Getting a .br Domain – How and Why to Do It

Use the internet for long enough and you’ll start seeing some unusual domain extensions. Apart from the .coms and .orgs of the world, you may also see extensions like .ca or .br.

These are ccTLDs.

A ccTLD is a top-level domain that denotes that a website emanates from a specific country – or geographical territory – and they’re often used to inject a little local flavor into a URL. Specifically, the .br extension mentioned earlier is for Brazil. Read on to discover how to get one of those .br domain extensions and why it might be worth your time to do so.

How Do You Get a .br Domain?

There are two types of .br domains for which you may be able to apply:

• .br – The standard Brazilian domain extension.
• .org.br – The extension used by non-profit companies based in Brazil.

All of these extensions are handled by an official whois server – whois.registro.br – and they’re not available to everybody. To get your hands on a .br extension you, as the domain owner, must be a legal resident or citizen in Brazil, or have a legally established entity in the country. If you want the .org.br extension, you also need to be able to prove that the organization for which you’re registering the extension is a non-profit.

So, if you’re not Brazilian, you can’t get this ccTLD, right?

Not necessarily.

Some domain registrars, including Register.Domains, offer a “trustee service,” through which they register ccTLD domains through an established business in the country of origin on your behalf. In the case of .br extensions, they register via a Brazil-based business entity, with the resulting domain being passed to you to do whatever you need with it.

Why Get a .br Domain?

Whether you register as a Brazilian citizen or use a trustee service, you can get your hands on a .br domain extension. The question now is simple:

Why do that?

Reason 1 – Establishing Credibility in Brazil

Let’s assume that you have a successful company in the United States and you’re looking to branch out. You’ve identified Brazil as a great target market – and your research suggests plenty of people want to buy your product – but you have a problem:

Your existing website is a .com site that’s entirely in English. It has no local flavor or credibility in the Brazilian sense, with any changes you made to the .com site being visible to your U.S. customers.

That’s where a .br extension comes in. You can use this domain to essentially host a new website – tailored to your new Brazilian audience – that injects some local credibility into your business.

Reason 2 – Protecting Trademarks and Tradenames

Your existing URL may use a trademark or tradename that’s legally protected within the U.S.

But it isn’t protected elsewhere – including Brazil. In some cases, this can lead to malicious competitors registering domains for that trademark or tradename using ccTLDs – including the .br extension – so they essentially control your presence overseas.

By registering a .br domain, along with other ccTLDs, for your trademark or tradename, you protect your business from these nefarious tactics.

Reason 3 – It’s Better for Local SEO

Search engine operators – including Google and Bing – have specific search engines for the Brazilian territory. It’s not impossible for websites without the .br extension to rank in those search engines, but it’ll be much tougher if they face competition from a host of local sites for their desired keywords.

With a .br extension, you can create a local website – using Portuguese keywords – that’s more capable of ranking in the Brazilian versions of popular search engines.

Reason 4 – You Build Trust

Trust is key for web consumers, with 70% saying they’ll buy more from a brand if they trust it. With a .br domain, you can generate trust by delivering a website with a local extension to a Brazilian audience.

How?

You’re signaling that the website is intended solely for that local audience by using a ccTLD, creating a targeted approach that leads to Brazilian consumers trusting the products and services sold on that site.

Get Your .br Domain Today

With so many reasons to get a .br domain – assuming you’re interested in establishing a presence in Brazil – your only remaining question is how to get one.

That’s where Register.Domains comes in.

If you’re a Brazilian citizen or legal entity, you can register your .br domain via our service and start building your website. If you aren’t, yet you still want to establish a presence in Brazil, then use our trustee service to get your hands on a domain while we handle the legal side.