Which Domain? .com or .com.au

Basic

Member
Hello,
Having recently relocated to Australia from the UK my old website ended with .com
This domain is due to expire in a couple of months and I wondered if staying with .com or .com.au was the better option?
The primary use for my site is soley as a portfolio and I use it more to direct people to it than have people find me.
Already owning the .com domain I have been considering renewing that and also buying .com.au
Does it matter what domain ending I have? I understand if its .com.au i will be associated with Australia which is great but is .com just as useful?
I hope this has come across correctly as I'm struggling to put it into words (I'll claim its because of the heat, only 44c today)
Thanks
Liam :)
 
I'd say it really depends on whether or not you want to target Australia specifically, or want to go for a broader appeal.
With the .com you'll still be able to rank for your local searches based on your content etc but you should still be easier to find on non-Australian searches whereas using the .com.au may limit you in the same way my .co.uk somewhat limits my own international ranks. Or at least that's what I'd guess at from the experience I've had from my own URL
 
As above, solely depends where you are looking to target really... worldwide .com, UK .co.uk, OZ .au. If you can create different content on each I'd run the .com and an .au version, targeting more local search terms with the .au.
 
Like above but if you're wanting to push for Aus clients then they really do like a .au
 
Excellent, thanks for these responses! Yeah that makes sense really if I'm pushing more for Aus based clients.
I suppose the main purpose of my site is to use it as a portfolio and on the odd chance someone finds it and offers me work then that's cool.
Would it be out of the question to push both domains or just stick with one?
At the moment I am Australia based (and hope to be for a good few years) but say I was too return to the UK would it be wise to have the .com domain still active for SEO?
Have I just opened up another kettle of fish?
Cheers ;)
 
The only way it would be advisable to have both is if you were going to write new content for each sites. If you just copied across and had both sites set up identical but on different domains you would get penalised for duplicated content.
Just keep the domain registered and if you move back simply make that domain active.
 
I would just stick with .com - is there really that much of an desire to use .com.au in Aus that people would be put off from using .com instead?
 
Sean Lee-Amies said:
I would just stick with .com - is there really that much of an desire to use .com.au in Aus that people would be put off from using .com instead?
you could argue the same with .co.uk.... the .au helps search engines with location aware searches (more noticeable on mobile phones than pc's in my experience) if nothing else in the same way as .co.uk helps differentiate UK from US sites etc.
Basic, you could redirect the .com domain to the .com.au and then use canonical links to define the preferred address for search engines to .com.au so you shouldn't get any negative impact from doing this (might have an initial negative hit while google 'resets' itself though) because you've only got one site online.
 
Interesting I didn't realise I could be penalised for duplicate content.
I like your thought process Levi :) there is no harm is purchasing the .au domain and I can have a look at the one site and redirecting .com to that.
This has given me plenty to mull over so thanks again! :)
Cheers
Liam
 
Basic said:
Interesting I didn't realise I could be penalised for duplicate content.
Google hates duplicate content. They'll just see it as "this guy has ripped another guy off." Levi's advice is sound.
 
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