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Getting Your Site Seen by Search
Engines
Is your site listed on search engines? When people search for you, does
your site show up on page 1 or page 10 of the search engine
results?
Optimizing your site to get it ranked highly on the search engines can
be a complicated subject. To simplify things, it's helpful to first
understand how search engines add sites to their database. Then we'll
cover some tips that you can put on your own website that will help you
to get listed on search engines and get a higher ranking.
The Major Players
Let's start off with the major search engines, the ones that most
people use. Google is the most widely used search engine with Yahoo and
MSN searches following close behind. While there are thousands of search
engines, it's always a good idea to start with submitting your website
to the three largest. Why? Because 95% of all searches go through either
Google, Yahoo or MSN.
Who Is Powered by Whom?
Many search engines do not have their own database, but rely instead
upon data supplied by someone else. This is important to know so that
you can submit your site to the most popular search engine databases
first. For example, AOL Search and Yahoo Search get data from Google,
while MSN and HotBot get some data from Inktomi.
How Search Engines Read Your Site
There are two ways search engines read your site: automated
(crawlers) and human-entered (directories). Crawlers follow the links
found on your site and enter your site into their search database based
on text they find on your pages. This text is either found on your
public pages, or the text keywords found in behind-the-scenes "meta
tags". The amount of your keywords found on your page, the more weight
it has with the search engines and the higher your ranking. But in case
you think you can load your page with keywords in order to fool the
search engine, think again. Search engines are smart and you can be
penalized for "spamming" keywords on your website. Major crawlers
include Google, AltaVista and Inktomi.
Human Directories are few and far between. Just imagine hiring enough
people to research the millions of website on the Internet! It's no
wonder they're steadily being replaced by automated crawlers. Yahoo is
one of the most famous human directories, where real people actually
evaluate your site and categorize it in their database directory. More
and more these search engines are relying on partial automation for
categorizing and listing new sites in the search engine database. In
addition, getting your listing in a Directory for free can take months.
Some human directories are charging a fee for business sites to be
included in their directory.
How Search Engines Index and Rank Your Site
Search engines use several techniques to determine which category
your site belongs in and what keywords or key phrases people will use to
find your site when using the search engine.
When submitting your site to search engines, they will ask you four
things: the title of your site, a short description of your site, your
keywords or key phrases (what words or phrases people typically use to
search for sites like yours) and what category your site belongs in.
Then they will often crawl your site, checking to see if the
keywords/key phrases you supplied match the text on your website. And
remember, you will be penalized for spamming your keywords and rank
LOWER because of it. Also it's important to note that search engines can
not read the text in graphics, so if you are using a graphic-based
navigation or have your keywords on a graphic next to your logo, the
search engine will not notice it.
Some search engines will rank your site based on your title, description
and keywords that are supplied behind-the-scenes in special coding
called "meta tags." While not every search engine will read meta tags,
it certainly can't hurt to use them. Again, there are rules: your Title
meta tag can't be more than 100 characters, your Description meta tag
can't be more than 250 characters, and your Keyword meta tag can't be
more than 1,000 characters. And anti-spamming of keywords applies to
meta tags as well - no more than six instances of the same word in your
Keyword meta tag or you'll be penalized by the search engine. For
example, if my key phrases include "business coach," "starting a
business," and "small business coach," that counts as two uses of the
word "coach" and three uses of the word "business".
Submitting Your Site to Search Engines
Once your site is primed and ready for the search engines, then you
have to submit it to them. You have two choices: either go to each
search engine and submit your site individually, or use a search engine
submission tool. Remember that the majority of searchers use either
Google, Yahoo or MSN, so consider submitting to those first. You'll
often find a link on their main page where you can add a site to their
search engine. If you want to automate the process, use an automated
submission tool. Make sure the submission search tool you select will
analyze your site to tell you if you're really ready to submit, then
submit your site to the top search engines for you.
Preparing your site for submission to search engines can feel like a
daunting task. With these tips in mind, you'll save yourself a lot of
time and frustration when it comes time to submitting your site and rank
higher in search results.
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