Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
What countries does Google crawl from? Is it only US or do they crawl from Europe and Asia, etc.?
-
Where does Google crawl the web from? Is it in the US only, or do they do it from a European base too? The reason for asking is for GeoIP redirection. For example, if a website is using GeoIP redirection to redirect all US traffic to a .com site and all EU traffic to a .co.uk site, will Google ever see the .co.uk site?
-
Hi Keith,
In my experience Google mainly crawls from the US.
You're quite right, GeoIP redirection can cause major issues with indexation - as if you're redirecting everything from the US to the .com googlebot can't see the .co.uk site.
As such, I'm not a fan. Rather than implementing a hard redirect I prefer Amazon's approach. If you visit the amazon.com site from a UK IP you get a javascript overlay that invites you to visit the .co.uk version of the site instead - they let the user decide which site to view rather than actually redirecting them.
This is a nice solution as it ensures that the search bots can crawl both versions of the site, and rankings aren't endangered.
I hope this helps,
Hannah
-
Keith, I am having the same issue and I agree with you. The fact that Google has data centers in Europe does not necessarily mean the algos are indexing from there. I also want to set Europe and US GeoIP redirection. It would be great to get Mozers opinions on this. Hopefully this post gets freshly reviewed
-
Interesting question - I'd quite like to know what happens here too.
Matt Cutts recently posted a video on cloaking (http://youtu.be/QHtnfOgp65Q) saying that as long as you don't do anything 'special' for Googlebot you're OK, but presumably if you are redirecting IP's based on location and you don't want to prevent Googlebot form accessing your site then effectively you have to do something 'special' for Googlebot (e.g. you're doing one thing for everyone else and a different thing for Googlebot).
-
Hi,
The data center locations is interesting, but it isn't what I was looking for. I need to know whether Google crawls the web from any IP other than US IPs.
To clear up the second question, let me be more specific:
Let's say Google is crawling a .co.uk site from a US IP address. The site is using GEO IP redirection to redirect all US traffic to the .com site. Therefore, when Google attempts to crawl the .co.uk from the US IP address site it will be redirected to the .com site, never seeing the .co.uk site. Can anyone confirm that this is what happens?
-
I found an article from 2008 that shows Google data centre locations: http://bit.ly/mONhf9
Your other question is a bit confusing. Why Google wouldn't see the UK site?
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Country and Language Specific URL Paths
Wanted to ask everyone a questions: So our company is going to be doing a website that is going to be full of videos. The url path will be country.domain.com/language/slug/content-id. We redirect the user when they go to the different country. So if you're in spain on a train to france your URL will change from es.domain.com/es/slug/content-id to fr.domain.com/es/slug/content-id. Each country can listen to each video in all languages. My question is with hreflang tags and canonicals. Aside from targeting users in a certain country via Google Search Console, how do I eliminate duplication and tell Google which I'd like to show up via which country. In spain I would like es.domain.com/es/slug/content-id to show in Google and would have hreflang tags on each of the es.domain pages but what about fr.domain.com/es/slug/content-id since it would show the same content? I can't canonical to one of them since I need them to show in their respective country. How do I show the difference in language and country without showing duplication?
International SEO | | mattdinbrooklyn0 -
Can you target the same site with multiple country HREFlang entries?
Hi, I have a question regarding the country targeting aspect of HREFLANG. Can the same site be targeted with multiple country HREFlang entries? Example: A global company has an English South African site (geotargeted in webmaster tools to South Africa), with a hreflang entry targeted to "en-za", to signify English language and South Africa as the country. Could you add entries to the same site to target other English speaking South African countries? Entries would look something like this: (cd = Congo, a completely random example) etc... Since you can only geo-target a site to one country in WMT would this be a viable option? Thanks in advance for any help! Vince
International SEO | | SimonByrneIFS0 -
International SEO Subfolders / user journey etc
Hi According to all the resources i can find on Moz and elsewhere re int seo, say in the context of having duplicate versions of US & UK site, its best to have subfolders i.e. domain.com/en-gb/ & domain.com/en-us/ however when it comes to the user journey and promoting web address seems a bit weird to say visit us at: domain.com/en-us/ !? And what happens if someone just enters in domain.com from the US or UK ? My client wants to use an IP sniffer but i've read thats bad practice and should employ above style country/language code instead, but i'm confused about both the user journey and experience in the case of multiple sub folders. Any advice much appreciated ? Cheers Dan
International SEO | | Dan-Lawrence0 -
Blocking domestic Google's in Robots.txt
Hey, I want to block Google.co.uk from crawling a site but want Google.de to crawl it. I know how to configure the Robots.txt to block Google and other engines - is there a fix to block certain domestic crawlers? any ideas? Thanks B
International SEO | | Bush_JSM0 -
URL Structure - Homepage, Country and State Pages
Hello, I am creating a website (or websites if best format) that will have state-specific boating license courses for every state in the US, Canada and Australia. I would like the content to be available on the website in English, French and Spanish. I want to be the global leader in providing boat test courses. For the (1) homepage, (2) country pages, and (3) state pages, what is best SEO format I should use for:
International SEO | | Monologix
(a) URL structure
(b) "href lang" code
(c) rel canonical code
(d) will meta content with non-English pages need to also be in the non-English language of that page? Also, what server company do you recommend I host my website with? I am a non-programmer and learning SEO, so any and all help will be greatly appreciated! Thank you very much in advance!!!0 -
How to rank in Google for a specific country?
Hi, I've a relative good ranking for a specific keyword in google.com (english queries (hl=en)), but searching for the same keyword in google.com.br (Brazilian Portuguese (hl=pt-BR)), my rank for that keyword is far worst. The question is: I need to do something specific to rank in google.com.br (hl=pt-BR)? I'm doing the regular link building. Creating some blogs, blogging for 10 days before droping my links, and creating link wheels the same way. The blogs I create to make links are written in Brazilian Portuguese, also, the blog that I'm trying to rank higher, is also written in Brazilian Portuguese. Sorry for the english, it's not my native language. Thanks
International SEO | | izaiasalmeida0 -
How can I see what my web site looks like from a different country?
I've tried a few proxy tools to try to see how my site looks from other global locations, but haven't found one that works very well yet -- or a list of reliable proxies around the world. I need to do this to test various geo-targetted ads and other optimizations. Can anyone make a recommendation? Thanks!
International SEO | | Dennis-529610 -
Country specific landing pages
I have a client who wants to put a re-direct on his landing pages based on the visitors IP address. The landing page will be a sub domain relevant to the country their IP is located in. I am a little concerned this will effect the SEO. Appreciate any advice. Dylan 🙂
International SEO | | gomyseo0