Is there a difference between .us and .org for a website targetting the US market?

[anitawapa]

Hello,

We were searching for some evidence regarding this and couldn't find much so the question.

We have a service that is related only to the USA market. If we buy a .us domain name with the service we provide in the domain name will google treat it the same with a .org? We did searches regarding this but didn't see too many .us domains popping up. Unfortunately the .com is not available.

Thank you

[MikeGracia]

Edited the above re: clarifying rel=canonical advice

[MikeGracia]

Hmmm good question!

Caveat: I don't know your exact situation, but let's discuss the options a little (I'll provide some links to reference material and a useful tool too).

I've not had to do this personally, most of the international SEO I've done involved the site having the same service offering across different economic regions, so the subfolders were only needed in their specific language (e.g. /es for Spain, /mx for Mexico etc).

This might get confusing, so I'll use some examples

One option would be to use subfolders for country, then language. This is a more complex scenario, so would need good planning of course, but by way of an example...  A section of your website targeting Spain (as a country) could be:

https://domain.com/es

Now, if you wanted a translated copy in English, of this page, you could do:

1) Query string (urgh!)

https://domain.com/es?lang=en

2) subfolder-subfolder

https://domain.com/es/en

An example when 'deeper' into an international subfolder, say the visitor is on the 'widgets' page, on the Spanish (Spanish country folder, showing Spanish by default, translated into English)...

https://domain.com/es/widgets/en

To add a little more complexity (sorry!) it'd probably be wise to set a rel canonical tag from the translated copy, to the country-specific version. So in the above 'widget' example, the page https://domain.com/es/widgets/en would have:

Then, on https://domain.com/es/widgets/, I'd set the hreflang to be self referencing, and I'd add a hreflang to the other country versions too (country versions in their own languages, rather than translated version of this one):

So on the above, as the english translation of the Spanish page is unlikely to want to be indexed (google.es should only have the Spanish version, google.co.uk, you'd want to index the English site, not the English translation of the Spanish site!), I'd rel=canonical it to the original Spanish page. But on every page that isn't rel=canonical'd to another pre-translated page (so, the ones we want indexing in their own country & language), I'd add hreflang tags to self and all other international sites, with their own language code.

Some reference material for hreflang (set to open in a new tab so you won't lose your place :D):

• https://webmasters.googleblog.com/2010/09/unifying-content-under-multilingual.html
• https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077
• http://www.rebelytics.com/hreflang-canonical/ (VERY strongly recommended read on not creating confusion between hrefland and rel=canonical)
• http://www.aleydasolis.com/en/international-seo-tools/hreflang-tags-generator/ (a generator for hreflang, but DO check it's output!).

Note: I'd still target the first subfolder from root (/es in the above example) to the specific country (Spain) in Search Console).

Of course as an alternative, you could do ccTLDs (.es/.co.uk etc) and then have a single subfolder for the country (domain.co.uk/es, for example).

UX Conisderations:

(You may have considered this already, forgive me if that's the case! Only adding here as I've had conversations on this in the past and have seen it cause confusion).

One realllllyyyyy important consideration here is how the visitor makes the switch from languages and also to a different country site. THIS is key.

Seriously. If the visitor gets confused and exits because something they didn't expect happened (switched to another country version of your site when they wanted a translation - this becomes worse when you have a considerable amount of country-specific content, such as guides etc), all the technical SEO work behind the scenes for the international SEO set-up is kinda wasted.

What I mean by this is (and this is true regardless of if you go down the ccTLD or gTLD with subfolders routes)...

When a visitor lands on your site, let's say domain.com root/homepage, how will they:

1. See this page in another language

2. Switch to a different country page?

A better example. Say I'm in Spain, you sell widgets and I search Google.es for 'best widgets for under €250' - you've done some awesome International SEO, so your site shows up high and I click on it. I land on:

https://domain.com/es/widgets/

Now, I'm on the **Spain **(country) version of your site, in Spanish (language), how would my journey be (in terms of clicks), if I wanted to:

a) View the English version of this page (domain.com/es/widgets/en)

b) Switch to the English site (domain.com/en/widgets/)

c) Switch to the English version of the site, but view it in Spanish (domain.com/en/widgets/) < Likely 2 clicks needed for this of course.

If you're adding to your site, the ability to both switch to another site country AND translate the current page into English (for non-English pages), it needs to be really clear to the visitor how to do either, so they don't click on a country flag and get a result they were not expecting.

Again, the above is true regardless of the gTLD or ccTLD issue. Good planning & labeling can help with this, just make it damn obvious to the visitor what clicking a flag will do and make sure they know how to 1) Translate the current page vs 2) Switch to another country-version of your site.

Whatever you decide, once you've worked out how you want it to work, I'd:

1. Role-play it yourself, visiting the site (mentally or on pen & paper if it doesn't exist online yet!) and try to 'be' the visitor in different scenarios - Is it obvious to get to where you want both country-wise and language-wise?

2. Once the site prototype is built, repeat the above, but on the actual site.

3. Write 2 or 3 scenarios (seriously, it will only take 5mins each!) and pass them to work colleagues - Ask them to run through the scenario and see if they get stuck).

4. If you want to really push the boat out (I recommend this!) use an online UX testing service:

• https://usabilityhub.com/ < Cheapest option of the two, with a few different tests you can do. Personally in your situation I'd probable have them open a country-specific page and ask them to switch language to English, then run a separate test asking another bunch to switch the country to England (or whatever countries you serve, but you get the idea... Ask one group to switch language, another group to switch country - check they do it right).

• https://www.usertesting.com/ < More expensive, but worth getting a small number done. Here you set a series of tests and a screencast of the user trying to carry out your tasks, whilst they talk into a mic.

Spending a few $ on user tests can be VERY useful for identifying where users may be getting confused, resulting in a much better user experience which, let's face it, is key not only for SEO these days, but also for conversions and £, $, and €

Phew!  long-ass post that may raise more questions than it answers I guess?! I don't know your exact situation so it's a tough one to advise on, but hopefully the above is some food for thought

[anitawapa]

Thank you for your reply, it was really helpful.

One other thing. You mentioned "or a gTLD with subfolders (domain.com/ domain.com/es, domain.com/it etc)"

Is there any way to add multiple target countries in google webmaster tools based on subfolders (each translated in another language like domain.com/es domain.com/it etc)? I couldn't find anything on this.

Thank you

[MikeGracia]

One difference is targeting options.

With a ccTLD (country code top level domain), you're not able to set the target country, it defaults to the country of the ccTLD. With a gTLD (generic top level domain), you can set your target in Google's Webmaster Tools (okay, Search Console).

I guess there are branding considerations and possible effects on CTR of having a .us domain - perhaps (100% conjecture here!) some folks would be more likely to click, due to confidence the site is targeting their country (though lots of variables here, for example with a SaaS business that is global, such as an SEO tool, prob less important than, say, a clothing company that only ships to one country!).

Personally, I prefer gTLDs in MOST situations, primarily because:

• You can target the country of choice
• It's easy to target a wider, international market in the future (domain.com/es. or domain.com/mx, /it etc)
• In Search Console, with a gTLD, you can even target different countries for different subfolders (or subdomains, but I'd usually recommend subfolders).

As for Google's preference/SERP advantages? Personally, I think that using a gTLD that has it's target set in Search Console to USA, VS a ccTLD (such as a .us domain) have no advantages either way in terms of USA ranking from an algorithm standpoint - OR at least any algorithmic advantage will be negligible.

Plenty of other factors to focus on, so I'd go with your preference, but if there's a chance you'll want to target internationally in the future, think now if you'd prefer separate ccTLD domains for each country (domain.us,  domain.es, domain.it etc) or a gTLD with subfolders (domain.com/ domain.com/es, domain.com/it etc).

Others may have a differing opinion though