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Anyone know how Google determines where a site is hosted ?
IP or DNS ?
The reason for my concern is the fact that the site gets around 1000 uniques from Google.co.uk daily and if Google suddenly decides that the site is not a UK site then well... I wont be able to sleep at night ;)
Thanks in advance
Dazz
However, your question is relevant to .com domains......
just to clarify :)
dazz
If the host traces to Chicago I would be surprised if it is in the UK? What is the IP and domain in question?
DMOZ recently implemented a UK site tick box for UK sites outside the regional area, well not that recently ages ago in fact but I would imagine that will help provide more geo-specific targetted content to the UK at least.
I have been having a long battle with a US client who wants UK coverage over this. Their web designers can't understand what the fuss is about, but I agree with you - it is a BIG thing to fuss about.
We have some sites using a US DNS management system, but the sites themselves are on UK IP numbers and they seem OK, but when we have clients hosting in the US, we certainly have problems in Google with "uk only" search results.
I may be wrong here - anyone got other experiences?
Dixon.
I dont think so, what about all the sites that are NOT in Dmoz ?
It would either be done by IP or DNS I am just not sure which :)
Dazz
However, your question is relevant to .com domains......
[webmasterworld.com...]
[webmasterworld.com...]
I would guess that it uses the DMOZ to determine if it is a UK site; If it is in the Regional UK area it is a UK site. Using IP's would be quite unreliable I suppose it could use the domain but again this is unreliable with many domain extentions being used outside their country like .tv, .it domain names for example.
I agree brendan, using IPs and domains does seem rather strange. Unfortunately it's how Google's UK index works. You need either the domain or the IP to be recognised as being UK.
diddlydazz:
> host traces to Chicago but the servers are in the UK
What do you mean? What do you see if you do a RIPE WHOIS search [ripe.net]?
Using VisualRoute it resolves to Chicago
the IP:
66.232.xxx.xxx
Dazz
I would be surprised if you could be in Google's UK index with that IP and a .com domain.
1) regional domain names (.co.uk, .fr etc)
2) IP address of host (traceback location)
3) DMOZ regional results; however, I am not sure if a UK DMOZ listing which does not fit into the above two categories will be spidered as a UK site, but the DMOZ description will be searched upon in the region.
You only need to have one of the above to be listed in the required region, but 1 and 2 will spider all your pages and put the in the regional SERPS, 3 may not.
I was at an Internet Marketing Conference in Berlin last November and the Lycos (or was it AltaVista) guys were VERY MUCH talking about using this technology not only to provide results related to the website's location but also the user's location - and they talked about using IP numbers to resolve this.
If you are in the US and you search on Yahoo, did you know that the overture results you see are different to the ones we see here in the UK?
I cannot see any other way for Google to get this geographical data other than using some IP mapping function. Our .com domains have no problem in UK engines - the only one that ever did have a problem was excite... but that's gone now anyway.
I accept that the chance of identifying the Web server's location is high, but this doesn't tell us that the content relates to that place.
If I move a site for a local hotel here in Scotland from our US server to one of our UK servers, does it suddenly become relevant to UK searchers? I think not.
Yes - I think that if you are marketing a local hotel in Scotland - and if your MARKET is UK users (probably not) then you would do better to host in the UK. But a hotel is different... actually your audience is international!
Dixon.
route: 66.232.128.0/22
descr: Iarna
origin: AS15216
mnt-by: <handle - UK ISP>
changed: <email - UK ISP>
source: RIPE
Nothing to worry about :)
[edited by: ciml at 9:57 am (utc) on July 16, 2002]
[edit reason] Removed Email [/edit]
IP addresses of any block can be redirected anywhere.
The whole C block belongs to Iarna (hostway) and is routed to the UK.
This is why I asked the question in the first place :)
But no-one seems to have the answer for sure.
In fact I have answered my own question by checking other sites on the same box and they are fine (I.E In goole uk SERPS).
Dazz
Dixon, I agree with you that IP addresses are used. I disagree with some search engines that they should be used.
It does matter, the domestic market is often overlooked in Internet marketing. About a quarter of local domestic accommodation searches at google.co.uk seem to use the UK index. This accounts for about 7% of *.Google.* referrals for hotels in this part of Scotland (not including images or directory).
