Does your website need an IP Address?? Does it really matter?

A Web site hosted with a "dedicated IP" never changes location. The advantages of having a dedicated IP number is that dedicated IP's tend to lend themselves much better to advanced web development, they are much easier to work with and they are more compatible with server side applications. So why don’t all hosting companies offer all their customers a dedicated IP? There are numerous reasons ranging from cost to the availability of IP addresses. In reality this is a hotly debated topic that no one can prove which is better, or in reality; the battle is are dedicated IP’s per website better for the owner of that domain and his web presence then a shared IP environment. This in my opinion, is the real question.

I like to break things down in real laymen terms and forget all about SEO optimization jargon; IT terms etc and let’s examine at it from the point of physical street address.

Shared IP’s is like an apartment building where you can have one address i.e. first Avenue but then have 1000 apartment numbers. The mail and people show up to the front door and the gatekeeper lets them in and points them in the right direction. The people usually find the right apartment. A Dedicated IP per website is like living in a single detached house and your address is 3 First Avenue – The people knock on the door you answer – faster and less chance of something going wrong. The search engines “BOTS” as they are called come and knock on doors, read and examine you site, determine how many people want your site, look at certain content etc and then leave and compile the information for their search engines. Do they penalize a website for being in an apartment building? More than likely NO! Now do you want to be in that apartment building if you neighbour is a spam artist, or do you want to be in that apartment if the people above you a running a high volume mail order business? Sometime you need to wait for the elevator to come get down to leave or your customers waiting at the front door because of you neighbour high use of the front entrance.

So the above paragraph does not really say which is better, even though I would prefer my own dedicated IP for my Website. Other advantages to having a unique IP for your site is if you change servers, you can point your users to a new IP, so they don't have to wait for the domain name change to propagate. With a dedicated static IP, it can also be simpler to upload and test your site before transferring the domain name to a new server. Setting up Secure sockets (SSL) is also much simpler. You may also not want to share your IP with some sites that could lead to your site being banned by search engines or spam lists. It’s more stable having your own dedicated IP for your Website.

Now the debate is always about search engines optimization but here is my belief; if you get added benefits of search engine optimization that would be great as well. Don’t be fooled by hosting companies that do not want to provide you a static IP for you site, or charge extra for it. Don’t listen to excuses about the shortage of IP’s and that they are not needed. My company
( www.Rebelnetworks.com ) offers dedicated static IP for every website, and dedicated server we host. The reality is it costs them more money to provide this type of service with a static dedicated IP’s per site and thus they most hosting companies don’t provide them. When your ready to host you business, or if you already have a business on line but want extra benefits ask for a dedicated IP address for your website.