How much should you research/care about your host location?

[babyface]

Hello,

I am at the planning stages of a new site and in my pursuit of perfection I started wondering if I should search for a Webhost that is located in the area that attracts the most attention for my keywords. When using search engines its not difficult to notice that your results are tailored to your location, and after a few checks I noticed that a lot of the results I get are sites with IP addresses hosted in the UK (where I am)

A quick worldwide Google insights search told me that the highest concentration of regional interest for my keywords was in places like India, Nigeria and the Philippines??

This seems strange to me, aren't the languages different?

And if I did want to do this, how would I go about it? do I ask a normal hosting service if they can give me a dedicated server based in India or Nigeria? or should I now scour the net trying to find hosts actually based in India?

I'm so ignorant on this subject that it makes me a tiny bit nervous
Any help would be appreciated.

[tke71709]

A quick worldwide Google insights search told me that the highest concentration of regional interest for my keywords was in places like India, Nigeria and the Philippines??

Are these countries that are likely to actually shell out money to buy your product though? Would they click on ads? And how heavily discounted would those ad clicks be seeing as they are from second and third tier markets?

This seems strange to me, aren't the languages different?

English is the international language of business, and I would assume that most people with access to the Internet in those countries would be fairly prosperous and thus more likely to speak English.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ing_population

And if I did want to do this, how would I go about it? do I ask a normal hosting service if they can give me a dedicated server based in India or Nigeria? or should I now scour the net trying to find hosts actually based in India?

I would think that the domain extension plus setting the country in Google Webmaster tools would most likely be sufficient. I doubt you would get hosting in Nigeria for example.

[Slowdive]

If you want to target Africa for any reason here is a brief check list...
Make sure your site is mobile friendly, a great many people do not have computers of their own. Capitalizing on this most cell companies offer monthly contracts for a browser friendly phone and a data package.
Their is traffic to be had out of Africa, especially if you are offering a nifty service or a solution. I know a guy who makes a heap buying items for people from Amazon (as they do not ship to much of Africa) one example.
You can register a com.na (namibia) or co.za although slightly expensive they can be registered via a register in the country from any place in the world. I am lead to believe still sees some favoritism all over Africa.
Although Africa is largely associated with poverty their is always a large upper class, often very ready to spend money on all manner of things. In part due to limited local ways to do so. I have often considered getting a bunch of thinkgeek stuff landed here, as you simply do not see it or any equivalent locally.

All vague examples but it may be of some interest if you have picked up a domain that is drawing in African traffic.

[babyface]

Thanks

So is it safe to say then that I can have hosting pretty much anywhere I want, just as long as I have a domain extension relating to a particular country and Ive also changed the country setting in Google Webmaster tools the site should be picked up by the search engines of that country?