|
Search Engine
Tips
What are the do's and dont's when submitting
a site?
Avoid the following:
- Frames.
Do not use frames, a lot of the search engines do not support them and it
restricts your listing potential. If you must, have lead in pages that you
submit that are not in frames so that you are still listed in the search
engines. Make sure that you have a decent amount of words on at least a few
pages on your site, keep them focused on the topic related to your site.
- Text the same color as the background.
This was a trick used to improve a sites ranking on a search engine.
However, these days engines are awake to these tricks. So using this method
will do your ranking more harm than good.
- Repeated Keywords.
"Spamming" certain keywords will also do your you more harm than good. Some
engines work on a relevancy percentage. ie: If you have 10 key words, each
key word will be given a %10 relevancy for your site.
- Flash
Though flash looks great, it does not contain any text or information about
your site. Spiders will not only have trouble indexing pages with flash, but
they will not find much information to index you with either, hence
affecting your ranking.
- Java Script.
The use of Java is fantastic on your web page, though an excessive use of
Java will often hinder a search engine spider. This in turn will lower your
chances of being indexed by the engines.
- Submitting too often.
Some engines have a No-Spam policy. If they receive the same submission
often, in a short period of time, they might reject your submission or give
you a lower ranking. We recommend that you do your submissions every 4
weeks.
- A url containing special characters such as: ?,
=, %, &
Often search engines will disregard url's with the above characters in them.
If possible please avoid the use of these types of characters.
- Pages requiring a cookie will not be indexed.
- How long will it take for my page to be added to the engine?
The time taken for your site to appear in the search engines varies greatly.
It may be instant, or it may take several months depending on the engine.
The submit pages on most sites will give you an approximation as to how long
it will take for your site to appear. Submitting your site to an engine does
not guarantee that it will be listed. Some engines review all submissions
manually and the administrators can add or reject your submission at their
discretion without notice. When you resubmit, be sure to be patient and
check that the information has been updated before you submit again.
- The use of meta tags is very important
It is important to ensure that your page has correct meta tags inserted into
the html code for page title, description and keywords. Most major engines
actually "spider" or download your page to get these and use them for the
title and keywords of your page on their sites. These keywords and meta tags
are used to store and retrieve your information in the search engines.
If you are not showing up in the first 200 or so entries under your chosen
keywords, you may need to design your page and meta tags to ensure that
users can find you under the keywords you wish to be found under. It is not
always a big change in your page that result in your position moving up, it
can be subtle changes that have the greatest effect. Don't forget it will
take a few weeks for your page to show up and not to submit too many times
and definitely not more than once in a day.
When you do search engine ranking, do not just look at your site. Look at
all the sites in the top 10 under the keywords that you want to be found
under. Maybe open a few of the top 5 in a different windows so you can
compare them. Look for where they used the keywords, how often, and the
layout of the pages. Viewing source in your web browser will also
allow you to see what they used in the keywords and description meta tags.
Look for similarities, in the pages then incorporate these into your web
page.
- Yahoo
Yahoo is a large, complex site that needs your special attention to get a
listing. They only have 750,000 sites. Where as AltaVista and Hotbot etc
hold around 110,000,000. It is hard to get a listing and there is nothing
that can effectively map out their category system. The only way is to go
there and explore and submit yourself. We could submit you to a general
category but you probably wouldn't get listed. You will not get the traffic
you deserve. As a note, Yahoo also provide a service where they charge $200
per submission and they guarantee to review your site for indexing. This
does not however guarantee a listing.
- Reciprocal
Try and find as many sites as you can that will link to your site. If you
manage to get a link from a site that has high traffic, there is a very good
chance that the traffic from that site will soon move on to your page. This
will be more relevant when the site that has your link is in some way
related to your site / service.
- What are the competition up to?
Go to a few of the search engines and search for topics relating directly to
your site's topic. See who comes up first, visit their pages and look for
counters and presentation. Choose a handful of sites that have reasonable
traffic, (or at least comparable traffic to yours) and approach them to have
reciprocal links. These can produce a fair amount of traffic, but be careful
to look after your link partners. If you are getting traffic from them and
they get nothing from you, they won't keep your link. Make sure you look
after them, especially, the good link partners. Do not hide their banners
away in the corner.
Reaching the top of search engine listings requires a lot of fine-tuning
and effort. There are millions of sites on the internet and they are all
vying for that top position. Submitting your site to all the engines is the
first step, fine tuning your meta tags and site content is the important
second step.
|