However, before you start searching for the most suitable methods to get your websites to rank higher, it is important to note that you need the sites to be up and running 24/7. In other words, the first step to success in the online business environment comprises of finding the best hosting solution. In addition to hosting, it is also advisable to consider the preferred TLD, especially since certain public domains have been blacklisted and obviously, you risk some penalties before you clear the air with the major search engines.
The location of the server host counts
Imagine the following example: you currently live in Finland and you want to rank a website for auto parts in New York. If you were to choose a server hosted in Finland or Europe when you are trying to target the market in NY, this discrepancy will negatively impact the proficiency of all your SEO campaigns. While there are some arguments on the fact that the geographical location of the server does not matter, the truth is that in most situations I've personally come across, it did.
The reason for this is simple: Google and other search engines account for the IP of the site as well as the TLD when providing results in the search query. Therefore, if your domain name is .fn then it will be considered discarded as irrelevant for the queries performed by users in NY. Furthermore, in the eventuality that your hosting service cannot provide you with multiple international IPs, then your chances of targeting the NY audience are practically zero.
The solution in this particular situation is to select a hosting service able to offer you international domain names. It is very important that provide Google with the information that your site addresses this location via the Webmaster Tools. In addition, in order to be certain that this aspect is crystal clear, you should also consider:
- Adding a NY address on the website
- Add content relevant to the geographical location
- Include a Google map code that shows the location of the business
- Make sure that your Google+ business account is verified
If your hosting service constantly experiences issues with the server uptime, then you can be certain that neither the bots, nor the users will be able to check out your content. In case you didn't know this, Google usually starts penalizing websites that were down on two consecutive crawling attempts by downgrading their rank.
Essentially, the bots are coming by randomly to crawl your page and nobody actually watches over your site's uptime. To put it simply, even though your site was up between the bots crawl session, it won't make any difference. If you are wondering why is Google so strict on this issue, then you should know that it is because they are trying to protect users from hackers.
One of the most common methods used by hackers these days is to insert iFrames into your pages so when the users click on something they will automatically download malware into their computers. It is necessary to mention the fact that resolving this issue and convincing Google you are malware free now is usually a lengthy process. Therefore, it is best if you pay attention and be on your guard for practices that affect your server.
You simply can’t do without private hosting
In spite of its bad reputation, the problems caused by shared hosting are mostly due to administrator choices and not the model per se. To illustrate this issue I'm going to use an extreme example: if you share the server with another 100 domains and you decide to crosslink to all of them, that is practically committing suicide in the world of SEO.
I also want to point out the fact that the situations when your shared IP simply gets banned because of what the person before you did are actually very common. Therefore, you should be worried that your business is losing its identity and getting penalized for illicit activities. This is why it is advisable to opt for private hosting: you are on your own, safe from such issues and with a lot more time to focus on your business.
ChadAbout the Guest Author:
Chad enjoys blogging about SEO in general and when it comes to hosting, he is a huge supporter of Host SEO.