Search engine friendly hosting?

All web hosts are not created equal! After 10 years of using different web hosts, we know this only too well. Hosting is a critical part of your internet marketing strategy. Pick the wrong host, and you will find it impossible to get the search engine positions you require.

These are the key things to check before you sign up with a web host.

Server location

Where are the servers located? One of the major web hosts in the UK has servers located in Germany, and we have found that this makes it very difficult for sites even with .co.uk domain names to appear in google.co.uk search engine results pages. (SERPS) UK businesses that want to be listed on Google UK should ensure thier host has UK based servers.

Server Uptime

On of the most critical issues for any web business is the reliability of the web and mail servers. Downtime of either can be costly. Many hosts offer uptime guarantees and assurance of uptime greater than 99.9% but remember that this equates to over a third of a day of downtime a year, and in reality, any downtime is harmful to your business. In our experience the only way to find out how reliable a host is, is to try them over an extended period.

Server Speed

A sluggish site can deter visitors and cause problems for search engines wishing to index your content. Look for high server specifications, and excellent connectivity. Again, the only way to know for sure is to try the hosting, and test page load times.

Feature support

Another problem with most of the major hosts is that they do not support some vital server features which require the use of .htaccess files.

.htaccess files enable you to set up the server to do some very useful things. For internet marketing, the two most important are search engine friendly redirects (301 redirects) and mod_rewrite which enables you to use search engine friendly URLS.

301 redirects are important, as they inform content has moved permanently and allow you to pass on the "importance" of the old page (PageRank in Google speak) to the new page. This is vital if you move content or indeed a whole site to a new domain.

mod_rewrite allows you to turn ugly URLs like www.yourdomain.co.uk/index.php?content=23&section=4&sess=3323423234&paginate=no&mess=yes

into something more aesthetically pleasing like www.yourdomain.co.uk/articles/hosting.html

 Why should you care? There is evidence that the pretty domain  names are favoured by some search engines, and let's face it, your human visitors are going to "understand" the latter URL a lot easier.

Web stats

Many major hosts provide truly dismal web stats. If your host only provides Webalizer stats, no access to raw log files (the record of every "transaction" between the server and the world) and you care about internet marketing even slightly, you should move host today.

Without good information about what is happening on your site, you cannot improve. You may as well sit in the dark. You can get around this by using the excellent Google Analytics, but it is always useful to have raw log access and a stats package like Awstats to hand, as Google Analytics cannot measure everything, namely any "non page" content like the download of files which can be very important.

Freebies

Your host will probably offer you a load of freebies to persuade you to buy their services. Some of the more important ones are:

Google Sitemaps - This allows you to instantly create a special type of file, an XML site map which you can send to Google. The file contains information about every page of your site, so it can be indexed correctly.

Content management & Blogging applications - These allow you to add content to your site very easily, via your web browser. No need to trouble a web designer, no need to spend lots of money on web design software. Content is very much king in the eyes of search engines, so being able to add and update information easily is vital.

Search engine friendly hosting

Knowing all of the above, and having suffered at the hands of hopeless hosts for some years, we have been hosting all our customers on our own carefully designed hosting packages for the last few years. This has led to excellent results, including excellent uptime, and great search engine rankings.

For example, Italyum are number 1 on Google since switching to our hosting service for amongst other keywords "Italian Recipes."

Heart of Scotland Tours found No.1 spot after switching to our hosting for the phrase "scotland tour" and other key phrases.

Of course, hosting is only part of the internet marketing battle. You need to ensure your site is well optimised for great rankings also, but build from a solid base and you have a much better chance of internet success.

To find out more about our hosting service, visit our dedicated site, Search Engine Friendly Hosting.