why's everyone after UK hosting?

[mtuffin]

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I thought the whole server location thing wasn't that important, since you can choose your target audience in googles webmaster tools?

From experience it doesn't always work with all domains. I'm not entirely convinced that a UK IP address matters for geotargetting but my personal preference is to go with UK hosting.

Mike

[rob.co.uk]

Does google webmaster tools also inform other search engines and systems that base stuff off server location?

[futureweb]

Who says its expensive? You can check our hosting plans and let me know

UK Hosting is generally for UK based websites with UK traffic.

Hello,

I currently have:
# Intel Celeron 2.4
# 1GB DDR2 RAM
# 120GB SATA 3GPS Hard Drive
# 2000GB Bandwidth
# 5 IP's
# extra 10 IP block
# WHM / CPanel

and I pay - $149.95 per month - this use to be about £75 per month but now it's about £96

can you better that - you specs say you can but I didn't see anything about WHM / Cpanel

+ I have full control unlimited domains - use of fopen - GD lib 2 and can install and add any features I like.

I would much rather host in the UK and if you tick all the boxes I will switch on the 1st.

[rob.co.uk]

There are a few like that... Poundhost - Reliable, fast and cost-effective Internet Services etc

[staystream]

I'm going to host everything on the other side of the wardrobe and see what the other search engines and systems make of it. (...but they're probably hosted there, to.)

[sabian1982]

Not necessarily true at all.

Yes it is

Having your site hosted on a UK server will help you achieve a better ranking in the Google.co.uk search results.

The result may be margin, but it does still help.

No one thing will help you achieve a good rank, its all about ticking as many of the SEO optimisation boxes as possible!

Likewise if i had a French site, i'd go and get myself some hosting with a French IP address/location...

[chickendippers]

From my personal experience operating servers in both the US and UK the increased latency makes little noticeable difference when browsing. However there is a difference when it comes to downloading.

I have only been able to achieve about 250Kb/s download speed from my servers in the US from a variety of residential ISPs (cable and ADSL) whilst transatlantic transfer speeds between servers reach 5Mb/s. This leads me to think that slowness on the download front is due to poor quality international peering by British ISPs.

[Jack Russell]

Hello,

I currently have:
# Intel Celeron 2.4
# 1GB DDR2 RAM
# 120GB SATA 3GPS Hard Drive
# 2000GB Bandwidth
# 5 IP's
# extra 10 IP block
# WHM / CPanel

and I pay - $149.95 per month - this use to be about £75 per month but now it's about £96

can you better that - you specs say you can but I didn't see anything about WHM / Cpanel

+ I have full control unlimited domains - use of fopen - GD lib 2 and can install and add any features I like.

I would much rather host in the UK and if you tick all the boxes I will switch on the 1st.

I can offer you a much better server specs than this old Celeron

eUK E2220
Processor - Dual Core Intel Core 2 Duo
CPU Speed - 2.4 GHz
Cache Memory - 2 MB Cache
Memory : 1 GB DDR RAM
Hard Disk :160 GB SATA
cPanel/WHM
Bandwidth : 3000 GB
5 Dedicated IPs
100 Mbps Dedicated Network
Fully Managed Server
Free Setup
Price: £99.00/Month

You will have full root access to the server which enables to install any application/software you wish.

Let me know think

[staystream]

even if it were true, you're basing one of the most important decisions (choice of host, which also dictates a lot of your other choices downstream) on a factor that -- even if it exists as a consideration -- is so marginal as to be practically irrelevant.

think how screwed-up google's rankings would be if they discriminated against the best hosts and datacentres? sure, it will take server location into consideration if the server is in Somalia because it follows that the company is located there. This obviously does not hold true elsewhere. It doesn't even make sense in some cases. UK host => probably a UK site. US host => impossible to say, let's look at context. Insufficient context? Maybe the site is intended for a worldwide audience.... if it's a commercial site, and there's not enough information to place it in the UK, the battle is already lost, your ranking will be diluted even on the co.uk portal

You are merely second-guessing Google's ranking algorithm. If server location is such an important factor, it's because people think it's a factor. Is the algorithm that socially aware? Maybe. The algorithm might think "wow, they'd be crazy to host a UK site in the States because everyone thinks I give a damn, ergo -- the rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday - but never jam today. :sneaky".

Does Google suggest people host sites in their home country? No. Well, I've never seen anything. I have seen the webmaster tools where you can let google know where your audience is and, as far as I know, that's all they recommend. Seems pretty definitive to me.

[Graham@Buyagift]

Whether hosting in the UK boosts your ranking in Google UK has been debated many times. The only conclusion I've ever drawn from it (and not through experience, just though reading) is that hosting a non country specific domain on a UK server will help - if it's .co.uk hosted elsewhere it doesn't matter as the domain shows it's a uk site.

If you had a .net or .com, you would benefit by hosting in the UK.

Thanks
Graham

[Josh-A]

If your website is targeted for UK clients then you should host your website on UK server. Your visitors will get better browsing speed and the search engines will categorize your website as a UK website and you get better ranking in UK.

[Entrepreneur]

Yes it is

Having your site hosted on a UK server will help you achieve a better ranking in the Google.co.uk search results.

The result may be margin, but it does still help.

No one thing will help you achieve a good rank, its all about ticking as many of the SEO optimisation boxes as possible!

Likewise if i had a French site, i'd go and get myself some hosting with a French IP address/location...

My point that this is not necessarily true at all stands. You can host a .co.uk website anywhere in the world and top Google for keywords.

This is something that I actualy tested several years ago with about a dozen sites and having .co.uk websites hosted in the UK made no difference at all to rankings compared to hosting them in the US.

In fact I ended up moving a .co.uk website hosted in Turkey (don't ask - it wasn't mine) to a UK server and again no difference in search engine rankings.

Have you tested it and got different results?

[staystream]

If your website is targeted for UK clients then you should host your website on UK server. Your visitors will get better browsing speed and the search engines will categorize your website as a UK website and you get better ranking in UK.

we need more UK VPS hosts, they should be supported, but they shouldn't have shill for business.

browsing speed really depends on server resources, the application and the database setup more than it does physical location. You can either worry about the 1/10th of a second extra latency, or find the host with the best hardware etc for your budget -- be they in the UK, or wherever. CPU contention, RAM, throughput, disk I/O...so many factors to consider before worrying about optimising something that already travels at the speed of light.

[befuddle]

My hosting is in Germany and that has done my SEO no harm at all.
--<br>Posted via my Mobile Device

[DavidCartlidge]

My hosting is in Germany and that has done my SEO no harm at all.
--<br>Posted via my Mobile Device

Unless you are at #1 for every single phrase you can't be sure of that though... you may be higher if it was in the UK