SEO & Hosting – Is VPS The Best Solution For 2014?

Choosing a web host for your site is slightly bewildering sometimes as there is an enormous amount of choice available. If you’re a web designer, you may want to use hosting that gives you a dedicated server, rather than a shared one, although this will be more expensive.

However, the advent of cloud computing has changed slightly and it’s now possible to have a virtual private server which looks to the outside world as if it’s all yours.

What is a virtual private server?

Essentially, it’s a virtual machine that acts as if it’s a standalone computer on a shared server. The server itself might run several virtual machines but they run independently of each other and can even run separate operating systems.

 

Photo credit: Ronald Lewis

The virtual server generally runs on a network cluster of high-end servers in a data centre – very secure, usually fast and offer an increased uptime. This is because if a piece of hardware fails on one machine then it can be quickly and easily routed to another part of the network. Bear in mind that whilst there are free virtual servers available, they do not tend to be of high quality – which is the point of having one in the first place!

OK, what does this have to do with SEO?

For a start, VPS hosting is generally faster than a site hosted on a shared server. This is because with a virtual server, you are allocated your own resources such as CPU, storage and memory usage and don’t have to share with others.

In contrast, shared hosting means that you have to share resources. This can be tricky as not all websites use the same and so you may have one or two sites on the physical server that use more resources than you, slowing your site down as it has less.

This isn’t always the case, many hosting companies allocate a certain amount of resources to each site. However, if one site is using a lot, then it can be difficult to pin them down and take action.

Speed matters

Site speed and SEO work hand in hand. Whilst it’s not necessarily one of the most important aspects to the average small business SEO strategy, it does have some bearing as it’s one of the things that the algorithms look at.

Whilst of course it may not be your hosting that is slowing your site down, it could be the site architecture, it’s certainly something to check out. In order to determine how Google scores your site for speed, check out the speed test utility on the developer website.

As you can see, this is a simple utility that you can use by simply tying in the URL of the site you want to check.

 

If there’s a problem with your site, you can also opt to take the PageSpeed Report which is displayed to the left of the page towards the top. This gives you a detailed breakdown of what could be improved upon and will tell you if the problem lies with your host.

For SEO, the search engines will rank you lower if your site is slow as it’s not ideal for the user experience. In fact, faster sites also enjoy bigger conversion rates, so it’s certainly something you should look at. If it’s a site problem you can sign up for Google’s PageSpeed service which at the moment they are offering for free.

Uptime and downtime

I’m pretty sure that I’ve never seen a hosting company display a high downtime percentage in their sales literature and most will be acceptable anyway. However, not all hosts are created equally, so it’s worth checking out reviews on the downtime others experience before choosing.

With a VPS, this isn’t necessary as barring a major disaster, downtimes are minimal. This is because, as I mentioned earlier, if one part of the network fails, the site can be routed to another, in most cases without you even noticing. As mentioned the free virtual servers tend to be lower quality and therefore, the downtime is going to be more frequent.

A site that has a lot of outages will be noticed by the search engines and labelled unreliable, so make sure your host offers a stable solution and further guarantee better uptime with a VPS.

Spam sites on a shared server

If you’re on a shared server and you’re unwittingly sharing it with domains that have been blacklisted for spamming, then you could be tarred with the same brush by search engines.

Whilst this isn’t something that you have to worry about extensively in general, it does happen and can be avoided with the use of a virtual server as it looks to the outside world like you have a server all to yourself. Essentially you do; a virtual server might share a physical machine, but it also runs independently to other virtual machines and is stand alone.

Google’s Matt Cutts says that there is little need to worry if you discover that you’re sharing a server with a blacklisted domain, but it’s better to be safe. He also points out that if you’re sharing a server with a number of spam domains, then you’re likely to be viewed with suspicion.

It’s not something that should be taken lightly for a business, I once had my mail server blocked due to someone sending me an email from a blacklisted domain and it took a while and a lot of placating clients to put things right.

Location, location, location

Another factor to consider for SEO is the location of the server/data centre. Search engines look at where the site/business is based and whether the host is based in the same country. If it is, then it’s likely to feature higher up in search when people search for your keywords.

Whilst it’s often cheaper to use a host situated in a different country, it’s far from ideal then.

Using a virtual server might not significantly increase SEO, but it does have a number of advantages over using shared servers.