Does a site get affected on Google search rankings by another site on a shared hosting?

[trustdnb]

Does a site get affected on Google search rankings by the presence of a spam site on a shared hosting server?
I mean, if my site is hosting on a shared hosting and having the same hosting space as mine has uploaded a spam site so will it tarnish reputation of my site in eyes of Google?
Your thoughts?

 

[PTTed]

My understanding is that it would not be affected unless there were a bunch of sites on the same shared hosting server that were guilty of being part of a spam network.

One site by itself should not be enough to impact you.

If however, there is a cluster of spam sites or otherwise bad neighborhood sites on your server and your website is the only clean one, then yes, I believe you could very well be affected on search engines.

There is probably a threshold there somewhere. I don't know where it is. I recall Matt Cutts being asked about this years ago. His response was similar to what I just explained if I recall correctly.

Wait..Here it is...

Hope that helps....

 

[DarnelWhite]

I understand your concern

Yes and No. Similar to what PTTED mentioned, if numerous sites on the same server are flagged, then you can have an issue. From my experience, it is rare for you to get affected.

All the best

 

[Hawker]

Well I would say that IF it shares the SAME IP address of a site that has been penalized by Google in some way then it could indeed effect your site using that same IP address too.

There is a lot of controversy out there surrounding this subject with some people saying no it doesn't matter at all as Google sees all domains differently regardless of their IP address.

And there are a lot of people who will say yes it can be effected if it shares the same IP address of a site that has been Google penalized.

Personally I side with these people because I've come across loads of people that have had their site effected due to one bad site in their neighbourhood (IP).

In the same way as one bad apple can upset the whole apple cart.

That is why you should always do your due diligence (homework) first and check out the other sites on that shared server and see if any of those sites are penalized in anyway or if they are shady sites doing shady practices if you are considering any such shared hosting plan.

How to know which sites are using the same IP address of your shared server?

Well you can use CMD command to find out or you can use an online whois tool.

First you need to find and know what your websites IP address is.

You can do that with a CMD command window using tracert www.yourdomain.com

Or if you already have it and want to know which other sites share that same IP address you can use a "Domain Neighbors" tool.

Some such free tools are

dnsqueries.com/en/ip_neighbors.php
ipneighbour.com
majestic.com/reports/neighbourhood-checker

However... Chances are as a shared host, it will have literally hundreds and hundreds of sites using that same IP address so to check them all is not really practical and would take a very long time and a lot of work.

That is why for this reason, for a professional site, shared hosting is not a good choice.

Better to pay a little extra more and get a dedicated IP at least.

 

[trustdnb]

My understanding is that it would not be affected unless there were a bunch of sites on the same shared hosting server that were guilty of being part of a spam network.

One site by itself should not be enough to impact you.

If however, there is a cluster of spam sites or otherwise bad neighborhood sites on your server and your website is the only clean one, then yes, I believe you could very well be affected on search engines.

There is probably a threshold there somewhere. I don't know where it is. I recall Matt Cutts being asked about this years ago. His response was similar to what I just explained if I recall correctly.

Wait..Here it is...

Hope that helps....

I appreicate your tips, if my sites are on same hosting with bad neighborhood sites then I should leave web hosting?

Find a new web host?

With a new web host, are there any way to avoid this repeat again?

Well I would say that IF it shares the SAME IP address of a site that has been penalized by Google in some way then it could indeed effect your site using that same IP address too.

There is a lot of controversy out there surrounding this subject with some people saying no it doesn't matter at all as Google sees all domains differently regardless of their IP address.

And there are a lot of people who will say yes it can be effected if it shares the same IP address of a site that has been Google penalized.

Personally I side with these people because I've come across loads of people that have had their site effected due to one bad site in their neighbourhood (IP).

In the same way as one bad apple can upset the whole apple cart.

That is why you should always do your due diligence (homework) first and check out the other sites on that shared server and see if any of those sites are penalized in anyway or if they are shady sites doing shady practices if you are considering any such shared hosting plan.

How to know which sites are using the same IP address of your shared server?

Well you can use CMD command to find out or you can use an online whois tool.

First you need to find and know what your websites IP address is.

You can do that with a CMD command window using tracert

Or if you already have it and want to know which other sites share that same IP address you can use a "Domain Neighbors" tool.

Some such free tools are

However... Chances are as a shared host, it will have literally hundreds and hundreds of sites using that same IP address so to check them all is not really practical and would take a very long time and a lot of work.

That is why for this reason, for a professional site, shared hosting is not a good choice.

Better to pay a little extra more and get a dedicated IP at least.

I did some researches on using CMD command but its hard to find out who is bad neighborhood that hosting on same your shared hosting. I heard of the VPS hosting can provide dedicated IP which can avoid this issue?

 

[PTTed]

PTTed

If you get a dedicated IP then it should resolve your fear. I personally wouldn't bother though unless you really think there is an issue. And I doubt there is an issue with your ranking because of the other sites sharing your same IP. In the Matt Cutts video he points out that it would have to be a pretty extreme situation for your site to be affected because spam sites are normally intermingled with good sites on various servers and Google understands this. As a result they don't usually penalize a site just because it's on a shared server along with a handful of spam sites.

The biggest drawbacks I have seen to shared hosting are:
1 - sharing resources with the same server where one of the other websites bogs down the server and your site is affected because of it
2 - some spammer or internet marketer wannabe gets emails from that IP address flagged as spam which makes it harder to get your own legit emails delivered to certain people

Those are the only two issues I have experienced to any degree having owned hundreds of websites on shared servers.

Actually those aren't the only 2 things, but the other things I experienced wouldn't apply to your situation.

I think you are worrying too much if you are worried about your ranking because other sites on your shared server might include some spam sites. It is very unlikely to be an issue.