If have .com US site with aspirations to go international, which are best ccTLDs?

[ebess]

Working with a client who is launching a mainstream .com site that he hopes to expand into foreign countries.
Given that premise, what order would you rank those in?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[dcristo]

The title of this thread makes no sense. If you have plans to go international, get the .com

 

[Busynic]

Depends on the business and what they are trying to achieve.
I started a global company in '01. In order of priority this is how we went about the domain names (not suggesting this is the only way or the best way - it really depends on the purpose. But we did build a globally noticeable brand in our niche industry).
1. Searched, found and registered a dot com (before registering the company in several countries). It had to be descriptive of the services being offered. We based the name of the company totally around what dot com was available and affordable.
2. Second priority was to make sure it was available in each of our major markets (North America, UK/Europe, Asia).
3. Registered the country extensions in each of those markets including variations (main ones co.uk, com.au, eu)
4. Redirected all the domains to the dot com (there are better ways to do this, but at the time it was quick, cheap and effective for us).
5. Pumped all our marketing and ad dollars into brand recognition of the dot com.

Good luck. I'm sure there are 1000's of variations and opinions. This is simply how we did it, and it worked.

In my humble opinion and observation, the country extension for those markets you are operating are an essential ingredient if you want to have a globally powerful brand solution (at a corporate entity level). It is not mandatory, but the leverage and recognition is undeniable if you have all the ticks in the box (i.e. one measure of brand penetration is when people type your company into the url do they arrive at your business - regardless of extension. Of course there are limits, and I'm only talking about the major markets that you operate, not every spec of dust occupying the planet).

 

[Bill Roy]

If you are launching internationally or even expanding internationally then registering a ccTLD for the relevent country you are going to operate in or sell too is (generally) such a small cost that it is almost pointless asking the question!

All major European ccTLDs, major Asian ccTLDs, major Australasian ccTLD's, major South and Central American ccTLDs, even most African ccTLDs are each less than $100 per year so compare these as a percentage of your start-up costs or expansion costs in the relevent countries and it is I would imagine a miniscual percentage.

It is simple, if you are aiming for market penetration in a country then register the respective ccTLD.

 

[ebess]

Thanks very much Busynic and Billbo for the helpful advice! I'll pass it along to my client

 

[dcristo]

Sorry mate I know what you mean by the title of the thread now. I completely agree with the advice. Developing sites on the relevant ccTLD is creating more work for yourself because you have to do marketing for multiple sites instead of one.

What you could do is create directories for the relevant foreign countries on the .com and then redirect the ccTLD to the directory. For example, register the .com.au which redirects to /au/ on the .com This is helpful if you have content which is specific to that country.

 

[ebess]

@dcristo - thanks, that's an interesting idea about having it redirect to folders on the .com, as I do think the site my client is working on would have content relevant to a specific country..