It’s been said that Google favors .com and .net TLDs over other domain name extensions. Is that true? Well, it may be, but the evidence is still not clear cut.
We’ve been working with some alternative TLDs lately, a .me and a .to. It occured to me that I have never seen a .to, .info, .anything other than .com and .net’s in the TOP 10.
Having tested .pn and other domain name extensions, we’ve seen our best results with .com and .net extensions, but that does not necessarily mean that Google favors those TLDs over all others. It could mean that older domains on those extensions are winning the search engine ranking war over the newer .pn extensions. After all, the search engine ranking climb is a steep one for newer websites.
That said, however, I have to really see any other extensions doing well in Google. Even .biz sites do not seem to do as well as .com even though that TLD has been operable for quite some time. You’d think that there would be some high profile .biz sites doing well in the search engines, but where are they?
Even if other TLDs are not favored by Google, that’s no reason to shun the use other TLDs. I have seen .pn, .biz, and other domain name extensions do well at MSN and Yahoo!. If you can achieve high rankings at both Yahoo! and MSN for any domain name then you can still run a profitable business. But you have to have a plan and you have to work it hard. Otherwise, it doesn’t matter what your TLD is.
This being said, think twice about diving into an alternative TLD, if you’re looking for a TOP 10 Ranking in Google you better get yourself a .com!