Can the choice of web hosting affect a website’s search engine ranking, in addition to following good SEO practices like friendly coding, quality content, and relevant backlinks?
A top-quality hosting service cannot ensure high rankings for your website, but a poor hosting service will definitely have a negative impact on your visibility on search engines like Google and Bing. Therefore, selecting a reputable hosting company is crucial.
In this article, we will discuss how SEO and hosting are connected and highlight the key factors in this service that impact your website’s online visibility. Ready? 🙂
Time of availability
One important aspect of web hosting that significantly influences a website’s SEO is its availability duration, also known as uptime. This metric reflects the continuous operation of your hosting server, with higher uptime ensuring longer periods of accessibility for site visitors.
A website that experiences frequent downtime not only disappoints visitors but also harms its SEO performance, leading to poor search engine rankings. In some instances, even well-ranked websites may temporarily drop in position after prolonged periods of inaccessibility. Although the position may recover eventually, consistent downtime puts the site at a continual disadvantage.
The top hosting providers promise a minimum of 99.9% uptime, but it’s important to monitor it to verify the stability of the hosting service. Tools like Pingdom (paid) and UptimeRobot (free) are effective options for tracking your website’s availability.
To delve further, check out this article that shows you how to monitor a website at no cost.
Velocity
Google has emphasized the importance of site speed for ranking, as mentioned in a post by the company. To achieve a good ranking, it is crucial to have a fast-loading and optimized website. Utilizing a CDN, caching, and optimizing images are key steps to enhance page loading speed.
Another element impacting website loading speed is the hosting service utilized, with factors like processing power and memory usage playing a significant role. The more visitors a site receives, the more server resources it will require.
Insufficient hosting resources can cause your website to slow down and become inaccessible to users, which can negatively impact your site’s rankings. Ensure that you optimize your site and select hosting carefully to avoid compromising your SEO.
Safety
The more susceptible your website is, the higher the likelihood of it being hacked or infected with malware, resulting in slow performance, instability, and possible unavailability. Moreover, there is a risk of your site being blacklisted without your knowledge, which could have severe consequences for your site’s SEO. It is crucial to prioritize security measures to prevent such scenarios.
The owner of the website is responsible for maintaining the site by updating plugins and systems to prevent security breaches. The hosting company is also responsible for monitoring and managing servers to protect customers from attacks. Dedicated servers and some VPSs require the customer to manage their safety.
Before selecting your lodging, ensure that it is secure. For added precaution, consider utilizing external resources to safeguard your website against vulnerabilities.
HTTPS/SSL
Google has announced that the SSL certificate is now considered a ranking factor in search results. While its impact on SEO may be limited, its significance is expected to grow as websites prioritize security, following Google’s push for a safer internet.
Make sure your hosting plan supports installing a security certificate for SSL on your website. Consider using a free certificate like Let’s Encrypt to save costs, which can help offset the expenses of hosting while ensuring the security of your site.
Place
The server location of your website hosting might impact your SEO, especially if you are targeting a specific audience. For instance, a website hosted in Brazil could have an advantage in ranking for Brazilian users due to its geographical proximity.
Hiring accommodation abroad or moving your site to hosting in Brazil does not significantly impact ranking, according to Google. The importance of this factor is low due to the prevalence of hosting in countries with advanced data center infrastructure, like the United States, and the widespread use of content distribution networks (CDNs).
The proximity of users to the server affects response speed, with closer users receiving faster responses. This difference is particularly significant for high-traffic websites.
Type of lodging
A shared hosting plan involves multiple clients sharing the same server. This setup can potentially expose your website to risks associated with neighboring sites engaging in spam or phishing activities. While the likelihood of your site being affected is minimal, there is still a possibility of encountering ranking issues due to sharing the server and IP address with other websites.
Most hosting companies monitor their servers to prevent and address unauthorized practices. It is important to choose a company that takes this issue seriously to maintain a good reputation for your website’s SEO.
What is the connection between SEO and web hosting?
Hosting is crucial for your website’s SEO, with factors like availability, speed, security, and location all influencing its performance. While hosting itself cannot ensure search engine rankings, an unreliable or unstable hosting service can harm your site’s positioning.
Check out our rankings of the top hosting companies now that you understand the significance of selecting a reliable hosting service for your website! 😊
Publication date: 02/05/2017 (last updated on 05/08/2020)
