Can multiple domains compete with one another if they have the same/similar content?

[kevinliao]

Could an ecommerce site with a .co.nz nd .com.au domain compete with one another and hard organic rankings if the content of the pages are the same? All the links would be identical (apart from .co.nz or .com.au) the product descriptions, pages titles etc... would all be identical or similar (our page titles are ever so slightly different). Could this be hurting us?

Thanks in advance ^ Paul

[FedeEinhorn]

If you are using the appropriate rel="alternate" hreflang="x" you shouldn't have any problem. For more info you can read here: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/189077?hl=en

Most likely, as the pages are the same, they won't show up at the same time, Google will serve the one that they consider appropriate for the user, hence the use of hreflang, to guide Google to know which version they should serve to each user.

[kevinliao]

Thanks for the advice.