Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
E-Commerce - Country Domains versus 1 Domain?
-
Hi,
Just wanted to get some feedback and opinions re the idea of segmenting our ecommerce site languages under various domains, like .jp for japanese, .it for italian etc...
I do understand the geolocation benefits that this could bring us, but on the flipside, it would mean that we would need to grow our domain authority, link buiding per country domain, which is quite a bit of work.
Has anyone ever considered or implemented this and any thoughts?
Thanks!
-
I'd agree, it's hard work! But, that's why we get paid a nice salary, to figure out those difficult problems. If you have an idea of the Customer Lifetime Value, for that country, you can get some decent estimates from the expected increase in traffic when targeting that country specifically.
-
Thank you for your answer.
It´s hard to estimate the value this one particular country would add - we work with a niche and getting estimates as to the volume of extra business it could yield is hard, SEMRush is helpful though.
-
My thoughts are as follows:
-
Do the country specific search engines add / have the potential to add a lot of value to your business?
-
If no, then do not worry about the country specific domains
-
If yes, identify the specific countries that can add more value
-
Are you having trouble ranking in those country specific search engines?
-
If no, then continue with the single domain and adjust your 1 website to be more friendly to all countries
-
If yes, do a cost-benefit analysis about the work it would entail to get country specific websites and the value you can derive from the expected increase in rankings
-
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Moving from single domain to multiple CCTLDs
Hi, I have a website targeting 3 markets (and therefor 3 languages). I was currently using a single domain with each market being targeted in the following format: www.website.com/pl
International SEO | | cellydy
www.website.com/de
www.website.com/hu It's clear to me by looking at organic results, that in my industry (Real Estate) Google is putting a large emphasis on local businesses and local domains. Top 10 organic results for all my keywords in all markets have country specific CCTLDs. I decided to migrate from a single domain strategy to a multi domain strategy. I own the domains. The new structure is www.website.com/pl -> www.website.pl
www.website.com/de -> www.website.de
www.website.com/hu -> www.website.hu All the website have been added to google search console and 301 redirects are in place and working correctly. The pages are all interlinked and have rel=alternate to each other. The sitemaps are all done correctly. My question is how do I tell Google about this. The change of address feature only works for changing one domain to one other domain. It's been a week and the old www.website.com domain is still showing up (even considering 301 redirects). Or do I just need to be patient and wait it out? Any tips?0 -
Where is it appropriate to use a .eu domain?
My client, a UK company, has a .eu domain and want to rank primarily in the UK but also worldwide, is a .eu domain appropriate?
International SEO | | peeveezee0 -
URL Structure - Homepage, Country and State Pages
Hello, I am creating a website (or websites if best format) that will have state-specific boating license courses for every state in the US, Canada and Australia. I would like the content to be available on the website in English, French and Spanish. I want to be the global leader in providing boat test courses. For the (1) homepage, (2) country pages, and (3) state pages, what is best SEO format I should use for:
International SEO | | Monologix
(a) URL structure
(b) "href lang" code
(c) rel canonical code
(d) will meta content with non-English pages need to also be in the non-English language of that page? Also, what server company do you recommend I host my website with? I am a non-programmer and learning SEO, so any and all help will be greatly appreciated! Thank you very much in advance!!!0 -
How to fix the duplicate content problem on different domains (.nl /.be) of your brand's websites in multiple countries?
Dear all, what is the best way to fix the duplicate content problem on different domains (.nl /.be) of your brand's websites in multiple countries? What must I add to my code of websites my .nl domain to avoid duplicate content and to keep the .nl website out of google.be, but still well-indexed in google.nl? What must I add to my code of websites my .be domain to avoid duplicate content and to keep the .nl website out of google.be, but still well-indexed in google.nl? Thanks in advance!
International SEO | | HMK-NL3 -
Best domain for spanish language site targeting ALL spanish territories?
hi, we're have a strong .com domain and are looking to launch a site for spanish speakers (ie latin america + spain). we already have various subdirectories for some foreign language sites (eg. ourdomain.co.uk, us.ourdomain.com, ca.ourdomain.com, ourdomainchina.com, ourdomainindia.com etc) we already have a B2B site ourdomain.com-es which will remain the same. I'm thinking best practice would be to launch translated copy for the following: ourdomain.com/es ourdomain.com/cl ourdomain.com/mx ourdomain.com/pt etc etc firstly is this the best option? secondly, i'm really interested to hear whether there is a less time/resource intensive route that would give us visibility in ALL spanish speaking territories? Also - if we go with just one of the above (eg ourdomain.com/cl) how likely are we to get traction in other spanish speaking territories? any help much appreciated!
International SEO | | KevinDunne0 -
How can I see what my web site looks like from a different country?
I've tried a few proxy tools to try to see how my site looks from other global locations, but haven't found one that works very well yet -- or a list of reliable proxies around the world. I need to do this to test various geo-targetted ads and other optimizations. Can anyone make a recommendation? Thanks!
International SEO | | Dennis-529610 -
Country specific domains pointing to a .com site
Hello, I am new to seo so please be easy if this happens to be a "silly" question. My company has a .com site. We are expanding into global markets, focusing on specific countries right now. General question: Would I be penalized for duplicate content if I purchased country-specific domains and pointed them to the .com site? Thanks, Jim
International SEO | | jimmer0 -
Targeting Different Countries... One Site or Separate?
I have a client who has 3 ecommerce sites. They are somewhat differentiated but for the most part sell the same stuff. Luckily 2 of them are quite authoritative, old and rank reasonably well. Most of the visitors and sales come from the US. He wants to start targeting Europe, Mexico and Canada. What are your suggestions for doing this? Are we better targeting on the main domains? Not really sure how to do that? Should we use a subdomain and a new store front for each geo? Should we use a .co.uk .co.mx and .co.ca each with a unique storefront? It looks like we are moving to a Magento platform so setting up multiple storefronts on a single database is not a big issue. Anyone have any experience with this?
International SEO | | BlinkWeb0