Do ip addresses affect SEO?

By: Tony Peters
Owner, AP Designs LLC
inquiry@apdesignsonline.com

Believe it or not ip address diversity makes a big impact on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).  Whether it's backlinks to your website from similar ip addresses or it's other websites on your same ip, we need to discuss what to watch out for and how to avoid these potential SEO issues.

Firstly, for those who are not familiar how ip addresses work with websites, let me explain.  Your website is located on a server somewhere.  If you use Host Gator, it may be in Texas.  If you use GoDaddy, it may be in Arizona.  Each server can host numerous websites, depending on the space dedicated to your hosting package.  Sometimes a shared server will host hundreds of websites.  This is considered a shared server, and it's what most websites use.

A shared server has a limited amount of ip addresses; sometimes just one depending on the configuration.  An ip address is similar to a residential address.  Each computer, tablet, phone, server, even routers will have their own ip addresses.  An ip address looks like this: 123.456.789.123 or 123.456.789.12.  A shared server that hosts multiple websites will have the same ip address.  For this reason, the domain name is then the unique identifier.

So, if your website doesn't have a unique ip address, it's easy for a search engine robot to think that the other websites on the same server could be related to each other.  This can be very bad for SEO for a few reasons: 1) Poor, malicious, or spam content on same server; 2) Link farming; 3) Previous or future poor content.  Let's expand on each one of these.

1) Poor, malicious, or spam content on same server.  Let's say your website coincidentally ends up on the same server as a "link farm" or other website which is dedicated to black hat SEO techniques, a known spyware or illegal download site, or even a pornography website.  Since your website is on the same shared server without a unique ip address, Google may think that your website is related to the aforementioned sites.  Since Google does not think highly of these websites, it could put you in the same category and downgrade your rankings accordingly. 

2) Link Farms on same server.  A link farm is a website that is dedicated to creating links to other websites in hopes to gain better search engine rankings.  Google is on to most of these blackhat websites, and has downgraded them drastically.  Do not ever be a part of or listed in these link farms.  Even if Google has not found them today, it's only a matter of time.  Similarly to the above, if a link farm is on the same server as your website, then your website could be affiliated.

3) Previous poor content on same server.  Even if you think you have vetted the host and server on which your website lives for bad content today, Google may have indexed a website with poor content months or years ago.  Even this could impact your SEO.  Also, it's more than possible that some time from now a bad website ends up on your same server, gets indexed by Google, gets flagged and downgraded, then affiliated to your website just because it was on the same ip address.  Ouch.  All that hard work on your SEO campaign gets wiped off the map.  Pretty bad, isn't it?  Therefore, if you are on a mission for high rankings in the search engines, don't fall victim to this.

So how do you avoid being on a server with bad content?  Well, the easiest and cheapest way is to purchase and install an SSL certificate on your website.  This will give you a dedicated ip address, just for you. I have done this for my website www.apdesignsonline.com to be sure my SEO is not negatively affected from this potential issue.  Depending on your budget and the size and resources your website requires, you could get a dedicated server.  But be warned, these are not cheap; they start at more than $100 per month.  Therefore, the SSL certificate is much more cost effective, usually only costing around $75 per year. 

So let's quickly recap.  Ip addresses DO affect SEO and search engine rankings.  If your website is on a shared server, it could be on the same server as another site that has poor, malicious, spam content, or a link farm.  Even if it's not today, the shared server could have hosted this content previously or in the future.  Since your website and the "bad" website have the same ip address, Google will affiliate them and downgrade you for being associated.  Therefore, having a dedicated ip address for your website, if you are serious about SEO and search engine rankings, by purchasing an SSL certificate is the best answer to avoid the pitfalls of shared servers.

If you learned anything new or enjoyed reading this, please share it for the benefit of others.  Thanks!