Multiple TLD SEO

[tomj]

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Question:

How naughty if at all is it to SEO say Bluewidgets.com and .co.uk and .net etc etc for the same keyword but have totally different site/design/content ?

Might the paranoid say change the whois on each and host on separate IP's too??

Any input appreciated.

Cheers, T

[Azam.net]

I would not suggest you do anything dodgy - sooner or later you will get caught out - but there's nothing illegal about using different TLDs to target the same keywords in the SERPs as long as they have distinct content etc.

We have Azam.net, Azam.info, Azam.biz targeting the same keywords and quite often get multiple listings for the same search terms.

As well as the opportunity to get multiple listings, It spreads the risk. Even if one isn't doing anything grey hat or black hat, better to have multiple sites than to be dependent on the one, just in case Google wakes up one morning and decides he doesn't like you.

Of course, on the other hand, it is a lot more work to maintain two or three quality websites rather than one.

[baggsy]

Technically, I don't think there's anything wrong with what you are doing.

As long as the sites are hosted in different places and have unique content, I think you'll be fine.

That said, Google do employ human reviewers to check the quality of the SERPs. If your three sites were to rank in the top 3 positions, all with the same 'look and feel' and very similar content, then if you were to miraculously lose 2 of the 3 rankings then I'd put it down to a manual review deciding that only one site should rank. I'm not sure how likely this is though. Also, I know competitors can inform Google if a site purchases links. There may also be a way for them to 'call you out' to Google for dominating the SERPs.

At the end of the day, my point is this;

The precautions you mentioned (different IPs etc) would differentiate each of the sites from a 'technical' or spidering point of view. To be extra careful, I'd also ensure that the sites look different to one another too, to get past a possible human review.

Good Luck

[trooperbill]

you'd get away with it no worries. just make sure the content is unique and have some products unique to each site.