Sorry, but Google doesn’t apply any blanket penalty to .infos. There are simply too many .info domains that rank well, including several that I own.

It’s also fun to test different keywords with cheap domains because of the fresh domain bonus. After they go into sandbox you’ll know pretty well what keywords are easy to rank and get decent traffic and the try to find an aged domain or go for exact match keyword rich .com domain

I’ve been working on developing niche sites and doing local contract work since last summer. As you might guess, a lot of the niche sites are on .info domains.

Well, I could post a big rant about why Google’s impression of what’s quality search results and what ours might be are so different. Basically, it boils down to them cutting small time affiliate marketers out of the SEO and the PPC (Adwords) markets as best they can because doing so means more money for them. It’s not fair but that’s life. The message is increasingly becoming, “Go Big, Go Branded or Go Home”

Is the small niche site dead? No, I don’t think so. There are ways to still compete on a shoestring budget. However, it clearly isn’t as easy as it was 5-6 years ago when the market was less mature. Content aggregation is certainly one effective method although there are some right ways and wrong ways to do this.

On Wayback machine, it’s probably the best choice even though it isn’t complete. Other domain information sites may have thumbnails of the previous site, should it exist. You can also check domain registration details and see if it has been previously registered. From there, you can make some guesses about how it was used. For example, product related .info domains that were registered in early 2008 and dropped in early 2009 were very likely to have been used by someone doing the “100 BANS sites” campaign.

Also .info domain names with buying keyword names should invite extra scrutiny on your part before purchasing them. For example, you need to do some good research when buying new domains, .info or otherwise, starting with words like “cheap”, “discount” or “vintage” or that have “review(s)” or “store” after the keyword. I’d recommend that you go with more social extra words is the exact match keyword name isn’t available, for example, “widgetblog.info”, “mywidget.info” or “widgetfan.info”, or brand-like names such as “widgetplanet.info”, “widgetdepot.info” or “thewidgetplace.info”.