Google to Treat .Co as International Domain
Thursday, July 22nd, 2010
Domain won’t be pigeon-holed to just Colombia in search engine’s eyes.
[Update: since some people asked, I successfully confirmed this with Google.]
One of the concerns registrants of .co domain names have voiced is if Google will treat the domain as specific to Colombia instead of a generic, international domain name. This is a valid concern given that country code domain names are the top factor Google considers when figuring out who content is created for.
According to a story at PCPro.co.uk, a popular computing site, Google has confirmed that it will allow .co to be treated as an international domain name.
While the .co domain is still assigned to Colombia at the moment, a Google spokesperson said that would soon change. “We will rank .co domains appropriately if the content is globally targeted. Webmasters will soon have the functionality to be able to specify this by using the geotargeting options in Google Webmaster Tools.”
This will give .co a big boost, as it was one of the most frequent arguments I’ve heard in recent weeks against registering .co domains.
Further Reading:
- Google Now Enables International Targeting of .Co Domain Name
- Matt Cutts: .Co Not Just for Colombia
- Domain Broker Tessa Holcomb Joins PPX International
Tags: .co domain
Welcome to the land of .TV, .ME, and others.
Major PayWall DNS Platforms will NOT resolve .CO domains until paid.
**Major PayWall DNS Platforms**
Rumor has it that there is a PRIVATE company called ICANN that will not advertise your TLD until you pay them $185,000 or more.
There is no reason to think Google will ever rank .co better than ws, tv, eu, etc; nothing ranks nearly as good as com, net, org globally.
And .co will always have ranking conflict with Colombia-targeted sites as majority of legit .co sites target Colombia, and probably always will.
Not all ccTLDs are created equal. Google knows what they’re doing.
TV, ME and CO are premium quality options mainly because they are widely recognizable and branded globally with no attachment to their country of origin.
I wrote additional thoughts on this a few weeks ago here: http://DotSauce.com/3753
“Not all ccTLDs are created equal.”
.CM and .CO are now blocked on major DNS Platforms – per subscriber’s desires
By the way, on Set-Top-Box DNS the software can do interesting things like add 10 second delays to .ORG resolutions. Consumers give up, the TLD fades away.
Meanwhile, that same Set-Top-Box DNS gets a real-time feed of any “Premium” .COM that has changed and refreshes the local cache. When a consumer hits a 4-Letter .COM for the first time, their Set-Top-Box already has the latest DNS ready to go.
Great news for .CO. Not a surprise but good to hear the confirmation so quick after launch.
Didn’t see any official position by Google. Can this be all lies?
.co will be like .asia
We have all seen this movie many times before … the ends is always the same … like any well managed company ICONN can eventually lower their prices on GTLDs and allow more confusion into the marketplace … Google and MS will love them for it.
**Major PayWall DNS Platforms**
Another mentality in the Set-Top-Box DNS arena is: Whenever there is a chance to engage the consumer in a dialogue, TAKE IT!! Run Ads!! Sell something!!
So, a consumer enters .CO and up pops a screen asking them if they really want that ?
Have they ever been to Colombia ?
Are they going to the ICANN Meeting in Colombia ?
Do they remember Juan Valdez and his Colombian Coffee ?
[ StarCash Ad Here ]
By the way, are .CO owners charged each year for PPC pay-outs ?
Sorry. It is off topic but who has the best price to reg. a .co?
Are there GD coupons specially for .co?
So far the lowest I found was $ 25.
But, I believe I read elsewhere a lower price.
namecheap
@ fernando veloso -
I have confirmed this with Google now.
I have to disagree. Missouri.ME doesn’t rank in the first hundreds of results for the exact term, “Missouri” and Bruce is a SEO expert. THAT should make people weary if brice can’t do it nobody can.
@no way,
I appreciate the seo expert comment but will say that Missouri.me ranks well for terms that we choose to rank for. First page for many city state terms as city/ news terms as well a business names etc. We are not a state tourism portal so have never even focused on ranking for Missouri.
We focused terms that would drive higher converting traffic for our local advertisers.
Just thought I would give some insight there.
Maybe someday if we decide to so an overall site for just tourism in the state I will give the term Missouri a go.
We actually developed a partnership with a legacy media company based on our ability to rank on terms they couldn’t and they have a .com
Bruce
Keep in mind the game is not over … gTLDs are not limited like land is and more will be entering the same space.
“Keep in mind the game is not over … ”
.BINGO
but, will gTLDs matter or the fact that users (eyeballs) are being migrated to things like BluRay drives with Internet@TV. If you have not played with the Samsung offerings, you have a lot to digest.
Consumers are being moved about ?4? PayWalls beyond what ICANN likely calls Secure DNS. That is a lot of opportunity to change the “Game”.
Consumers want this. Look at the 20+ Billion DNS queries per day that flow via http://OpenDNS.com That is just one DNS Platform. More are on the way.
@ Jim Fleming … very interesting thanks
I agree with what Jason is saying. That is some true insight.
If .co does not reference Colombia sites it will lose relevance like .Asia.
Nobody likes .ASIA b/c is is a huge region that does not resonate with anyone. Why would an Indian think he has anything in common with a Korean? Same with .co. If .co means everything, everywhere, international….then it means nothing.
Everything is moving light speed towards LOCAL ! Ignore local and you are irrelevant here in the next handful of years.
It’s a total waste of money is buying a .co domain.
@ Tim -
Everything is moving light speed towards LOCAL ! Ignore local and you are irrelevant here in the next handful of years … the internet
is getting up close and personal
Never under-estimate the “VOLUME Domainer Mentality”
IF you make $1 profit per year on a domain and own one million .CO domains then that is a nice living for some.
http://domainnamewire.com
http://domainnamewire.co
http://domainname-wire.co
http://domain-name-wire.co
IF .CO domains were 50 cents per year (true cost) it would not take much to justify owning a large number of them.
Just wait for the Single-Letter .C TLD
Does anyone know what the current prices are for the auctioned .co names on namejet?
I want to sell one but have no clue what to ask
The above comments confirm .CO will be a success for me. Instead of talking this and that one should go and check out how many and for how much those “failed” tlds go for on Sedo.
I really like this negativity around .CO I was super negative to scar kids, so that I would not have to bid against them in landrush.
Total of .ME sales on Sedo last 30 days: $79,990.00 (two good domains only join.me and puertorico.me)
One can make a million on any tld and millions can not make one.
Have fun bidding.
Having walked away with only a handful of .co domains and having spent way too much time and energy on this launch, I hope the predictions above about .co’s ultimate lack of popularity come true. But based on early indications about registration distribution, those hopes are unlikely to be realized.
A little more than half of the .co domains I went after in general availability were registered by parties outside of North America.
The whole world is trying to compete for branding attention in a small playing field of premium gTLDs. The ccTLDs don’t have the reach or consumer credibility to anchor a global brand. Will American consumers complete the shopping cart process on a .cn site?
Most consumers feel uncomfortable merely going through a .co.uk or .de site — simply because of the risk of added charges for currency conversion. Get burned by a .ca site charging unfair currency fees and you may not be eager to test your luck again.
The stupid Z on the end of .biz kills its credibility. Consumers and brands are attracted to the two-letter format of .co and to the trustworthiness of the two letters themselves, which .asia and .eu lack.
The reason I only came away with a handful of .co domains is not because of professional registrants locking everything up. Instead, it seems that about a third of the general availability domains were registered by entrepreneurs looking for opportunities to brand or rebrand their own business creations. It is that trend that will give .co traction.
Another subtle hidden down-side of [.CO Success] is that there will now be TWO 900 lb. gorillas sitting before the U.S. Congress claiming:
“DNS is competitive and now no more is needed!!”
This is similar to the 3 Rental Car Company mentality at airports. When people talk about competition, some may assume thousands of TLDs. Others may point to .COM and .CO (and .NET .ORG) and say enough!!
This could become more of a Nash Equilibrium than was present in the past. ICANN may be able to find paid experts who agree.
Users may have to select a “Different Internet” (.XXX?) or some ChaosNet if they want a more dynamic experience.
Set-Top-Box Internet@TV vendors don’t really care about new TLDs because they bring the big-box .brands in via their AP Stores. For them the DNS is well-hidden from the consumers. Consumers navigate with their IR Remote Control with Point and Click.
Consumer Banking will likely have its own super-secure infrastructure. DNS is not needed to make that happen. Interest in new TLDs could diminish as other solutions emerge.
I believe that .co is and will continue to be a winner simply because it is short, catchy and recognized internationally… the same way that .com is. Now, that Google says it will treat .co as international (like .com is) only solidifies its long term appeal and success!
We registered CowboyBoots.co and RecordPlayer.co among others… even though the price of registration is quite steep.
This is great news! Really looking forward to developing the .co’s based on this information.
Should be a real boost in their value. Now we just need to see some .co auction results to set a baseline.
I got MTVIndia.CO , Shakeys.Co (the pizza) , losangelestimes.co, and there are others i m interested in getting. Cna smone tell me if these are good names to get as i am intersted in seling then. Bobby1@Usa.Com thank you then here thank you then here
@bobby Bhai, you need to stop registering domains for some time. All of those that you listed will only cause you trouble.
You’ve made up some random crap in a blog post and managed to get 30 comments. This information is completely misleading.
Great way to generate traffic, but your reputation will drop for this.
Whether google ranks .co domains or not doesn’t matter, no one is going to develop a legit .co website anyway.
Reason #4 why .co are a waste of money:
To most of the world (including surprisingly enough even most Columbians), it looks like you meant to say “.com,” for forgot the “m.”
Sorry. Meant to say: “… say ‘.com,’ but forgot the ‘m.’”
There have ALREADY been some legitimate .co sites developed and it will steadily continue.People are more adaptable than you think and i don’t see a problem of them incorporating .co into their memories. Some make it sound like we are all a bunch of .com somnambulists walking around hypnotized with the word “.com” on our collective breathes and that all businesses should be fixed models with no room for change or flexibility. I don’t think being frozen in .com time is progressive. Bottom line here with .co has always been availability. All good .com words are gone so
people find a creative alternative to get the word they want with a legitimate, short extension. Just pretty natural, IMO. .co is just an alternative for the new generation of interneters.
Wow…thanks for the heads up. This is so great…now I can own some premium domain names…I just bought an amazing premium domain home-for-sale.co Hope this is a good investment.
I’m not looking to flip, but to build and brand. Two domains I reg’d during general release where the extension is being used as an abbreviation (and substitute) for the word “County”.
When viewed, in print, it seems to suggest exactly that:
Sonoma.Co
Marin.Co
Some counties have more appeal than others. IMHO, it works for these two.
Bobby,
I’m no expert, but.. You just registered a trademarked name. No one can use that for business without a trademark violation.
What I like in .co’s is the fact that in the future, technically and ideally, it could be even a better version of .com because of its shortness and memorability, which is what the DNS has been created for. Plus, let’s not forget that countless millions of websurfers are always used to the .co TLD because of their national ccTLD (.co.uk, .co.za, .co.jp, .co.kr just to name the most famous examples).
I think for cost i prefer .tv considering the internet is very much becoming video based , good luck with your .co’s
.co domains will be a bluff… they will be in same category as .info, .biz and other strange tlds
In Google Webmasters .co still shows as geotargeted to Colombia without the possibility to change it.
@ Woof – patience my friend
@subhash Kindly stop spamming.
I heard from google today and they said this will be implemented ‘soon’, but they can’t give a specific date.
HI, wy not try .co the key factor its the keywords, short, memorable, means company, co etc. just think guys: if its my only option to be in the firts 10 results WY NOT at the end google its goin to permit to point in the google webmaster tools.
@Woof, it has been confirmed that Google will allow the changing of .co to become a global target.
All will be good
OK, but is it possible to see any Google’s official source for this?
@ Joe – it’s in my email inbox
@Andrew Allemann
Could you post a screenshot ( link to a screenshot ) of that email … we are all intrested in this topic and would apreciate a confirmed source of this …
international targeting is now available: http://domainnamewire.com/2010/08/04/google-now-enables-international-targeting-of-co-domain-name/
There are only 2 TLD’s that mater – .com & country TLD’s ie. in the UK .co.uk …all others are worthless and soley put out there for money making purposes from the registras, any good SEO will confirm this if they have a clue
I didn’t remember this post. Anyway, while we’re at it, here’s the official reply from Google:
http://www.google.com/support/forum/p/Webmasters/thread?tid=18cfda837cec2f50&hl=en
I want to believe that all ccTLDs are created equal. However the results tell me differently. How many .info or .tv domains have good position on SEs? A .co site that I have (2 monthh) even beaten by articles in article directories. Perhaps I need more time to see the real results.
@rinaldi
Recently sold .info website on flippa for $8000 and this website was having around 1000uniques a day, so .info domains can rank just like like net, org, com.
Yesterday registered .co domain, and will see how good I can get it to rank.
I Agree with Stuart Chester There are only 2 TLD’s that mater – .com & country TLD’s ie. in the UK .co.uk …all others are worthless and soley put out there for money making purposes from the registras, any good SEO will confirm this if they have a clue
But in my own experience .net rank ok and .tv .co nothing so far
Do you think Co domains will have good positions in Google Search in near future?
I have bought 2 Co domains. Now I am undecided to develop them or not!