Country Code Domains Confirmed to Perform Better in Search Results

Country code domains are said to be given preferences in the search results. Gary Illyes, Google Analyst, confirmed this statement on the SEO Office Hours Podcast.

Illyes has stated in a Q&A that Google boosts websites that utilise these country-specific code domain names.

Additionally, Google amplifies local sites so websites using these code domains perform comparatively better than sites that do not use country domains.

Illyes has also stated that going after users’ language may have better results than going after the domain names. Targeting languages means the website can be seen no matter where a user searches. However, ccTLDs only seek the country itself.

Country Code Domains or ccTLDs

ccTLDs are domains particular to a certain country and are an abbreviation of the term ‘Country Code Top Level Domains’. For instance, .in for India and .kr for Korea are common examples of ccTLDs. Such domain names are targeted toward Internet users living in a certain country. It is not language-specific but rather more geography-based.

Generic Top Level Domains also called gTLDs are domains that are not country-specific. Google sometimes treats ccTLDs like gTLDs for ranking reasons. For example, the British Indian Ocean’s ccTLDs is .io but Google sees it as a gTLD.

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