I have a client in Australia that is going to set up a website that is in Chinese to service their Asian customer base (Indonesia, Singapore, HK, China). What domain should they use?

[100yards]

They're website is hosted on a .com.au domain. Should they host their Chinese language pages under their current domain (.com.au) using a subdirectory (i.e. /asia) or should they use another separate domain that they own that is a regular .com? Or does it really not matter?

[benesmartin]

Hi,

Chinese internet is a bit special, as it requires a website to be hosted in China with .cn TLD. However, it is possible to host it in Hong Kong as well. For other countries, I'd recommend to setup the subdirectories on .com.au for not loosing the domain authority. However, if you plan to extend your business to more countries in the future, I'd recommend to setup scalable system of TLD's (such .com) as soon as possible. But for now, start with China .cn with 301 from .com.au/cn.

Best,
Martin

[shopwood]

Hi,

I'd recommend getting a ccTLD (.cn) and hosting in China or Hong Kong. Also localizing your website with the help of native professionals.

Pros: This is the clearest sign to Baidu (The predominant search engine in China) and to all search engines in general.

Cons: The domain authority of the new site will be completely independent of the current site and it might be expensive

Now, if you wish to use a gTLD and put the Chinese version of the site in a subdirectory. That's fine too. Just remember to add the Hreflang tags.

Pros: Less expensive

Cons: Chinese search engines and internet users favorite sites that are hosted locally.