Would askaboutmoney.ie be better than .com for Google ranking?

We own both domains, but .ie just redirects to .com.

If we switched to .ie would it help our rankings on Google?

Hi Brendan,
The fact that the site is hosted in Dublin is one of the heavy weighing factors as to helping you Google ranking for searches in Ireland.

The fact that the site is Irish specific means I would switch to the .ie anyway. It will give Google that extra hint (and other search engines) that the site is specific to an Irish audience.

There is also the fact that there is quite a few posts that I have noticed from US posters who are not aware at all that it's an Irish site.

If you are considering the change, I would suggest that you think long and hard about how your are going to implement it. You will need to have conditional 301 redirects setup correctly in order to preserve your current rankings. I suggest that you get in touch with Richard Hearne of redcardinal.ie if you need assistance.

dave2k said:

I suggest that you get in touch with Richard Hearne of redcardinal.ie if you need assistance.

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Why this specific individual?

ClubMan said:

Why this specific individual?

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Because I have worked with him in the past and I know he knows his stuff. I have worked with him on a very similar project actually.

I have also heard him speak at an event on this topic.

No, it shouldn't affect your Google ranking at all. As a previous poster has stated, as long as your website is hosted in Ireland, it will rank as an Irish website.

A better option would be to install something like http://www.vbseo.com/ which will make the forum posts more search engine friendly.

Not on all search engines , but it will on some.

Edit:
Sorry, looks like you have 403 in place. Then no , it won't help.

As above installing a SEO mod for vB would be a better move.

Brendan,

Not deleting old threads that contain relevant content would have more of an impact than changing the primary domain name extension.

AFAIK I configured the .ie redirects correctly so we shouldn't suffer, and it would just be a matter of reversing those rules if you decide to change. But given that our web server IP address is "Irish", it shouldn't matter. Also we are setup as an Irish site in the Google webmaster tools.

Looking at Google Analytics, over 80% of our hits originate from search engines. Around 10% of these are searches for the site name rather than for keywords of interest. Interestingly our top referring site is (drumroll) The Property Pin with about 15% of external referrals originating there (thanks guys!).

I do agree we could make the site more obviously Irish, as some new posters seem confused. That might be a reason to switch the primary domain, and rejig the branding / Irishness (coincidentally I'm involved in another site with dual domains where we are considering switching for the same reason).

I have read a few article on this and from what I can gather some say Google uses (1) the hosting location, (2) some mention the domain extension and (3) some mention location specific keywords to determine the sites location. From what I gather it is probably an algorithm that looks at all three with a weighting attached to all three.

By moving to the dot ie domain extension it would seem that it would help increase the chances of higher local rankings but is not is not the sole criteria.

It won't do any harm for the ranking anyway.

I would suggest going for it and changing the domain extension.

MugsGame said:

Not deleting old threads that contain relevant content would have more of an impact.

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I see where you are coming from and there is logic to to not deleting content to re-post it elsewhere to keep rankings if this works.

I wonder if this plays out though as the Google algorithm seems to find reposted content quite fast. For example I deleted the old dated credit card rewards thread and posted the new one recently but AAM is still number one in a Google search for "best credit card reward scheme" and Google has found the new thread.

It is difficult to out smart the Google algorithm

Brendan said:

We own both domains, but .ie just redirects to .com.

If we switched to .ie would it help our rankings on Google?

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I have both (in fact.co.uk as well) for my own sites, and I don't think it makes any difference to Google. However, it may make a difference to the perception of the people who use the site.

Also, in my experience, the location of the hosting makes no difference to being found - as long as you set the location correctly in Google webmaster tools, and have relevant local content.

Finally, much of the effective Google SEO optimising is based on the keywords or search terms by which you want to be found. Not sure how you would manage that here, as the content is very diverse.

+1 on almost all of the above. Keywords are not important. Google analyses all the content (usually ignoring keywords completely) and tries to figure out what the site is about and if your site is genuine or if it is search-engine spam/bait. The diversity of the content is a good thing for this reason. The highest organic ranking comes when others link to you and they too have a good reputation (as decided by Google). For this reason, you need to encourage others to quote you.

If you employ deceitful tricks to increase your ranking, Google will punish you.

I think the .ie vs .com thing is mostly a matter of consumer confidence. That said, if Google were to recognise that it's much harder to qualify for a .ie domain than a .com, it might give you extra credibility points.

VBSeo would be worth getting.

I've got it on and it works really well

I'd also seriously consider spending money on customising the site's look and feel. At the moment it's using the default vbulletin templates with zero customisation.