.COM or .ORG - Which is better?

[vpoffunk]

I work for a non-profit association. We currently use a .com as our primary, but also own the .org. Should we switch to the .org address? What would the benefits be?

[ProjectLabs]

Many people assume that .org means it is a non-profit but many people use .org TLDs for commercial purposes.

Google's Matt Cutts has said that the TLD (top level domain) doesn't affect rankings.

Here is a quote from Matt Cutts on May 14, 2012:

"Sorry, but that’s just not true, and as an engineer in the search quality team at Google, I feel the need to debunk this misconception. Google has a lot of experience in returning relevant web pages, regardless of the top-level domain (TLD). Google will attempt to rank new TLDs appropriately, but I don’t expect a new TLD to get any kind of initial preference over .com, and I wouldn’t bet on that happening in the long-term either. If you want to register an entirely new TLD for other reasons, that’s your choice, but you shouldn’t register a TLD in the mistaken belief that you’ll get some sort of boost in search engine rankings."

Another thing to consider is that when you move your website to a different domain, you can lose rankings and authority.

[sbaylor]

I work with a non-profit that uses the .org TLD, and you'd be surprised how many (presumably non-technical) people tell me that they couldn't find our website when I told them about it. A little probing told me that they heard the name before the TLD and automatically went to the .com site by habit.

Besides that benefit, I can't think of a reason why a .org wouldn't be sufficient.

[EGOL]

I work for a non-profit association. We currently use a .com as our primary, but also own the .org. Should we switch to the .org address? What would the benefits be?

You own them both.  That's the important thing.

I would carry on as you are doing and 301 the .org to the .com.