Using residential IP proxies is a great way for businesses to achieve their goals without being blocked by sites. Expand your market reach by collecting and analysing data and comparing prices and products online while going unnoticed. Read on to find out more about what residential proxies could do for your business.

What are residential IP proxies?

Before diving into the details, let’s get a basic understanding of what an IP address is.

An IP address is the unique identifier that is attached to the device you are accessing the internet with. Your IP contains sensitive information, such as your ISP (internet service provider), your location, and what type of connection you are using. This could be an issue as it means you are easily trackable online - this is where proxies come in.

Proxies are networks that can be managed by companies to gain more security. A residential proxy allows you to connect to the internet via a specific location, country, or city and act as a real user in that area. They mask your real IP address and act as a buffer between you and general web traffic. As Residential proxies are IP addresses that were issued by an internet service provider for an existing device, they are reliable and trusted by websites and applications.

With recent breakthroughs in the advancement of residential proxies, they have become a valuable tool to maximise your brand potential. 

How are residential IP proxies useful for business?

Residential proxies are more reliable and trustworthy than other types of proxies, as they are tied to a physical address. Here are a few uses of residential IP proxies:

• SEO compliance - In order to harvest data from reputable sites and search engines, a good residential IP proxy is crucial. You can also create strong link-building between domains, change your site’s content to support multiple languages and see where your site ranks in searches for your target keywords.
• Social media management - Just as SEO, the importance of social media can not be undermined in today’s market, with apps like Instagram becoming essential for brands. By utilising a residential proxy, it’s possible to streamline all your social media accounts and manage them seamlessly.
• Marketing and AD verification - Residential proxies can be used to see how specific online adverts perform in search results for different people across different locations. They help promote your business by ensuring your campaigns and affiliate links are verified, while detecting and avoiding malware on ad placements. You can also monitor the performance of your competitors’ marketing campaigns.
• Price aggregators - Price aggregators need to collect data everyday to deliver accurate information. Residential IP proxies allow price aggregators to access all the websites they need. Proxies can bypass the restrictions a lot of e-commerce pages install to prevent their data from being gathered.
• Increase brand security - Having good security protocols is something every business should have. Another benefit to using residential proxies is protecting your intellectual properties and ensuring that no unauthorised personnel or third party has access to your data and assets.
• Big data - As big data continues to impact businesses on a day-to-day basis, many companies have built their business models around streamlining many different sources of data into one place. Residential proxies help to keep databases updated and scan through and collect huge amounts of data in real-time. As they can bypass geo-restrictions, you will be able to compare data from all sources without being blocked.

How do IP proxies differ from VPNs?

IP proxies and VPNs are similar tools that work in different ways. The main difference is encryption. A VPN will encrypt all traffic sent from your device, while a proxy redirects only the traffic sent from your web browser. As you might have guessed, this means that proxies work faster than VPNs.

While both proxies and VPNs will hide your IP address and prevent restrictions, the level of security is vastly different. A VPN creates a secure and private tunnel between your device and the site or application you are visiting - a proxy does not offer this kind of protection. This is because proxies work at application level while VPNs work at device level. It’s best practice to use residential IP proxies and a VPN in conjunction to gain the benefits of both without any compromise. Utilise the speed and content collection of a proxy while having the protection and security of a VPN.

The bottom line

Residential IP proxies are a great network tool. Businesses can perform many activities in order to further their business while protecting themselves and their data. Residential IP proxies have many benefits, allowing businesses to access consumer data without restrictions for analysis and marketing purposes. They are essential to stay competitive in the market and maintain a strong brand identity.