Ranking for local monthly search only! is it possible?

Hello , please I'm new to SEO... I want to rank for a keyword but the competition is dam too high globally! My site is based on local traffic. i.e I market to only people from my country and that have about 8k local monthly search... How do In rank for this keyword on my country only? let's say www.google.com.us, instead on www.google.com.
And also, I bought an age/expired domain but still index (8years old) and did a 301 redirect to my main site... is that a good practice? I read sometime ago on BHW that,301 redirect helps to make your site appear old to Google....
Sorry for the noob question. Please help..... Thanks

If you want to rank in a non-US country you should at least have a matching domain. So, for example if you are trying to rank in Germany (google.de) you should have a .de domain (and of course your site should be in German). A 301 redirect is for when a site or page permanently moves. In terms of SEO it's really just a way to preserve content that is already ranking when you move it.

If your searches are high, you should focus on local listings. And 301 is a good idea in term of SEO.

Buy a local domain name, host your site on local servers, analyze the competition and try to get a link from the places that they get their links, find links mainly from local sites, use the local translation for your keyword and variations for diversity, add other links from various places for diversity.

Thanks for your suggestions pal! hope to see ideas

mangobuddy said:

If your searches are high, you should focus on local listings. And 301 is a good idea in term of SEO.

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Does the old domain have to be on the same nich with new money site domain? i.e if for instance my main website is on dog training and a buy an aged domain on insurance nich... does that have any effect? does it the nich matters?

Lordemma said:

Does the old domain have to be on the same nich with new money site domain? i.e if for instance my main website is on dog training and a buy an aged domain on insurance nich... does that have any effect? does it the nich matters?

Click to expand...

If the idea is to use a 301 redirect, then the domain probably does matter. I think Google would be very suspicious of a redirect from a dog training site to an insurance site. But you could probably go from dog training to a generic pet site. The idea of the 301 is really for when companies switch domains (they changed their name, got bought out, etc.). So, think about it that way to determine what might make sense.