Hosting Server Location: Does it impact Website SEO?
The SEO rankings of your website depend on many factors. For example, you may focus on the content, keyword distribution, and backlinks. However, the speed and response times of your website are also driving factors. A hosting server location can impact page loading times, SEO rankings, and compliance. In this article, we’ll look at hosting server location and how it impacts website SEO.
Hosting Server Location Overview
Choosing a hosting server location that is appropriate for your SEO efforts is an important step in the process. There are several important factors to consider, including data storage regulations, the target audience of your website, and other factors. If you have an online store, for instance, you should consider a location that will optimize your shipping costs and increase customer satisfaction.
The best server location for your website is one that is close to your target audience, as this will improve your site’s speed and overall user experience. This is especially true if you have a website that is targeted to a specific country.
For example, if you have a website targeted at the US audience, you should consider hosting your server in the United States. It will improve your site’s speed and SEO rankings.
It can also help if you choose a hosting server provider that offers uptime guarantees. If your website experiences regular downtime, your customers may become dissatisfied with your service. You should also consider using a content delivery network (CDN) to improve your site’s speed.
Why is the Hosting Server Location important?
Hosting server location affects website speed
The physical location of your server is an essential factor in determining your website loading speed. If your servers are located far away, it will cause a delay in data transfer. As a result, your users will witness site latency. The servers that are close to your target customers will transfer data over shorter distances. Due to this, your users will witness fast response times. You will need to decide which data center region will offer localized hosting for your audience.
Google research noted that 53% of mobile visitors are likely to abandon the site if the page load times are longer than 3 seconds. The analysis also mentions how latency directly affects your revenue. Site speed is a contributing factor to search engine rankings. To improve your site speed, you need to host your website near your customers.
Hosting server location affects SEO rankings
Page speed reduces bounce rates. Bounce rates (or single-page sessions) are where visitors land on a website page and leave quickly, without triggering another request. With a slow site, you are likely to have a higher bounce rate. For example, the bounce rate increases by 32% as page load time goes from 1 second to 3 seconds.
Page speed also improves user experience. You get a high dwell time on a fast-loading site. Dwell time is the length of time users spend on a web page. Faster-loading sites are also easier to crawl by search engines. Crawling is where search engines discover updated content. The content can be new web pages, sites, or when you change your existing content. Website crawlers and bots need to crawl your website regularly for indexing and ranking.
You can see how the SEO rankings are linked to your site speed and server location. Search engines allow you to choose your target regions. It helps in geo-targeting and using the right keywords for that region.
A suitable hosting server location can make your website load faster.
Hosting server location affects legal compliance
Hosting your website in a different country also has legal implications. You have to abide by the regulations and compliance before storing your data in those regions. Some countries may restrict storing sensitive user data on the servers. If you fail to comply with their laws, there may be financial repercussions.
It is essential to know the data laws of the country before using servers in those regions. If your websites are not accessible to users due to non-compliance, the SEO rankings may drop.
Considerations when choosing a Hosting Server Location
When choosing a hosting server location, there are many factors to consider. One of the most important considerations is how your customers will be affected by the location of your hosting server.
The following are some of the considerations that you should make when choosing a hosting server location:
- Geographic Location
- Privacy Laws
- Server Security
- Network Latency
Conclusion
A hosting server location does impact your website speed and SEO ranking. The further the location of your server from target users, the slower your website. Companies choose a server overseas to save costs or for better server infrastructure. Although it may seem like a good option, these benefits are short-lived. Speed is a direct ranking factor for your website. Therefore, a hosting server location should be close to your audience for faster speed.