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Does Google Penalize Virtual IP?

shared ip address

         

coolcreep

4:42 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



For the past six monthes I have been at the top of my niche at Google for many keywords and this last dance dropped and lowered many keywords.
I'm tweaking my site and trying to figure out what happened. I don't cheat in anyway but I do have a virtual IP sharing a few non related Domains.
I think this must be it.
Does Google penalize for virtual IP address's?

thunderpaste

4:59 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



They say they don't except in very extreme cases. According to GG, your site would have to be hosted with hundreds of super-evil spammy pron sites to risk a ban due to IP sharing.

coolcreep

5:03 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



Thanks, I only have 4 shared domains each on a different subject. Back to the drawing board!

Yidaki

5:05 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



A site search [searchengineworld.com] for "zeus", "reciprocal linking" or "bad neighborhood" as well as a google backlink search for your site (is it the one in your email adress?) could answer your question. It's not a matter of virtual hosting!

shady

5:15 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Think that is likely Yidaki, looking at then links! :)

coolcreep

5:37 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



no..no...no...Not the domain in my email.
I know for sure Alta Vista treats virtual ip's as spam.
I'm going to lease a server and put all my Domains on
their own IP to be safe.
I love working for my self and better to be safe than sorry.

coolcreep

6:03 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



Just a quick note on Zeus. I do use it on about 10 of my sites and they all are doing great with Google.
I make sure Cyber-Robotics takes me out of the collective
and completely customize including the default "links" directory.
Quick structure:
Main page linking to:
(zeus) main page/sub-topic1/bla-bla1info-and relatinglinks.html

(zeus) main page/sub-topic2/bla-bla2info-andrelatinglinks.html

and so on with all categories tightly themed to
main pages main subject.
No cheat No spam and at the top!

healthgal

6:16 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



I have around 30 health related sites on various products and health matters. I list all my sites with links to each site at the bottom, my sites have a PR4 and some PR3.

Is this OK with google? Linking between my seperate domains.

thanks
healthgal

thunderpaste

6:32 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



healthgal, are you linking to each site from each page?

ciml

6:36 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



coolcreep:
> Does Google penalize for virtual IP address's?

No, most domains use name based hosting so Google wouldn't penalise for that IMO.

On the other hand, there have been cases where a search engine has penalised all domains hosted on a particular IP or block of IPs that they have identified with spam.

healthgal:
I list all my sites with links to each site at the bottom

If you link each of the sites from each of the sites, then you begin to sound very much like the people who got automatic penalities last Winter.

northweb

7:37 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Yes, I'm linking at the bottom to each site. They show up as Similar pages n googles search. But if i remove the linking want they lose ranking?

How should I link them? I would hate to lose 1 1/2 work because of penalties.
healthgal

healthgal

7:53 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Hi Thunderpaste, i use a bottom boarder and link to each site - all my sites are on the health topic.

Ciml, thanks for the comment. So it sounds like it's a problem linking between my sites. Any suggestions?

coolcreep

8:19 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



Hey healthgal, so what you are saying is that you are linking 30 health related sites together and they share
the same IP?
If that's the case that sounds a little scary.
Googlebots look for a theme and 'health' could easily
be concidered one theme by a robot. If your sites are all
on their own IP you are helping yourself by linking your own sites if they have unique content.
I do that but I don't put the home page links. I link
to the area of the domain that matches the other domains
content the best.

thunderpaste

8:44 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



In a sense the Google PR system relies on the idea that a link to a site can be considered a vote for that site. If I had anything to do with it, which I don't, I would try to filter out attempts by webmasters to make it seem like they have more votes. It's cheating the democratic spirit of the PR algo.

So if you have a bunch of sites and you are linking them for the sole purpose of increasing your inbound links and PR Google will probably be able to catch you one day and it may be soon.

On the same note Googlebot is getting smarter all time. If you have a legitimate reason to link your sites together that increases the overall relevancy of the index then you can probably do it even on the same IP.

It's all about relevancy. You have to think to yourself "Is putting this link here going to help my users?" If not you need to figure out a way to add the link in a useful manner.

This thinking will not normally result in heavy linking of sites but does result in links that are in useful, relevant positions. What makes Google number 1 is they provide SERPs that are good for the user so if you design for the user you should rise to the top as Google gets smarter.

My advice is to take a good look at your linking strategy and start writing some link request letters for some outside links.

troels nybo nielsen

9:00 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



> It's all about relevancy.

That's exactly the point when making internal links on one website and between several websites on one domain. I have been doing it very much right from the beginning, but all my internal links are natural and relevant and I have never been penalized for them.

Napoleon

9:01 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



>> I know for sure Alta Vista treats virtual ip's as spam. <<

Really? I don't agree at all. ALL my sites are on virtual IPs. If AV or any other SE persecuted solely against this they would be chopping some of the best quality sites on the whole web. It doesn't happen and can't happen so long as they want to rank on quality.

>> I'm going to lease a server and put all my Domains on <<

I wouldn't if I were you...at least if you link them together.

To be honest, it's no longer worth the short cut of creating a stack of sites and cross linking. It's history. Worked a few years ago but times have changed. Of course I comment on the basis that you actually want to sleep at night!

europeforvisitors

9:33 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)



On the same note Googlebot is getting smarter all time. If you have a legitimate reason to link your sites together that increases the overall relevancy of the index then you can probably do it even on the same IP.

If (as some of us suspect) Google favors large sites that have plenty of content, it may be wiser not to divide a site's content among 20 or 30 domains.

Granted, there's no hard proof that Google thinks a 1,000-page site deserves more clout than ten 100-page sites or 100 ten-page sites. But it stands to reason, because (1) a large site is more likely to be an authoritive source of information, and (2) favoring large, single-domain sites over multiple small sites would discourage "domain spam."

rfgdxm1

10:21 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>Granted, there's no hard proof that Google thinks a 1,000-page site deserves more clout than ten 100-page sites or 100 ten-page sites. But it stands to reason, because (1) a large site is more likely to be an authoritive source of information, and (2) favoring large, single-domain sites over multiple small sites would discourage "domain spam."

I see no evidence at all Google is doing this. My guess is this is just a byproduct of the fact that if I put up a 1,000 psge site with lots of content, it is a lot more likely people will end up linking to it then a 10 page site with little content. The Google algo definitely favors sites that get a lot of links.

Marcia

11:56 pm on Nov 9, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member



>>>How should I link them? I would hate to lose 1 1/2 work because of penalties.
healthgal<<<

Unfortunately, if a penalty hits all is lost, so it pays t make efforts to remedy anything questionable and start on establishing legitimacy within safe bounds.

The best thing is to link very judiciously between your own sites (it can be done) and avoid any appearance of a "closed circle" linking structure. Get links from independent sites unrelated to your own, and if necessary broaden the scope of the sites to encourage more inbound links. Plus - link out to quality sites that would be good resources for site visitors.

Another point to look at is that if the sites are very related by topic or subject matter, watch out for obvious similarities in design and make sure text and content are unique, different enough to avoid appearance of duplication. If the sites are in a market that's at all competitive, if you get rankings reasonably close to the top, you'll be coming under close scrutiny from competitors. Sometimes it depends on how competitive the particular market is what the bounds of safety are.

Same IP hosting is OK (there was a free host banned from AV at one time, for a fact), but in cases where several sites are concerned with a degree of cross-linking and similarity, it could be just another factor to consider.

coolcreep

12:01 am on Nov 10, 2002 (gmt 0)



Yeah, this Googlebot is one of my best friends. Most of us would not even be here if we didn't know how to tweek for the all mighty engine. If you have an IP or a "farm" of IPs
?
I did not mean in any shape or form that because I want unique IPs on a dedicated server to promote a single theme.
I have major keywords for a big number of sites.
Put them all on a unique IP....Hell NO!
Did you guys and spiders know that on the rules of infospider says no to virtual domains now?
If you have domains already in Altavista they still spider.
Well..I'm here for Google knowledge.
I am going to give up on virtual domains.
Does the spider ask you if you are in a hotel or a home?
Yes.......They do.

coolcreep

12:42 am on Nov 10, 2002 (gmt 0)



these bots are friendly boys'
I'll be back.

thunderpaste

1:43 am on Nov 10, 2002 (gmt 0)

10+ Year Member



Did you guys and spiders know that on the rules of infospider says no to virtual domains now?

I don't see how any engine can possibly do this and still spider the whole web. There simply are not enough IP adresses to go around. Virtual domains are a necessity.

With that said I am not exactly ready to endorse hosting all ones sites on the same IP if there is any sort of linking stragegy.

Jane_Doe

4:59 am on Nov 10, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



>> I know for sure Alta Vista treats virtual ip's as spam. <<

This has not been my experience. I have one site that has a a virtual IP address. I just did a spot check in Altavista, and all of my pages I checked that were more than a month old were in the index, including some in the first page of results.

percentages

7:26 am on Nov 10, 2002 (gmt 0)

WebmasterWorld Senior Member 10+ Year Member Top Contributors Of The Month



coolcreep, Google doesn't penalize for IP sharing. Not a chance, no way, will never do it....they are too smart for such a simple trick.

The IP penalty is a myth. FAST is on the record, in writing, saying that it penalizes for IP sharing if you share with a bad neighborhood.....total junk...it doesn't!

Altavista...never seen anything definitive that it penalizes for sharing IP, but in practice it doesn't.

As for the number of pages on a site, it is mainly irrelevant to PR. Amazon.com has over 3 million pages and a low PR for most of its pages.

It is possible to engineer a slightly better PR with a good internal linking structure....but this is based upon site design more than number of pages.;)