits to convert (PPC > Organic > Direct, or some mix of those), so that would be a good reason to try to keep it within the same domain.

                        However... If these landing pages cannot be imported to the current website CMS, and the external landing pages are converting, then it would be negligent to cut those out of PPC. You could really hurt the business if they stop getting leads. I would first try to see if the landing pages can be created on the client's domain, and A/B test. PPC does not affect SEO, and SEO does not affect PPC. It's all based on bidding, and quality score of the ads. If the client is getting business out of the current PPC work, don't kill it without testing and being absolutely sure you have a solid game plan. You don't want to get caught in a scenario where you could be fired if the client stops seeing leads.

                        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
                        • garfield_disliker
                          garfield_disliker last edited by Nov 12, 2015, 9:37 PM Nov 12, 2015, 9:37 PM

                          There's absolutely no reason their PPC efforts—as described—should have a "negative effect" on your organic rankings.

                          Are you right about staying on brand? Almost definitely. Would it be better for visitors to know what the actual domain is so they're more likely to become repeat converters down the line? Probably. Is it easier for customers to refer your client when they know the name/actual domain? Totally.

                          But would sending paid search visits to an off-site landing page have a negative effect on your rankings? Nope. As long as they're out of the index, no.

                          Maybe those landing pages on an external domain convert better than sending them to their usual domain though. What happens if the client follows your advice and the phone stops ringing from PPC and you're still not getting rankings? Are you comfortable with that?

                          Do you really think that them pointing their ads to the actual domain is going to increase your rankings? There's no way.

                          TBH I think it's pretty fair for the PPC agency to push back on this. I would.

                          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 3
                          • 1 / 1
                          1 out of 12
                          • First post
                            1/12
                            Last post

                          Got a burning SEO question?

                          Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


                          Start my free trial


                          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.

                          • See all categories

                          Related Questions

                          • WebDaytona

                            What's your proudest accomplishment in regards to SEO?

                            After many years in the industry, you come to realize a few things.  One of of the biggest pain points for us   at web daytona  was being able to give clients a quick keyword ranking cost estimation. After multiple trial and error and relying on API data from one of the most reliable SEO softwares in our industry, we were able to develop an SEO tool that allows us to quickly and accurately get the estimated cost for a given keyword (s) using multiple variables. Most agencies can relate to that story. It’s something my colleagues and I at Web Daytona have been through before. Finding the cost and amount of time needed to rank for a keyword is a time consuming process. That’s why it’s a common practice to sell SEO packages of 5-10 keywords for about $1000-2000 / month. The problem is not all keywords are equally valuable, and most clients know this. We constantly get questions from clients asking: “how much to rank for this specific keyword?” It’s difficult to answer that question with a pricing model that treats the cost of ranking every keyword equally. So is the answer to spend a lot more time doing tedious in-depth keyword research? If we did we could give our clients more precise estimates. But being that a decent proposal can take as long as 2-5 hours to make, and agency life isn’t exactly full of free time, that wouldn’t be ideal. That’s when we asked a question. What if we could automate the research needed to find the cost of ranking keywords? We looked around for a tool that did, but we couldn’t find it. Then we decided to make it ourselves. It wasn’t going to be easy. But after running an SEO agency for over a decade, we knew we had the expertise to create a tool that wouldn’t just be fast and reliable, it would also be precise. Fast forward to today and we’re proud to announce that The Keyword Cost Estimator is finally done. Now we’re releasing it to the public so other agencies and businesses can use it too. You can see it for yourself here. Keyword-Rank-Cost-Ectimator-Tool-by-Web-Daytona-Agency.png

                            Local Website Optimization | Mar 29, 2021, 10:45 AM | WebDaytona
                            0
                          • Ohmichael

                            Multi location silo seo technique

                            A physical therapy company has 8 locations in one city and 4 locations in another with plans to expand. I've seen two methods to approach this. The first I feel is sloppy and that is the individual url for each location that points to from the location pages on the main domain. The second is to use the silo technique incorporated with metro scale addition.  You have the main domain with the number of silos (individual stores) and each silo has its own content (what they do at each store is pretty much the same). My question is should the focus of each silo, besides making sure there is no duplicate copy, to increase their own hyperlocal outreach?  Focus on social, reviews, content curated for the specific location. How would you attack this problem?

                            Local Website Optimization | Feb 15, 2017, 9:03 PM | Ohmichael
                            1
                          • RichardRColeman

                            SEO and Main Navigation Best Practices

                            I've read a number of articles on SEO and main navigation for websites. I'd like to get a solid answer/recommendation to help solve this one. This is the situation. We're helping a local business that offers pest control and property maintenance services. Under each of these, there area a number of services available, eg, cockroach control, termite inspections or lawn mowing services, rubbish removal and so on. Is it best to have a main nav containing the top keywords for the services - Pest Control | Property Maintenance, with a drop down to the services under each. Or, a simple approach - Our Services > drop down to each - Pest Control > Termite Inspections, etc. My concern here is that they have quite a lot of services, so the nav could be way too long. Really appreciate any assistance here. Many thanks.

                            Local Website Optimization | Jul 28, 2016, 10:05 PM | RichardRColeman
                            0
                          • Cantor-Crane

                            How many backlinks from one domain?

                            How many backlinks from one domain is too many? 1? 3? 10? For example, directory listings. If you have 5 separate links to one website in lets say DMOZ (good for you!), is it really only "juicy" one time? Or each one just as awesome? What about multiple guest articles on a related website?  If I had 2 or 3 articles on one website that each have different contextual links, is it just the same as if I had one article?

                            Local Website Optimization | Feb 29, 2024, 6:46 AM | Cantor-Crane
                            0
                          • LittleDog

                            Should I open a new domain and website for a new location under one company?

                            Hi my name is Gina and I wanted to ask for some advice. I'm thinking opening a diff location and was thinking if its a good idea to open up a new domain and new website? And why that may be a good idea and why or a bad idea and why?

                            Local Website Optimization | Dec 8, 2015, 7:01 PM | LittleDog
                            0
                          • edward-may

                            How can i optimize my pages for local areas if we are not in that area?

                            Hi Mozers! So I watched a video about Matt Cutts he talks about creating multiple web pages just for one keywords is an absolutely no go.  So I was wondering we serve a clients in NZ Australia and USA, If we target phrase like Psychic Readings California, Psychic Readings San Diego etc (USA) Psychic Readings Melbourne, Psychic Readings Sydney (AU) Psychic Readings Auckland, Psychic Readings Wellington (NZ) What is the best practice or right way to go about structuring my pages to do this without going against googles guidelines. Many thanks

                            Local Website Optimization | Jun 18, 2015, 1:56 AM | edward-may
                            1
                          • DanielBernhardt

                            Does the Location of my Server effect my SEO?

                            Does the geographic Location of my Server effect my SEO? HELP US! We are arguing for 3 weeks already. My partner has mentioned multiple times in the past that  "since 2013 google does not require your server to be in the country you are targeting for seo"
                            And that actually all they care about is if its a good and fast server - not where its physically located in the world. I am a strong believer that the geographic location of your server directly effects your SEO ranking... lets say if you want to target www.google.ru for your seo, best you have a server located in Russia for hosting your website.. WHO IS RIGHT? Choose the winner and base the facts.
                            If anybody has the correct answer and information to base it on it will help us alot - and maybe even spare some unnecessary violent between us two! we found some articles across the web, sadly they are all dated back to 2012.... Thanks in Advance for all the help guys!

                            Local Website Optimization | Jul 18, 2014, 6:01 AM | DanielBernhardt
                            0
                          • kinimod

                            SEO: .com vs .org vs .travel Domain

                            Hi there, I am new to MOZ Q&A and  first of all I appreciate all the folks here that share their expertise and make everyone understand 'the WWW' a bit better. My question: I have been developing a 'travel guide' site for a city in the U.S. and now its time to choose the right domain name. I put a strong focus on SEO in terms of coding, site performance as well as content and to round things up I'd like to register the _best _domain name in terms of SEO. Let's suppose the city is Atlanta. I have found the following domain names that are available and I was wondering whether you guys could give me some inside on which domain name would perform best. discoveratlanta.org
                            atlantaguide.org
                            atlanta.travel
                            atlantamag.com Looking at the Google Adwords Keyword tool the term that reaches the highest search queries is obviously "Atlanta" itself. Sites that are already ranking high are atlanta.com and atlanta.gov. So basically I am wondering whether I should aim for a new TLD like atlanta.travel or rather go with a .org domain. I had a look around and it seems that .org domains generally work well for city guides (at least a lot of such sites use .org domains). However, I have also seen a major US city that uses .travel and ranks first. On the other hand in New York, nycgo.com ranks well. Is it safe to assume that from the domain names I mentioned it really doesn't matter which one I use since it wouldn't significantly affect my ranking (good or bad)? Or would you still choose one above the other? What do you generally thing about .travel domain names (especially since they are far more expensive then the rest)? I really appreciate your response to my question! Best, 
                            kinimod

                            Local Website Optimization | Apr 29, 2014, 7:33 AM | kinimod
                            0

                          Get started with Moz Pro!

                          Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

                          Start my free trial
                          Products
                          • Moz Pro
                          • Moz Local
                          • Moz API
                          • Moz Data
                          • STAT
                          • Product Updates
                          Moz Solutions
                          • SMB Solutions
                          • Agency Solutions
                          • Enterprise Solutions
                          Free SEO Tools
                          • Domain Authority Checker
                          • Link Explorer
                          • Keyword Explorer
                          • Competitive Research
                          • Brand Authority Checker
                          • MozBar Extension
                          • MozCast
                          Resources
                          • Blog
                          • SEO Learning Center
                          • Help Hub
                          • Beginner's Guide to SEO
                          • How-to Guides
                          • Moz Academy
                          • API Docs
                          About Moz
                          • About
                          • Team
                          • Careers
                          • Contact
                          Why Moz
                          • Case Studies
                          • Testimonials
                          Get Involved
                          • Become an Affiliate
                          • MozCon
                          • Webinars
                          • Practical Marketer Series
                          • MozPod
                          Connect with us

                          Contact the Help team

                          Join our newsletter
                          Moz logo
                          © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
                          • Accessibility
                          • Terms of Use
                          • Privacy

                          Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.