At Little Dragon Media we understand that, in 2024, Canadian companies must have a fully responsive, mobile-optimized, professionally designed website to flourish. Yet, one client recently asked us if it mattered which domain extension they selected for their website. Well, being a data-driven digital marketing agency, we conducted a survey asking 1,501 Canadian consumers which domain extension they trusted most on a Canadian company’s website. We used the Google Publisher Network through Google Surveys, and targeted males and females between the ages of 18 and 65+, from coast to coast. We asked the following question with several possible responses:

Which of the following domain name extensions do you trust the most on a Canadian company’s website?

• .ca
• .com
• .org
• .net
• .info
• .co
• .io

Here’s the link to the survey with sorting and filtering options:

https://datastudio.google.com/u/0/reporting/f018ef09-16a5-4132-b86e-235f11274c1e/page/7bSrB

Canadians Trust .Ca Company Websites The Most, And .Io The Least

Interestingly, the vast majority of Canadians trust a Canadian company website with a .ca domain extension far more than .com. This comes as some surprise, given the prevalence of company websites with a .com extension. Unsurprisingly, so few indicated that they found a company with the rarely seen .io domain extension to be trustworthy.

Older Canadians Trust .Ca Even More, Especially Woman 65+

Compelling insight was gained when demographic filters were applied to the survey results. When those 65+ were specifically targeted, 63.6% indicated that they trusted a company with the .ca extension the most. Additionally, when demographic filters focused specifically on females 65+, that percentage leapt to an astounding 67.5%.

Curiously, female consumers, in general, found .ca companies to be more trustworthy. When demographic filters were applied to the results factoring solely gender, 62.8% of all female respondents indicated that they trusted a Canadian company with the .ca domain the most. Conversely, 57.8% of all males selected the same response.

In this age of global pandemic, a positive online presence is critical for Canadian companies to truly succeed, especially pertaining to essential components like website design and website maintenance.

Male Consumers Trust Canadian Companies With .Com Websites The Most, Especially Millennials

The sexes did not agree with one another on this survey!  Overall, male participants stated that they trusted .com websites more than any other domain extension, with 25.9% selecting this option. 

Of all the demographics who participated in the survey, Millennial males between 25 and 34 years old indicated that they trusted Canadian companies with .com domains the most, at a whopping 28.8%. 
On the other hand, when demographic filters targeted female respondents, only 20.8% said they trusted Canadian company websites with .com domain extensions. In particular, only 15.2% of females between 45 and 54 years old indicated that they found Canadian companies with .com websites to be trustworthy.

Young Females Between 18 And 24 Trust .Org The Most On A Canadian Company’s Website

Of the survey participants, 7.23% indicated that they found .org to be the most trustworthy domain name extension.

Yet, when demographic filters were applied solely focusing on young females between 18 and 24 years old, the percentage soared to 11.7%. Curiously, only 6.7% of male respondents from the same cohort selected this response.

Young Males Between 18 And 24 Years Old Trust The .Net Domain Extension The Most

Another domain extension that consumers found trustworthy (albeit a small percentage) on a Canadian company’s website was .net – with a meager 2.73% of respondents indicating this option.

Compellingly, when demographic results were applied focusing specifically on young males between 18 and 24, the percentage rose to 6.2%. Overall, 5.1% of 18 to 24-year-olds stated that found the .net domain extension to be most trustworthy on a Canadian company’s website.

Females Between 45 and 54 Trust .Info The Most On A Company Website 

Another domain extension that a small percentage of consumers trust on a company website was .info, with only 2.4% of survey participants selecting this option.

Yet, when demographic filters were applied targeting only females between 45 and 54 years old, the percentage nearly doubled to 4.6%. Interestingly, the demographic with the lowest number of respondents who trusted .info on a Canadian company’s website were males between 55 and 64 – an infinitesimal 0.9% of participants from this cohort indicated this response.

Middle-Aged Males Between 45 And 54 Years Old Find .Co The Most Trustworthy

The penultimate survey response garnering only 2.29% of responses was the .co domain extension.

However, when demographic filters were applied to the result targeting males between 45 and 54, the percentage leapt to 6.7%. Interestingly, this was the third most popular response amongst this cohort.

Young Adult Males Between 18 And 24 Trust .Io The Most On A Canadian Company’s Website

Lastly, a paltry 1.72% of survey respondents indicated that they trusted the .io domain extension the most on a company website.

Yet, when demographic results were applied specifically focusing on males between 18 and 24 years old, an astounding 4.7% indicated this response. Thus, the percentage nearly tripled amongst this cohort.

Conclusion

In this unprecedented age of global pandemic, a positive online presence is essential for Canadian companies to flourish. Most importantly, having a top-quality, mobile-ready, user-friendly website is vital to instill trust and legitimacy in the minds of consumers. Based on the results of this survey, Canadian companies would be well served to choose the .ca domain extension for their website, which will further increase the likelihood of creating trustworthiness. This is particularly true amongst female consumers, especially older women. Furthermore, given the uncertainty of our times, in addition to crucial elements like website design, companies should consider things like strategic consultation. This will assist in planning for scenarios in the foreseeable future, in addition to developing a comprehensive strategy to adapt to the current market. 

Link to full survey with filtering options: https://datastudio.google.com/u/0/reporting/f018ef09-16a5-4132-b86e-235f11274c1e/page/7bSrB

Details About The Study And RMS Score

Sampling

Audience: Users on websites in the Google Surveys Publisher Network

Method: Representative

Age: All Ages

Gender: All Genders

Location: Canada

Language: English

Frequency: Once

Root mean square error (RMSE) is a weighted average of the difference between the predicted population sample (CPS) and the actual sample (Google). The lower the number, the smaller the overall sample bias.