Developing .US - focus on US market or go global / generic?

[RTM.net]

I thought I would start a discussion on the topic of developping .US domains; we have a few that are developped and doing quite well.

One example is Oxycodone ///us - certainly not a topic (oxycodone is a popular and highly abused prescription drug) restricted to the US, but it gets plenty of traffic - albeit primarily from the US. This may be because the subject at hand is inherently concentrated in the states.

So, the question, what about a very generic name (think along the lines of stuffforsale ///us tho' that isn't the name)... should we build it to specifically target ONLY US-based visitors, or do we try a chance on making it a truly global site based on the generic keyword?

In addition, what about foreign language keywords in .US (Spanish / French / German / etc...) ?

Thoughts and ideas greatly appreciated!

Rob

 

[Argie]

I'm not an expert but I think in the end you'll end up losing a lot of traffic to the .com and also the .us ext is only known in USA, I mean, for example, here in Europe nobody would think of going to a .us website, off course, I'm talking about type in traffic, if you manage to get good SE position for your .us domains, then you'll probably get traffic but people going back to your site will probably end up typing the .com version...In my opinion you shouldn't invest too much effort or time into developing them. Hope it helps.

 

[RTM.net]

Thanks Argie for your input.

It's worked very well for oxycodone in the .us extension with excellent search engine coverage, organic traffic, etc ... but you're right, it's probably because the subject matter is quite specific to the US.

As for the foreign language (French) term in the .us extension, we're still undecided, we may have a French end-user who wants to target French (global) visitors for US based goods or property... a niche market, but the domain could work in terms of being relevant, i.e. French product or service in US.

Thanks again
Rob

 

[Shane]

.US can be used with success for global audiences. The problem is 99% of developers are lazy and half ass everything they do; which leads to misconceptions about the viability of certain extensions. Fact is, most developers would fail even if they had the best .com imaginable.

As with any website it would behoove you to start with a small demographic then expand.


Good luck!