18 replies to this topic

[Om Samurai]

I have been lurking for a while and picked up massive amount of tips. Thank you one and all.
I have incorporated them gradually into my website and I was found on google and other search engines after a couple of months. I am now in the process of doing all my main site pages as well as my other websites now that I have been found by several search engines.

Now I have a dilemma and really don’t know what to do for the best.
I am panicking, thinking that I won’t be found by the search engines \ spiders when I transfer my crystal sanctuary domain name to oneandone.

My main e-commerce website www.crystal-sanctuary.co.uk is presently hosted on a shared RAQ server.
The hosting and accumulated charges were getting to high so I decided to shop around.

I finally decided and bought a “Professional” hosting package from www.oneandone.co.uk
I also registered www.crystal-sanctuary.com a while ago and that is parked in this package \ server as well.

However, I was unaware that oneandone uses a “frame” to redirect parked domain names to the root of the server then to any sub-folders \ (other websites held in folders) within the root of the server.

I also have several domain names parked on www.justthename.co.uk then redirected at present to another shared RAQ server.
I then use the masking option to mask the redirection.
www.just-the-name.co.uk/url-masking.shtml

I though I could redirect and mask teh URL from justthename to oneandone till I heard about the frame method used by oneandone.

This justthename masking I think is far superior as it does not use a frame method ?

I also want to transfer all my websites on my other raq server which includes my other business domain name to oneandone.



So my questions are as follows:
1, Will the search engines \ robots still find me the same at oneandone even though they use this frame method to direct files to the root ?

2, Will the redirecting and masking of domain names held on www.justthename.co.uk cause any problems regarding search engines or robots.

3, Is there are problem at all with what I am trying to do regarding search engines or robots.

4, Would it be better to put my main site as being crystal-sanctuary.com and redirect and mask, crystal sanctuary.co.uk from justthename.

5, Or do I bite the bullet and transfer form my present host to www.crystal-sanctuary.co.uk to oneandone.

6, Is the oneandone frame redirecting method really a problem to search engines & robots.

7, Or am I just getting my knickers in a twist for nothing.

Any advice would be gratefully received.

Kind Regards
Om Samurai

[Jill]

Welcome Om Samurai!

The frame masking is definitely a very bad idea. Hosting is so cheap these days. Just buy a real hosting package for each domain. They can even share an IP, that's not a problem.

There are plenty of packages for just a few bucks a month. It is well worth it for peace of mind.

Good luck!

Jill

[Om Samurai]

Hi Jill
This time I feel your answer is a bit off base, concerning cost effective hosting being inexpensive. Theres hosting and theres hosting. It's a nightmare issue.

I should have added in my last post that I am in the UK.

The web hosting market in the UK nothing is nothing like that of the States.

I have been trading on the internet for 3 years doing my own web building in house for 2 years and involved with the internet for about 27 years, schhh!! can't tell you why it's a secret. So I don't think I am a newbie to the subject. I am also a keen student of optimisation methods.

Check out the accumulated prices at the company I just left Zen Internet all hinden charges till you sign up, (business quality) hosting starts at £100 + £50 for actually hosting the domain name, then £245 for SSL + VAT (UK Tax) so not must change out of "£400". 400 UK Sterling = 728.76 US Dollars

I even reduced my costs by using an instantSSL $49 but the hosting company charged me £50 for installing it so the bottom line is £300 300 UK Sterling = 546.57 US Dollars per e-commerced enabled server is about average for professional hosting here in the UK.

This seneraio is identical for all the top UK hosting companies.

$20 a month in the States sounds great for a busness ready hosting package however I have found a deeper story lies within.

I have even looked around the states over the past 18 months, in and out of hosting companies support forums, you are correct when you say there are "cheap deals", in the states. However, when you dig deeper you find that the hosting company is mearly a "Reseller" and is is not actually maintaining the server, it's a larger hosting company in the background. When you read the support forum such as on based in Florida. you will see that even the most basic server backups are not been done professionally, and outages are common even though they state a 99.9% uptime. They and other US hosts faired very badly in comparison to UK hosting companies on everythng except "price".

I think the hosting server \ rediection method and search engines used is still a major issue, no matter what side of the pond we are on.

I think I am stiil asking if one redirection method is better or worse than the other ? and more to the point why ?

However, thanks for your comment.
I'm still lurking but I am in the door now.
Kind regards
Om Samurai :halo:

Edited by Jill, 07 January 2004 - 09:04 AM.

[Jill]

The beauty of the Internet is that you don't need to host your site in your own country if you don't want to.

Try one of the packages at Ventures Online on for size. You won't be sorry!

Jill

P.S. That's where this forum and all of my sites are hosted.

[Randy]

Frame redirection will be a problem. No question about that one.

The best way to do redirection is definitely at the server level by creating a 301 Permanent Redirect header. That's not only the proper way to do it from the IT perspective, but is also the way most search engines want it to be done frankly. Granted, some SE's deal with that better than others, however if you stick with the Standards you'll rarely go wrong.

A suggestion or three... (I'll apologize now for the length, but hopefully you'll get something out of it.)

First, contact oneandone to see if they'll support your using an .htaccess file. If they do, you should be able to create your own 301 Permanent Redirect instead of employing their Framed redirect. That'll be the simplest for you all the way around.

If they can't or won't allow you to use htaccess (Yes, there are tons of other ways to produce the same effect, but if they won't allow the easiest method they're likely not going to allow the more complicated ones) then you need to find yourself another host.

Now, this may sound slightly ridiculous and overkill, but in my opinion choosing your Hosting company is at least important as choosing which bank is going to used for your Business. Some banks charge all kinds of "hidden" fees. Fees for writing X amount of checks per month, fees if your account falls below a certain amount, fees to send you a monthly statement, fees to have online access to your account so that you can check on it each day if you would like, fees, fees, fees.

On the other hand, some banks not only won't charge you all of those fees but will actually pay you interest if you maintain a certain minimum balance in your business checking account.

In my mind you have to first know which questions to ask up front, before you sign on the dotted line; And then you have to go shopping around and ask those questions. It's the same thing as choosing a hosting service in my book. It's a Business Decision and has to be approached from that perspective.

The main thing to watch (from my experience) is the amount of Bandwidth you're allowed if you plan to grow your site. I have one client (actually a client of a client) who on average uses maybe 5-6 gigs per month of transfer. Very reasonable, and should fit within any plan from any hosting company.

But this particular e-commerce site is very, very cyclical. She's coming up on her heavy season. November her site used up (real figures) 6.03GB, up from a low of 2.31GB in July. December this one site jumped up to 21.58GB. So far in January, through yesterday January 6th, her site has already pumped through 29.3GB of information. Based upon my projections, she'll end up over 300 Gigs of bandwidth transfer in January. Well over 400 Gigs in February and somewhere in the 600-800 Gigs in March and April.

Now, if she had to pay me the standard $2 per gig for everything over 20 gigs in a month that I charge for the hosting plan she's technically on, I'd be making a killing (as her "host") for 4 to 5 months out of the year.

Here's the deal, and something I've done often in fact...

This will be my last year hosting this client of a client's 5 sites on one of my servers. We've hit the limits, if you will, that were set down before I ever started hosting any of her sites almost 2 years ago. Instead, next year she'll move all of her sites to her own dedicated, co-located server. They're so cheap these days that she'll be able to easily pay for her own server (on the extra bandwidth charges for one site alone) and be able to afford me or someone else to keep an eye on the server and play Sys Admin when need be.

Bottom line, if you can't find a Host who will do things the way you want them done, for the price you want them done at, it's very, very easy to start hosting your own sites. And it's actually a very cost effective option if you're talking about having anything more than 5 "average" sites. The only question then becomes, do you want to learn how to secure your machine and administer it, or if you're going to hire someone to do that for you.

Based upon what you've said above Om Samurai, it sounds to me as if this may be the best option for you to consider if you're looking to hold down your costs and give yourself plenty of room to grow. Plus you'll get 100% control over what can and cannot be done with your server environment.

[Denyse]

Jill,
About what you said re hosting anywhere.

My site has a .com ending rather than .ca (actually I own both) and my site is currently hosted in the states.

I am finding that G Canada does not index me at all when doing a "sites in Canada" search, where as G us does. So I am wondering what the deciding factor maybe, a) the country where the site is hosted or the extention.

I thought that the hosting country was the deciding factor because alot of Canadian sites have a .com extention but are indexed on the Canadian G.

What is the truth of the matter?

[SearchRank]

Denyse - country specific search engines usually filter results by the top level domain, which in your case is the .ca.

[Jill]

I don't know the truth. To me, I would think it would be the extension. I can't imagine why the location of the hosting company would matter.

But the engines don't always work on common sense, so I can't say for sure. I've heard others here swear that the hosting company matters.

[mcanerin]

In most cases, it's easier for a SE to filter out (or actually *in) all the .ca 's first, then go looking for others it missed by IP geolocation. You are best served by having a .ca hosted in Canada, but if you have a .ca you *may* not need to be hosted in Canada. If you have a .com you should be hosted in Canada to be considered Canadian.

I've heard rumours that if your site is found in a country specific area of DMOZ, then you would be considered to be from that country - but I haven't verified that yet and it might be wishful thinking

Ian

[Denyse]

OK Ian, but since I own the .ca as well - can I direct the .ca to the same site as the .com or is that an SEO booboo

[SearchRank]

OK Ian, but since I own the .ca as well - can I direct the .ca to the same site as the .com or is that an SEO booboo

If you redirect then search engines will see both sites as the same. Which one they decide to list is up to them I guess but I would assume it would be the main site. Therefore to get the .ca site listed in a Canadian search engine, you would have to host it separately, or at least that is always what I have been led to believe. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

[AdrianS]

On a similar theme:

I have a .com
hosted in the US
for a UK based service
listed under UK in DMOZ

I don't see much difference between results on g.com and g.co.uk
however, on g.uk if you choose the 'pages from the uk' option my site doesn't show. which seems to say that this option is for sites hosted in the uk, or possibly with uk extensions.

This seems obvious and is academic but i guess the question i have to consider is will the consumer search using the 'pages from the uk' option expecting to find all services in the uk and hence should i do something about it.

[mcanerin]

Re: DMOZ

I think I've just verified that it sometimes works.

I just went and found a site: www.lightspeed-electrology.com/calgary/

Which is a .com hosted in Florida, but is in the Calgary/Business/Health and Beauty section of DMOZ

Search for "lightspeed electrology calgary" showed the site #1 on Google, but the same site did not show up when Canadian Sites Only was chosen.

However, a search on FAST showed the site in the normal listings and also for Canadian only. I tested it for UK and Africa, too, just to make sure it wasn't broken, but it did not show up there.

Interesting - while looking through this I noticed that MSN.ca no longer has a "canadian sites only" choice, and you can't even choose it as an option in Advanced search - North America is as granular as it gets. Same with Teoma and Inktomi (Hotbot)

So DMOZ does help, but only with FAST, as far as I can see, and I haven't checked any country other than Canada, so it may vary.

Ian

[mcanerin]

Denyse: I believe, but haven't tested yet, that if you make the .ca the default domain and then redirect the .com, then the SE's would consider both to be .ca and you should show up.

Remember, I have not tested this yet (though I'd like to)

Ian

[Denyse]

Thanks Ian,
Here's another stupid question? How do you make and extention "default"?