UK prefers to purchase through .co.uk names

72 per cent of British website users are more trusting and loyal to UK domain names, according to recently published research.

Some 62 per cent of people surveyed also believe that a UK suffix will mean that the site is more relevant to them, while a third believe that local domain names are essential in order to appeal to local customers.

For example, when looking to buy books on line, seven out of 10 surfers would head straight to www.amazon.co.uk, with just five per cent of people saying that www.amazon.com would be their natural first port of call, according to the survey of more than 2,000 net users carried out by YouGov on behalf of UK domain registry Nominet.

"The findings show that British Internet users are loyal to local websites and have higher levels of trust for the .uk domain name," said Lesley Cowley, Nominet's chief executive.

"It's clear that the trust issue is one of increasing importance to the Internet industry, as well as Internet users".

HOWEVER, a big factor this research completely ignores is the way search engines handle websites with multiple domain names. Even so, it is always better to register all of the principal Top Level Domains for your website (if they are available!)