Does .es get penalized in Google for USA, even if not a Spanish site?

Forum Moderators: open

Message Too Old, No Replies

Does .es get penalized in Google for USA, even if not a Spanish site?

Does .es get penalized in Google SERP's?

shaolinmonk

7:17 pm on Jan 20, 2010 (gmt 0)

Hi everyone. Thanks in advance for any thoughts!

Basically I'm looking to purchase some .es domains for domain hacking to be hosted in the United States, English language sites, not Spanish targeted.

Does Google penalize for domain hacks?

I am hoping my results for example(product).es would be targeted to U.S. consumers, and not automatically buried down in Spanish search results for Google.es instead of showing up in U.S. results at Google.com.

I know that .es is set by Google to be a default Spain based site.

Should I not purchase the domains?

[edited by: Webwork at 9:09 pm (utc) on Jan. 20, 2010]
[edit reason] Please stick to using Example.com [/edit]

makemetop

3:28 am on Jan 21, 2010 (gmt 0)

You are going to find it much harder to come up in US searches, though not totally impossible, with an .es domain. As you correctly pointed out the country TLD is a prime indicator to most search engines of the country of origin and where to emphasise results.

If the areas you are in are competitive, I wouldn;t even attempt it. If less so, then by getting links and testimonials from authorative US sites may help.

Could be pretty hard though.

canadafred

2:27 am on Jan 24, 2010 (gmt 0)

Similar to what makemetop offers, I think it nearly impossible to rank well for anything remotely competitive, nearly impossible. I would never try it because of the enormous challenge it poses. I have seen it done fairly easily with English counterparts (.ca or .co.uk for example) but for foreign language TLDs, extremely rare and when it happens it's a result of some clever Black Hat SEO trick.

shaolinmonk

3:43 am on Jan 24, 2010 (gmt 0)

Thanks very much, CanadaFred and MakeMeTop! Your thoughts are both very, very, helpful.