Hey, quick question. I just found a nice sounding, rememerable and acceptably short domain name. The only problem is that the .com domain is taken, while the .net is free. The .com site is not much active (it has only ads), so would this be a problem if I buy the .net domain? How much traffic do you think I would be losing?
Having either a dot com, net, org... none of these will affect how much traffic you receive. How much traffic your site receives is dependent on your SEO, nothing more nothing less. From a branding perspective, having a dot com is always better (higher resell value, etc), however Google definitely does not penalize a website for simply having a domain other than a dot com. If your content is up to scratch, and relevant to keywords that people are searching for, then you will rank wel.
you will lose some traffic because people do not know you are a .net.. if you only care search traffic and do not care type in traffic, then use .net otherwise I would stay clear of a .net domain
.coms are prefered though, because of their rememberability factor, but .net should do just fine if you add great quality content and keep it regularly content. Is it an option for you to acquire the .com from its current owner if it is currently containing only ads? The current owner may like to sell it though.
if you optimize your site to good way so you can also get good traffic google not see you have which domain google see only you website optimization and content