Having a website, the first and the most important thing you would look out for is the ranking of the website. There are a total of 1.94 billion active websites over the internet. Now, surpassing the count and reaching the top spot isn’t easy. Hence, it is crucial for you to keep in mind all of the factors that influence the ranking of your website on Google. These include relevant content, SEO optimization backlinking and your web hosting services provider.
Yes, you heard that right.
Of all the popular and the not-so-popular SEO ranking factors, the hosting package you choose also affects your online ranking. In order to ensure optimal Google ranking, your website needs to function smoothly and swiftly. The website that offers seamless navigation experience fewer page breaks and is more likely to have a rank greater than others. This is where the idea of website hosting services come into the picture.
It is your hosting package that determines the size of the website, the time taken to load a page and the targeted audience. Needless to state that these account for your website ranking.
If you are still not sure as to how can a website hosting service affects your online rankings, this is article will help you out. We have highlighted some of the factors that are directly related to Google SEO tricks.
The Effect of Your Hosting Package on SEO Ranking
- Higher Uptime
This is one of the most important factors that lay an impact on the ranking of your website. Consider it this way; you have a well-designed website, stuffed with relevant content and effectively optimized, keeping in mind the SEO. A user enters a word linked to your services; however, your sites don’t show up. By this we mean, it isn’t online, or your web server is offline.
You are not the only one responsible for turning your website offline. The web hosting services provider can also shut down the website, thanks to a number of reasons (maintenance of the server, poorly managed hosting, server failure, etc.). Websites that have prolonged downtime tend to have poor performance and a lower SEO ranking.
This can be attributed to the fact that when the SEO algorithm fails to find a website, the bounce rate increases, and the SEO value decreases. Further, with a higher bounce rate, the website authority will suffer. On the whole, the website suffers.
Hence, it is important to choose the hosting package or a service provider that guarantees higher server uptime.
- Website Speed
It wasn’t until 2019 that google explicitly stated the speed of a website as a crucial factor determining the website ranking. With more than 4.68 billion smartphone users, people have this tendency to surf web pages through their mobile phones. Now, the issue of using a smartphone is that they are mobile, giving users the freedom to access webpages on the go.
Given the above, the speed isn’t the same, and poor connectivity would delay page loads. The slower the page loads, the greater is the possibility of users leaving the website and switching to another one. Of course, you would not want your visitors to turn to your competitors.
You might try to reduce the page size by restricting the content count, comprising on the image quality, still dealing with the issue all by yourself isn’t feasible. Your Web hosting package has a vital role to play in optimizing the speed of your website. When you are about to choose the package of website hosting, invest in one that offers greater web space. Next, replace the HDD packages with SSD ones as the latter loads faster than the former. And finally, prefer hosting your website on a dedicated or a VPS server. It is true that web hosting is economical, but it suffers in terms of space, memory and processing speed. Engage with the service provider that uses the latest caching technology to boost the page load time and improve your SEO ranking.
- Website Security
Websites that aren’t secure and have the red block displayed at the top left corner comes last in the list of websites. This implies that the likelihood of your website appearing at the top is least if it is not secured. While you were deciding on the hosting package for web hosting services, the SSL certificate option did not appear important, right? But do you know that these are vital when it comes to the security of the website?
Having a secured website suggests that you value your customer’s information and under no circumstance plan to expose their crucial data. It is a common trait of Google SEO to rank secured websites above the flagged ones. Choosing the hosting package with an SSL certificate ensures encrypting all information shared by the customers over the website and in a way, prevent malware attacks.
- Location
You might wonder why the location of the service provider? Well, choosing a local host for your website hosting needs is seen to enhance the engagement rate. Every website is designated with an IP address which links with the geographical area. Now every time a user puts up a search query, the local websites are fetched first. This increases the visibility of your website and further improves the overall SEO ranking. Also, the location of the server affects the page load time. In case the location of the server is adjacent to the target audience, the data is fetched quickly, and the page load speed increases, improving the global presence.
The Final Word
Having said all of the above, it is clear that a poorly hosted website would account for a lower SEO ranking, and this is fatal for your business. Though Shared Hosting is not the best choice, if you are restricted in the budget, make sure that the package maps the aforementioned requirements. To sum up, both the choice of the service provider and the hosting package plays an important part in the success of your online business.