Thread: domain name

i need advice on choosing a .com and .co.nz for domain name

i am building a website for a automobile company which is based in new zealand and i need to choose a domain name now i need advice if i have to choose a .com or .co.nz

the purpose of the website is to sell automobile/car lights, it can be head lights, tail lights for a broad range of car brands so in general the website is about selling automobile/car lights

i have done a bit of keyword research from google keyword research tool and i have chosen few keywords

automobilecarlights
automobilecarlightsonline
onlineautomobilecarlights

i client wants his website over a period of time to be searchable from any country not just from new zealand so what i need advice is should i choose a .co.nz domain because the company is based in new zealand so that people in new zealand are targetted first or should i choose a .com domain straight away as the website is for a long term startegy


alternatively will it be a good idea to build the entire website with a .co.nz domain and also choose a .com and just have one page on .com and create a .htaccess at .com and permanently redirect all traffic to .co.nz where the actual content for the website is and not on .com

any ideas and suggestions will be greatly appreciated

thanks

I will suggest you the best domain as automobilecarlightsonline you can get easly ranked for all three key words like "automobile", car lights "online automobile " online automobile ,"online car lights" because the key word is there in the domain.

thanks for replying

in regards to my question about having the content for the website and having 2 domains which domain should have the content and on which domain should i set the 301 redirect using htaccess

thanks

Does the company trade only in nz or international? If just within nz then I'd stick with .co.nz. Of course getting both won't hurt, if they do trade internationally you could have a localised version (.co.nz) and one aimed globally (.com).

the company trades in nz but would like to sell globally through the website

in regards of having 2 domains should the main content for the website be on .com or .co.nz as there should not be duplicate content so i guess 1 of the domain should have simply 1 page and set with a 301 redirect to the other domain which has the entire content for the website

From an seo perspective, if you are using a .co.nz you are only targeting locally to your country, so in the search engines it will reflect that in your position, for example you might be higher in the search engines for your own country but much lower for everywhere else in the world.

If you had a .com which is global it works out the same with one difference, the positioning within outside countries within search engines like google for example will be higher as that is part of what you are targeting.

Based on what you have said, the .com is the way to go as it is globally recognised and used by every country in the world.. Google will always place companies closest the searcher at the top of results ( based on ip I would have thought ) but with a .com they will also see that its not just for one country so will make you a little higher than you could be with a non-globally recognised domain.

thanks for replying saltedm8

so should i just have 1 .com domain and create the entire website content on this .com domain and not register a .co.nz and create 1 page and set 301 redirect to .com


also if i were to choose .com will the website still be searchable over a period of time for people searching locally in new zealand as the company is based in new zealand in the first place

thanks

In my opinion if you target global so, choose .com domain for that.

If the goal is to trade globally then .com is the way to go. I would also grab .co.nz and probably .org and .net. The reason for this is that your domain name choices are devoid of branding and it would be easy for a competitor to set up on a similar domain name.

The alternative route though and one which I believe is better is to establish yourself in a single country. Once established branch out into another country. This allows you to do far better targeting. Depending on the size of your business and projections you could set up sales people in each country to branch out into.

If you look at amazon. They have a .com for america, then a local extension for each country. I would opt for a similar model. A new company with a new site, unless they are doing something radical are unlikely to make much a dent against truely global competitors.

As for your other question. If you are going local I would use htaccess to redirect lost users from the .com to the .co.nz. Otherwise I would do it vise-versa.