IP Popularity is a metric that is used to evaluate the number of incoming links from different servers. Only one link per IP address is counted.
What is IP Popularity?
Every domain is stored on a web server under a specific IP address. Web users, however, enter the domain name, e.g. https://www.sistrix.com, into their browsers in order to access websites. The mapping between name and IP address is done through a services call the domain name service. (DNS.)
When IP popularity is calculated, a maximum of one link is counted for each IP address, regardless of whether one or 10,000 domains are hosted on this IP address.
In addition to link, domain and network popularity, IP popularity is another metric that is used to evaluate incoming links.
A good backlink profile would include a wide spread of IP addresses. Multiple links that are ‘bundled’ onto one IP should be checked to see what type of link activity has occurred.
In the past, IP popularity was an more effective means of detecting private blog networks: these were often hosted on a server or a server group, which can also be found via network popularity.
Nowadays, IP addresses in the IPv4 space are rare and many domains are hosted on one IP by large host providers. This means that the significance of IP popularity is no longer as strong as it was in the past.
