A keyword rich domain name and on page SEO will only get you so far, back links and many other factors come into play for high Google rankings.

This may be closely related to the similar concept that in a not very competitive niche on page factors are enough to rank well while with very competitive niches it takes not just on page factors but also off page factors (i.e. lots of backlinks) to rank well.

Just my opinion but I have noticed this play out in example after example in many different niches so I think that it is pretty accurate.

An exact match domain will make it easier to rank for that specific term in Google. A good domain name will likely increase your CTR from the Google SERPs. With good SEO, one can make your site rank better than other sites for a wide variety of terms – even better than sites with exact match domains.

I don’t want to put palmsprings.com down but its just filled with links and its not the most engaging of websites. No juicy content, the design isn’t partcularly appealing, the meta description isn’t very good and the fact is that palm-springs.org is the Bureau of Tourism for Palm Springs making it very relevant in the eyes of Google

With regards to the links, palmsprings.com does have 14,000+ but it appears a majority of these are from its own pages, pages which as you click further into the maze of links on the site the PR disappears. With SEO a handful of high quality, relevant links go much further than volume, low quality links.

Nowadays more needs to be done than relying on the weight of the domain name itself to rank highly. Especially in more competitive search term markets. A great domain none the less.

I agree with you in part but not in whole.

I have been marketing online since 2003 focusing on SEO & Google AdWords and have tracked, tested & measured thousands of ad campaigns over the years.

What I can say for sure is the top 3 – 5 spots obviously get the most traffic and just because its a dot .com does not make it a dead set certainty to get clicked on if its in the #3 spot when running against any other extension. When it comes to search users have been conditioned to click on the top one or two results before anything else.

In regards to .com vs other ccTLD’s for search results, well the ccTLD’s (especially in the markets that I spend most of my time in) which are .COM.AU, .CO.UK & .IN hold their own very well because searchers know that the website is relative to their locality and the .com is very often not.

If I live in Australia and was searching for a Solar Hot Water Heater then 90% of the time the .com.au will win as the .com will most likely be an American website.

So the .com has its place in the US but not necessarily everywhere else unless the product or service provided by the .com website is truly a global product.

#1 .org

#2 .net

#3 .com

Guess which one gets clicked on the most??

Yup, the .com each and everytime.

Users trust .com more than anything else.. Even if it is #4 or #5 if the result is visible.. They will click on it.

Mike

Palm-Springs.org maybe ranked first because it is receiving authority backlinks from government (.gov) and likely educational (.edu) institutions.