Google North: Google.com vs. Google.ca

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Effectively Targeting Your National Audience

To celebrate Canada Day today I thought that I would write about the differences between search results in Google USA (google.com) vs. Google Canada (google.ca).

When looking at SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages) from Google, one consideration that is often overlooked is which Google is doing the searching—in this post, we’re going to look at SERPs from Google.com vs. Google.ca.

To illustrate my point about how different the search engine results pages can be, I’ll be using some examples from general search terms. The first search results pictured are from Google.com (using a reliable American proxy) and the second results are from Google.ca (using my normal internet connection from Vancouver, BC, Canada).

The Search Terms:

• “news”
• “soccer balls”

News

Google.com identifies CNN.com (with site link directory), Google News, MSNBC and Fox News as the top information sources online. (I love the “Related searches: wrestling news” suggestion. I mean, it’s not like there’s a political race, or other events going on or anything).

When we check out the Google.ca results, we see a strong Canadian showing—kicked off by the CBC (site link directory), CTV, Google News, CNN and Google News Canada.

With this general term as an example, we can see who Google identifies as the top “news” sites for the .com and .ca results pages. In these instances, we can say that the Big G is identifying these top-ranking sites as not only the best results for the user, but the best search results for a user in that area.

Soccer Balls

While this probably isn’t the top term you’re going after, it does further show how different the results can be. Specifically, take note of the limited competition in the PPC side of things. In addition to the focussed sales portion of the .com pay per click listings, look at the discrepancy of e-commerce sites vs. informational sites from the .com to .ca.

This will show that in competitive ares of e-commerce, there can be available space in nationally-targeted areas of search.

The Size and Scope of the Market

Of course, Canada is a much smaller market that the US—Canadian pop: approx. 33 Million vs. approx. 301 Million in the states (as of July 2007)—but it can be important as a Canadian company to focus your efforts on the home front before looking internationally.

While a lot of Canadian searchers are used to typing in “Google.com” because of that international and ubiquitous branding, but after identifying user IPs, the redirect goes to Google.ca—which supplies the results from above, even when the “search the web” field is selected instead of the “search pages from Canada”.

How to Capitalize On This

Basic techniques for going after national SERP results

1. country specific domain (get the .ca)
2. geo-targetted ppc (go after those polite searchers above the 49th parallel)
3. nationally specified content and meta information (Be Canada’s Sports Leader)

Canada is, in many ways, a relatively unsophisticated search market. By using a .ca domain, a company has a great advantage in geo-targeting and getting a leg up on competition that is slow to follow, or going after a general online audience.

As a canadian company, with a proper search and internet marketing strategy, you’ve got a great chance at really cornering the market at home. Having a nationally focused site drills down your niche even further—while it can, in some ways, limit your audience, it does give you the opportunity to dominate the .ca SERPs. With first page results at home, it’ll be a lot more comfortable to take the show on the road.

Posted by Chris Breikss on 07/01 at 12:37 PM
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