Everyone seems to think .gov and .edu sites have some special consideration when it comes to Google algorithm calculating the value of links on these pages. Naturally webmasters would think this since these official .gov and .edu sites dominate the SERP’s and are usually found in the top ten for targeted keywords. The truth is though, Google does not favour these sites and are treated equal to other sites.

What the official .gov and .edu sites have going for them, is that they are well funded and would obviously have a very professional design with valuable and official content. They are the sources of official news, findings, educational documentation etc, and you can not find such information anywhere else. Thus thousands, maybe millions, of related sites would link to them and improve the organic rankings for the .gov and .edu official sites.

If you compare .com sites with .gov and .edu, most .com sites would not be as good. But if you look at official .com sites, they have just as much authority and would probably receive just as much organic growth. The bottom line is, The TLD (top level domain) will not influence Google’s algorithm. It will only come into effect when searches are done on a geographical basis. Value, content, presentation, and structure of a website will always be key factors. So if you are after links on .gov or .edu sites, don’t try too hard, because you will probably get a much better response from authority .com sites who might also be more commercially driven.