Google’s John Mueller has recently published on the Google Webmaster Central Blog about how Google is planning on handling new Top-Level Domains (TLDs). The reasoning for the blog post was due to the overwhelming number of questions and misconceptions that the webmaster community have shared in regards to how Google will be treating new TLDs such as .guru, .how, or any of the .BRAND gTLDs.
Generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) is the suffix found at the end of a domain name. The core group of gTLDs are .com, .org, .net, and .info; In addition to those TLDs, .gov, .edu, and .mil are considered as generic but are designed to be restricted because additional proof of eligibility is needed.
Out of all the questions and answers provided in John Mueller’s original blog post, here are three question and answers that we will be paying closer attention.
Q: How will new gTLDs affect search? Is Google changing the search algorithm to favor these TLDs? How important are they really in search?
A: Overall, our systems treat new gTLDs like other gTLDs (like .com & .org). Keywords in a TLD do not give any advantage or disadvantage in a search.
Q: Will a .BRAND TLD be given any more or less weight than a .com?
A: No. Those TLDs will be treated the same as another gTLDs. They will require the same geotargeting settings and configuration, and they won’t have more weight or influence in the way we crawl, index, or rank URLs.
Q: Will Google support my SEO efforts to move my domain from .com to a new TLD? How do I move my website without losing any search ranking or history?
A: We have extensive site move documentation in our Help Center. We treat these moves the same as any other site move. That said, domain changes can take time to be processed for search (and outside of search, users expect email addresses to remain valid over a longer period of time), so it’s generally best to choose a domain that will fit your long-term needs.