Changing website providers

[casper434]

After increasing suffering down time from my current website provider, I am seriously considering finding a new one. My only concern is the effect on SERP. Does anyone have any experience with this and what to do and avoid?

[MarieHaynes]

Hi Brett.  I haven't used IDX for my sites because it is not available for our real estate board.  If your board has IDX available then you should be able to integrate it into your website.  Or you can hire someone to do it for you.

Send me a personal message (via my profile) and I'll tell you who I host with.  I can share some ideas with you too.

Marie

[casper434]

thanks Marie. my site is ranking in the top 3 for most keywords. Where did you go to create your own wordpress site (bluehost?). Also, how does one deal with the integrated IDX issue for a real estate site from an SEO perspective? thanks

[MarieHaynes]

Hi Brett,

I'll share with you my experiences.  I recently changed hosts from one that gave me some down time issues to a better host and it has improved my site.  In my case, my urls did not change at all when I moved from one host to another so once I was moved, I didn't have to worry about 301 redirects.

I have another real estate site that is a templated site by a real estate site provider.  These sites are great for realtors who are just starting out and know nothing about web sites.  But, I soon found that as I was learning SEO and wanted to apply it to my site that using a templated site was a challenge when it comes to applying SEO.  In many cases you can't alter things like the title tag or url structure.  What I did was bite the bullet and create my own site (in Wordpress).  I then applied SEO to this site and it is doing really well and bringing us in a lot of leads.

Are you ranking well for your keywords?  If you are ranking well then I'd build a new site and try to keep all of the urls the same as they were (or 301 them to the appropriate ones if keeping the original structure is not possible).  Similarly, if you have backlinks built to multiple pages on your site then the same applies.

If you don't have many backlinks, and if you don't have crazy competition I'd be tempted to just start from scratch.

Like EGOL said, if you go with another templated site provider you're at their mercy.  With your own site, you are in control.

Another point I'd like to add is that I have a Canadian real estate site that is hosted in the US and it does really well.

[EGOL]

I would avoid any JoeSchmoe.com's sitebuilder program.  They often become orphans when Joe moves on to other projects.

I would favor something like wordpress that is used by millions of people, installs on your domain and there are many many smart SEOs who can tweak it for top performance.

If you are not into servicing your own databases, templates, etc. there are plenty of people out there who will do that for you on an hourly or contract basis.  The important thing is to get someone who knows what they are doing from an SEO perspective.

[casper434]

thanks I suspected that this might be the case. The only other major consideration is whether or not to create a site with which I do not have to rely on a hosted site-builder but not sure what my options may be in this regard.

[EGOL]

OK... it sounds like your site was made with a hosted site-builder.

If that is the case then moving your site will require a lot more planning and care.

If this site has links and rankings then you will need to preserve the URL structure of the site and if that changes use 301 redirects to preserve rankings and linkvalue.

You will also need to preserve your page optimization to be sure that no rankings are lost.

All of this could involve a lot of work.

I would honestly use this as an opportunity to make a huge improvement in your site.

I would either study this very carefully myself and make the move or I would hire a pro to do it for me or to provide close consultation.

If your biz is in Canada and you want to be found by Canadian searchers then  you want the server in Canada.

[casper434]

I should have been more specific. My website is provided by a company in Canada and the host server is located in the US. If I move to a different company I will essentially have to build a new site with the same (as much as possible) content as I now have. The new company is located in Canada and the server is in Canada. Not sure if this will make a difference?

[EGOL]

Changing hosting companies is a very safe thing to do as long as you are going to a quality host and their servers will be in the same country as your current host.

If your site is down a lot it could have a positive effect on your SERPs - so going to a quality host could be a good thing.