Last Updated: January 29th, 2020
Most people are patriotic by nature, and there are countless heartfelt ways to show love and appreciation for a specific country. Opting for a country-code top-level domain builds trust while catering to the users’ patriotism and pride.
What is a Country-Code Top-Level Domain?
A country-code top-level domain, or ccTLD, is a domain extension that is using a particular country’s code. As of December 2018, there are 304 global ccTLD extensions, such as .AT and .DE, which relate to the countries Austria and Germany. The registrations of domain names within two-letter country-code top-level domains are administered by country-code managers and is arbitrated with their own rules and requirements. Some countries also offer non-Latin character domains, which then are called internationalized country-code top-level domains, or IDN ccTLDs. Depending on the ccTLD, someone seeking to register a domain may be required to be affiliated with the country to qualify.
ccTLDs in Numbers
A ccTLD is the strongest signal you can send to your audience as well as to a search engine that the content of your site focuses on a specific country or territory the website is registered in.
Even though .COM continues to dominate the list of the most popular TLDs with a market share of 72.90%, the numbers show that in some countries, there is still a strong preference for local ccTLDs and domain customers using them to target a local audience. At the end of the second quarter of 2019 ccTLD domain name registrations were at 158.7 million. The total worldwide count of ccTLDs grew by 5.6% between 2017 and 2018, which shows stable growth in local domain registrations. The country with the highest number of registered domains is no surprise. China defends it title year after year with currently 22.7 million domain names registrations followed by the rest of the top 10 ccTLDs: .CN (China), .TK (Tokelau), .DE (Germany), .UK (United Kingdom), .TW (Taiwan), .NL (Netherlands), .RU (Russian Federation), .BR (Brazil), .EU (European Union), and .FR (France).
When ccTLDs Reflect Patriotism
A small, but very interesting market is Austria, a country with no more than 8.8 million citizens but with a very strong affinity towards its ccTLD. The domain registration of .AT started in 1988 and is now managed by nic.at, which also manages .CO,.AT, and OR.AT. As of today, more than 1.3 million domains were registered, while the majority of the domain holders (73%) are located in Austria. The registry performed a blend of qualitative and quantitative market research on the subject of domain strategy and to explore the image of the .AT domain. More than 80% of all registrars agreed that .AT is Austria’s leading top-level domain.
(Image from nic.at)
The graphic shows clearly that the vast majority recognizes the domain ending as a sign of patriotism. The .AT domain has proven its value with a long and credible history and stands for “an online representation of the home country” as well as loyalty and trust.
In 2016, a global ICANN study with almost 12,000 respondents in 24 countries about the popularity of domain extensions and reasons for domain choice resulted in a similar outcome. 95% of all respondents indicated confidence in the TLD of their native country and expected there to be a visible connection between the extension and the content of the website. On the other hand, domains with unknown extensions tend to be avoided due to security concerns. Customers visiting a website may feel safer to use a ccTLD site in their native language.
Target Your Audience
gTLDs like .COM or .NET don’t have a specific target audience and don’t necessarily cater to local markets. With ccTLDs, you can tailor a website to a local business. Website users show a preference for local business websites, which are more likely to be trusted. They, therefore create increased traffic and higher page ranking, since search engines use IP addresses to find the most relevant local results for users. With the use of a ccTLD, the website owner is not only able to establish trust and show potential customers that they share the same language and culture, but also operate in a country without necessarily having to physically be there.
IDN ccTLDs also help to target the audience in its native language and improve the SEO ranking by using the same alphabet (like Arabic, Chinese, or Cyrillic) used in the search query.
Another version of ccTLDs are generic ccTLDs. Those domain extensions like .TV (South Pacific Island of Tuvalu) or .IO (British Indian Ocean Territory) refer to a corresponding country, but Google treats them like generic TLDs rather than country-code domains since they have been adopted by certain communities not associated with the respective countries. .IO is mostly recognized as standing for “Input-Output” and is used by programmers or start-ups. Likewise, .TV is commonly used for “Television.”
Against common belief, not every domain registrar is qualified to sell every ccTLD on the market. If you are looking for a rather special domain extension, 101domain offers the single highest selection of country-code domains found anywhere. Check out their website for a full list of ccTLDs—it’s quite extensive and very informative.
Is it worth the risk?
When companies operate internationally, they have to decide what kind of domain strategy will work best for them. They can either use several country-level domains (ccTLDs) or group all their sites under one global domain (gTLD). This decision can generate growth if handled well, but it can also result in losing website visitors.
An excellent example of a successful migration from several ccTLDs to one international gTLD is NFON, a company that specializes in cloud telephone systems in Europe while operating in twelve different countries. A view years ago they decided to move their country websites into subdirectories on a shared international domain. As mentioned earlier, companies and individuals in Austria still have a lot of trust in their country code .AT. Due to lots of specific SEO activities for the small market, the ccTLD of NFON performed very well in Austria compared to national competitors. Surprisingly, after the migration, visibility increased even more, and organic traffic grew by 90% in the first few months.
Switching from several country domains to a single international domain does not just come with short-term risk of losing a good SEO performance; it also comes with possible long-time consequences of losing customers or users that identify with their country-code domain more than with a generic domain extension.
(Sources: NFON, Verisign, DomainState, nic.at)
True Tamplin is a technology specialist, author, and public speaker. He writes on a broad range of technical topics including search engine optimization, cybersecurity, and technology relating to the internet.