.io isn't country specific though; it's being used by tech start-ups mostly.

That's an excellent idea; I'm in no hurry to move, so this will be a great way to test. Thanks!

Thanks; I'm ok with a short term minor loss. I'm quite worried about the long term implications of exact match domains too though; any losses I do could be offset, surely?

Purely because I couldnt find a suitable .com - thats partly why I had a .org in the first place. Targeting is not geographic specific; anywhere English speaking.

I'm considering switching my main site from a .org to .io address; the .org is an exact match domain which helped to kickstart it a few years ago and now has about 50% repeat visitors, but was thrown off the Apple affiliation program for trademark infringement.

I've found and purchased a nice (non-infringing) .io domain, and I've read the advice here on how to properly 301 the old domain; but my question is - does it matter that it's .io? Is this going to significantly hurt my rankings, even when everything has been 301'd properly?

Another thought I had is that I may actually come out better off in the long run, what with Google penalties being applied to exact match domains.

Is this a ranking suicide? If so, I'm tempted to leave it as is; even without the affiliation, it's making a good amount every month in ad fees that I don't want to disrupt.

Thanks all!