How does the google uk search engine work?

May 19th, 2008 | by Peter Cullen |

Are the results you get back from the Google UK Search Engine radically different from the Google.com? How does Google determine what is more relevant for a UK audience than an Irish audience or a French or Spanish or German audience?

If you take into account that localiased pages get special treatment, what additional factors influence ranking on Google’s tld’s? Let’s take the example of a random surfer who types in the phrase, ’seo companies’. What is the result from Google.co.uk? I’ve left the ‘Search the web’ radio button clicked and hit search! An analysis of the top 10 websites:

Ranking TLD Hosted Registered
1 .com UK UK
2 .co.uk UK UK
3 .com UK UK
4 .co.uk UK UK
5 .co.uk UK UK
6 .co.uk US India
7 .com Denmark UK
8 .co.uk US UK
9 .co.uk UK UK
10 .com Germany UK

So, in the top 10 results you have no website that has no connection with the UK, i.e. no website that is registered and hosted outside the Uk and has not got a .co.uk. So, what about when I search on ‘pages form the UK’? Does the top 10 change? What changes are there? Let’s have a look…

Ranking Search the Web Search pages from the UK
1 www.whitehatmedia.com www.whitehatmedia.com
2 www.dolphinpromotions.co.uk www.dolphinpromotions.co.uk
3 www.dolphinpromotions.co.uk www.dolphinpromotions.co.uk
4 www.positiongoldltd.com www.bigmouthmedia.com
5 www.bigmouthmedia.com www.bigmouthmedia.com
6 www.blueclaw.co.uk www.maximumhit.co.uk
7 www.maximumhit.co.uk www.positiongoldltd.com
8 www.freshpromotion.com www.positiongoldltd.com
9 www.smart-traffic.co.uk www.blueclaw.co.uk
10 www.hobo-web.co.uk www.smart-traffic.co.uk

Look at the results above, there is very little difference between results from the Web and results from the UK. So, what’s the key to getting a good ranking if you are targeting the UK?

From the (admittedly small) example above, if you are hosted in the UK, have a UK tld and register your domain with an address in the, then you stand a much greater chance of your content appearing in the UK.


  1. 4 Responses to “How does the google uk search engine work?”

  2. By fatih on May 31, 2008 | Reply

    interest article. I should also add that if tld or hosting is located outside UK, you can use google webmaster to define the location of your website.

  3. By Jay on Sep 1, 2008 | Reply

    smart-traffic.co.uk is the company we regretfully chose.

    We opted for a complete SEO package from smart-traffic.co.uk after promise of a great service.

    smart-traffic.co.uk did a complete analysis of our site and said it would be possible with the site we have to guarantee they can get us a number 1 spot on one of our key words in google after 6 months.

    After regular monthly calls for our stage payments and six months later they were not getting us to number 1.

    smart-traffic.co.uk said because we have a .com domain and not .co.uk and our site is hosted in the US smart-traffic.co.uk could not get us to number 1 and we would need to spend more money for this.

    We refused and asked smart-traffic.co.uk why they didn’t outline this in the initial review before we agree. All smart-traffic.co.uk could say was its not up to them.
    So we would need to somehow get a .co.uk domain and move our hosting!

    How ridiculous and yes after our last payment to smart-traffic.co.uk there was no more calls to see how we were going. One thing smart-traffic.co.uk said was if they could not get us to number one in the specified time they would shell out the cost building more links etc. To get us to number 1, but nothing.
    To sum up there are plenty of reputable and honest companies out there and in our onion, smart-traffic.co.uk isn’t one of them. Do not get caught up in the what we now know as the scam of position 1 guarantee, there will always be a way for smart-traffic.co.uk to get out of it and stitch you up.

  4. By Peter Cullen on Sep 1, 2008 | Reply

    Hi Jay,

    I think it’s safe to say there is no company that can guarantee a number one position in Google, be it .co.uk or .com or whatever.

    Looking for a quick solution to good traffic usually leads to tears!

    Maybe http://www.smart-traffic.co.uk would like to reply to your comments?

  5. By Dan on Oct 1, 2008 | Reply

    Peter is right Jay, there is no quick fix to ranking business and if they come at you which such promises run a mile or better yet keep your money in the bank.

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