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>> Marketing >> Online Marketing: Search Engine Submissions & Ranking
When you are looking for something on the Internet, what do
you usually do? You go to a search engine. Where do
those results come from and how do you put your website up
there too?
The mother of all marketing tools online is the search
engine. There are many to choose from and there is no
reason not to be listed in as many as you possibly can.
However, there are only a few which garner more than 80%
(between them) of the Internet's searching traffic. These
are usually referred to as the "Top Ten Search Engines."
They are, in no particular order: Yahoo!, AltaVista, Lycos,
MSN, Netscape, AOL, Excite, LookSmart, Google, and the Open
Directory.
Now, this list is misleading for two reasons: 1) not all of
those listed are search engines, some are actually direct-
ories (human-edited, not computer-based "spiders") and
2) most of these sites interlink with one another to some
extent and many even share the same algorithms or data-
bases! Don't get the idea that there's one magic place to
submit your site to and everything will be hunky-dory.
That's not true. You'll want to submit to at least five or
six of the above list regardless of who they "link" with.
The first step in submitting your site to the search
engines requires only a text editor, word processor, or a
pen and paper. Write down all of the words and phrases (up
to three words each) that you can come up with which you
might type in a search box when looking for a company that
offers products/services similar to what you offer. Put
each on a separate line and try to come up with at least
five of them. Now open up your email program or pick up
the phone and call/email at least two of your friends, col-
leagues, and family members and have them do the same for
you. Take their lists and your list and compare them. Do
any of the phrases match? What about individual words?
The more matches, the merrier. Make a new list of matching
phrases/words and put a number next to each one indicating
how many matches it had. These are your keywords! The one
with the biggest number next to it is your first keyword/
phrase, with the rest falling into place according to rank.
After the first key phrase, the order of the rest is not a
big concern, so long as they are all listed.
Now look at your website. What is your website's Title
(usually appearing across the top left portion, or "title
bar" of your browser)? Does it contain your key phrase?
If not, it should. Don't make it ambiguous, though, humans
have to read that too. In fact, it may appear as the
title/link in search results!
Next look to your META tags. They are viewable only in the
source of your website. In Internet Explorer, open your
website, click "View" and select "Source." This opens
Notepad and shows the source file of your web page. Some-
where near the top will be a group of tags that have the
word META as the first word. One of these will be labeled
as "content='keywords'" and another as "content='descript-
ion'." These two are the ones you're after. What do they
say, if they even exist at all? Do they match your list
of keywords? Probably not. You can either change them
yourself and re-upload the new pages to your site or have
your Webmaster do this for you. Although the META key-
words tag is not as important to keyword ranking as it once
was, it still has some merit so it should still be used.
The next thing to consider is the actual body of your
index or website's front page (usually index.htm or html).
Since some search engines don't utilize the META descript-
ion or keywords tags, they will use the text appearing on
your front page to accomplish this. Make sure that the
text is readable, full of your keywords, and not over-
zealous (you don't need your keyword to appear 500 times,
once at the beginning, once at the end, and a few times in-
between is good). There isn't really a hard-and-fast rule
on this, but I would say ten or so times is more than
enough to get the point across.
Now you are ready to begin submitting your site to the
search engines and directories. What? You bought a nifty
piece of software that does this for you? I hope you
didn't pay a lot. No Internet Marketer will tell you to
use that software to submit to the Top Ten. Why? Because
you need to submit to each site individually and try to
optimize to each one. That software won't do that. If it
links to "thousands" of others, then by all means, the more
the merrier. Just remove the Top Ten from the list and go
ahead and use the software! The second rule to site
submissions is NEVER submit your site more than once every
three weeks (I round off to a month, since it's easier to
track). Otherwise, you run the risk of being considered a
SPAMmer to the search engines and you (and your site) may
become blocked altogether. Getting off that list is nearly
impossible, so staying off it in the first place is best!
Each engine is discussed below. I have not included the
URL for site submissions because these change regularly and
directories require that you go to the area where your site
would be listed and submit from there. Another thing you
should do is to go through your site completely and make
sure that there are no broken links, graphics, etc. If
your site doesn't look and act professionally, it might not
get listed. I strongly suggest that you open a text
editor/word processor and write a keyword list and
description line for EACH engine/directory. Label each and
put them on separate lines/paragraphs. This will help you
track your progress and aid you later with re-submissions.
Directories
The Open Directory (www.dmoz.org) - This is a completely
human-driven database and directory and is the leading
information house for the Google Engine. DMOZ is run
completely by volunteers and is a very tried-and-proven
system. Getting listed in the Open Directory will almost
guarantee a listing in AOL (America Online), Netscape,
Lycos, and other Google Engines.
Rules: Make the Open Directory editor's job as easy as
possible. Submit your items in such a way that the editor
will not feel the need to edit them (thereby possibly
changing your keywords) before acceptance. Your site
description should be a single sentence of not more than
fifteen words. It should convey what your site DOES (NOT
things like "Come check us out!"), contain at least two key
phrases, avoid any kind of hype (all caps, !!, etc.), use
proper sentence structure (capitalize the first word and
proper nouns ONLY), be written in the third person (i.e.
"Offers..." instead of "We offer..."), and end with a period
(not a ? or a !).
Now select the proper category for your site (usually by
searching your keywords!). Once you have found a spot that
matches (and the sites are similar to yours), then find the
"Add URL" link at the top right. Some categories require
that you further specify sub-categories before submission
and will not list an "Add URL" link. Keep moving through
likely sub-categories until you find the right spot. Then
fill in the blanks. Your official site name should match
your TITLE tag and including your email address, though
optional, is a good idea since the editor may wish to send
you an email to explain why you were/weren't or whether you
were/weren't listed.
Yahoo! (www.yahoo.com) - Yahoo! and the Open Directory are
very similar in function, though they aren't related other-
wise. Yahoo! is the mother of all search engines and will
gather you more traffic than any other search engine on the
Web. Yahoo! knows this, though, so expect to pay for the
privilege of being listed there as a business. Currently,
it is about $300 and carries no guarantee that you will be
listed, only that you will be reviewed.
Rules: Read their instructions THOROUGHLY. Read the Help
Index (http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/url) and their How To
page (http://docs.yahoo.com/info/suggest). They are very
strict about their rules, so if you inadvertently break one
of them, not only will you not get listed, you may be out
your $300! Now make sure you are "providing unique
content." Yahoo! is very adamant about this. If your site
is nothing but affiliate links and supplies no useful
information for the user (this information is not one-
liners, it should be at least three or four pages in
total), then you will not get listed. You also need to
list a physical address for your business (PO boxes don't
count). There are a million things you can do wrong and
not get listed at Yahoo!--too many to list here. My sug-
gestion is to either hire a professional and pay them to do
it, or get listed in the other engines and wait for your
site to pop up in Yahoo! on its own.
Search Engines/Spiders
Most of these are similar with only minor differences.
MSN/Looksmart (www.msn.com/www.looksmart.com ) - These two
combined to become one engine and should be considered
singular, though many still refer to them separately. The
downside to Microsoft ownership? Money. They charge $150-
$300 to list your site, depending on your chosen options.
Rules: If you really wish to be listed here, I suggest
using the "Note sure...Let us help!" area at the bottom of
the submission screen. Put in your URL
(http://www.yoursite.com) and submit it there. Within two
or three days (usually), someone will contact you via email
or phone (depending on what you have listed on your site
for contact). This may seem pushy, since you'll have to
talk to a salesperson, but it's worth it if you're going to
spend the money to get listed. This person will set you up
and even submit the site for you! All you have to do is
cough up the money.
Google (www.google.com) - This is a good engine to submit
to, since it is the base for many other search engines out
there. The Googlebot takes a couple of weeks to look for
you, but will spider your site eventually.
Rules: It's pretty simple to get listed here. Put in your
URL (including http://) and put your keywords (no commas)
OR your description (either is good) under "Description."
AOL (www.search.aol.com) - If you get listed in the Open
Directory, you will not need to submit to AOL. Submitting
here submits to the Open Directory rather than to AOL!
Lycos (www.lycos.com) - This is a simple submission, though
somewhat tedious. They usually spider within a month.
Rules: There aren't really any rules to this engine. Put
in your URL and you're finished. If you want to create
search terms for EVERY page on your site and enter each
page individually (Lycos allows this), then you should do
so. This becomes tedious, but may pay off when their
spider comes to your site.
AltaVista (www.altavista.com) - As of this writing,
AltaVista is having financial trouble and has reportedly
not updated their database in over six months. So if you
do submit your site, don't expect it to be listed very
soon.
Rules: Although they give a lot of options, I wouldn't go
beyond "basic" at this point. You can ad the others later
(they all cost something). Other than that, there aren't
any specifics to know when submitting here.
Netscape (www.netscape.com) - The same as AOL, this engine
gets its listings from the Open Directory. "Ad a Site" is
only a link to their professional search engine submission
service.
Excite (www.excite.com) - Interestingly, Excite has
partnered with Looksmart (aka Microsoft) and is now
charging for submissions (same as above). The search
engine itself still lists itself separately from the other
two, however. If you plan to spend the money, I would use
the Looksmart submission instead. It's a little more helpful.
Obviously you need to get listed in the search engines to
get noticed significantly online. The down-side to this is
that, unlike the early days of the World Wide Web, getting
listed in the popular search engines is time-consuming,
becoming expensive, and takes FOREVER. There are few
"free" alternatives for the little guy anymore. If you are
in a hurry to get listed and have the budget, then by all
means use the paid services. If you aren't, make sure that
you're listed in the Open Directory (at the very least) and
you'll show up elsewhere as time goes on. Search engine
placement/marketing has become a full-time job in itself
with several professionals making careers out of it. I
suggest 1stSearchRanking
(http://www.1stSearchRanking.com/t.cgi?1778). Although
they are expensive, your results are GUARANTEED and you
will be listed high in each search engine!
=====
Aaron Turpen is the proprieter of Aaronz WebWorkz, a full-
service provider of Web needs to small businesses.
www.AaronzWebWorkz.com
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