I just want hosting IN the UK!!!!

talk4 · 27-07-05

Just realised that the hosting I thought was in the UK for a .com name at Meirhost is on their US server. So I read through this forum VERY carefully and make a decision to register with beamhost, get the server details and it appears to be IN THE US! I have got great, fantastic US hosting coming out of my ears and even don't have a problem now I'm targetting Germany as oneandone's servers are there. But I was still thinking there is some mileage left in targetting the UK, not doing well enough at the moment to justify my own server again, just want my sites to be spidered and busy then I can relocate them. Have got an account with U-H Hosting which seems OK but isn't very busy, and 34SP but I hate Plesk (Love cPanel). But even tried Webfusion but their system rejected my .com name for transfer to them. Why is it so difficult RANT RANT....

justhomdotcom · 27-07-05

Try donhost.co.uk

talk4 · 27-07-05

David's moving my sites to his UK server and lightning doesn't strike twice in the same place does it

.

lowndsy · 28-07-05

There were some initial problems with Meirhostings UK offering, but I thik a lot of th problems were out of Davids hands, and he certainly works harder than some of the other hosts, so I'm sure it will grow to be as reliable as the his hosting - which I still use and am very happy with.

Remember that uk domain names can negate a lot of the effect that foreign hosting has on SE rankings. I won't say remove the effect completely because I don't know for sure, but I do fine with .co.uks and US hosting.

drivetowin · 28-07-05

Ok - ready to get flamed here

I personally think all this talk about what country your server is in having an effect on your traffic is just a load of bull put out by UK hosting companies to justify them charging higher prices for UK servers and by SEO companies who really ought to have 'search me' as their slogan since they dont have a clue.

I've got .co.uk and .com domains on a US based server and still get high rankings and high levels of traffic to all of them. I've also had them on a UK based server for a time and saw no noticeable increase in traffic.

If you brand your site well enough, have a memorable domain name, and work hard at building quality content so other people link to it, without you needing to go hunting for links you will do well, whether your server is in the UK, the USA or Timbuktu.

talk4 · 29-07-05

I really hope what you say is true and certainly as far as .uk names are concerned I always assumed that they could be hosted anywhere. Just checked 'credit cards' on google and the number one site for all searches and for uk based searches is hosted with oneandone and therefore is based in Germany. But surely for .com names you would need a much greater 'edge' to compete with all the international sites to get to the top, and so far I haven't found any .com non-UK based sites in the top-10 when I search on Google for 'pages from the UK'. Does anyone know what proportion of people search for 'Pages from the UK'?

CompareStore · 29-07-05

I would recommend Open Hosting http://www.openhosting.co.uk
Ask for Jonathan Buckle and say Chris Young referred you and you will be treated well. They have the best support I have ever experienced and are competitive too.

Dynamoo · 29-07-05

I use three hosts in the UK:

Catalyst2 (dedicated server)
Donhost (reseller account)
UK Solutions (Unix shell account)

The Donhost reseller account is a good one for incubating affiliate sites as you can have as many domains as you like with 20Gb bandwidth/month for about £400 + VAT. That gives you the space to experiment and create new sites with no risk. Once you start to exceed the 20Gb a month limit it gets EXPENSIVE though, but then you can always move a busy (and profitable) site to another server later.

I'm pretty happy with all of them - they all offer something a little different in terms of service and cost.

Brendon · 29-07-05

SE's (Google in particular) DO take note of geo information to decide "where" a website is. They will look at the top level domain (.com, .net, .uk), the hosting IP, an din the case of G, and possibly Y, any address data in the site (they can detect post code formatting etc) If any one of those indicates a UK site for example, it will be treated as such (inserted in the UK index, boosted for UK terms etc)

This means that the server location is irrelevant for a .co.uk site. I have also seen limited evidence that a .ocm, hosted on a US IP can rank in the UK index, if it has enough UK linkage data (incoming and outbound). SEs can be quit esmart, just don't assume it