There’s an interesting question inside SEOchat forums about a new-ish country tags one can notice in search results.

That’s a good call to sum-up what we actually know about that setting (as it’s so often misunderstood)

The “Geo-Setting” Facts

• The setting only works if you have a generic top-level domain (here’s the list). If you have a country-specific top level domain, Google will assign you to that country no matter what.
• The setting serves as *additional* help to Google and only affects search results if the user limits search results to a specific country.
• The setting refers to area, not language of the search results.
• (New!) Now Google is going to show your geo-setting in search results in green:

Conclusions and Sources

• In most cases you don’t need to enable the geo-targeting setting option. Besides, they say, if you once change your mind and edit the setting, it may take Google months to recover your rankings in other countries.
• If you really want to only rank in a certain country, a geo-specific TLD is your best bet.
• The new introduction can be a slight argument towards the geo-setting. If you are targeting a specific country and it shows up in search results, that may affect your click-through!
• Always read the official guidelines by Google, of course.

What are your experiences with Google’s geo-setting? Please let us know in the comments!