Website Design Articles :: FAQS for new website owners

Why is my site not listed for UK specific searches?

When searching Google using the 'Pages from the UK' option, a number of factors are often cited as being taken into account.

The region in which pages are hosted (ie on a server based in uk, or a server with a UK IP address)

When returning UK specific results, Google will search for pages from that country. Hosting your site with a company who has servers in the UK (and therefore a UK allocated IP address) will therefore have a significant impact on whether your site is included in the "Pages from the UK" search.

Region specific extensions (eg .co.uk domain names)

A site's domain does not affect whether or not it will be returned with a country restriction enabled. For example, a .com site hosted in the UK will show up in results for pages from the UK while a .co.uk site hosted in the United States will not.

Inbound links from sites hosted in a specific region or having a region specific extension.

While inbound links undeniably improve your ranking, it's arguable whether in themselves they are sufficient to improve your rankings in a UK specific search in google.co.uk.