|
Click here to Print |
Because there are millions of sites on the Internet with more being added every day, your site will always have competition for placement in the top 40 sites of your category. Search engines inspect the Internet for new information daily, weekly, or monthly, depending on their programming. A site that is the number one search result today could easily be number ten, or lower, tomorrow. There are no foolproof methods for getting your site highly ranked, or keeping it there.
All search engines take submissions, though a few charge a fee for it. Each one has a different system of listing sites. You can manually check out every search engine you can think of, or you can go to a site-submission service and follow their steps to have your site submitted to multiple search engines. A good one to try is Search Engine Garage.
Note: Submitting your
site to search engines does not automatically guarantee listing in
their engines. Neither Pacific WebWorks or the individual search
engines can predict when and/or if your site will appear in search queries.
Once a search engine knows about your site, either a human or a computer will analyze it. Criteria involved in this analysis include:
Keywords and phrases - Always insert keyword and description "meta tags." Meta tags are special HTML tags inserted at the top of your pages that are often weighed heavily by search engines. The WebWizard Editor has a special meta tag editor that allows you to insert these important tags on each of your Web pages. You can insert both a keyword meta tag and a description meta tag. When you are choosing your key phrases, make them two or more words in length. Because of the vast amount of content on the Internet, searches for single words usually return results from thousands of sites. Multiple words and key phrases limit the amount of competition you will face and will increase your chance of being listed near the top of a search. Make your descriptions concise and meaningful.
Title tags - The most important area in which to place keywords is in the title. If you want to be referenced near the top of a search, make sure to include your keywords in your title.
Place your keywords near the top of your pages - Have your keywords placed near the top of your home page as a category title or part of your first few sentences. It is best to place your keywords above any graphics on the page.
Title your graphics relevantly - Give your graphics meaningful names that incorporate your keywords and title words. For instance, on a site that sells antique furniture, it is better to title a picture of an antique chair "antiques1.gif" instead of "0000.1.gif". This keeps your keyword "antique" in the search engine's results.
Use your keywords frequently - Many search engines also consider the frequency of your keywords in relation to other text on the page. Use your keywords often, but only if it is reasonable and relevant to do so.
Don't spam your pages - Because search engines rely heavily on keywords and key phrases, some pages have keywords used repeatedly and irrelevantly in a text color the same as the background color. This is called spamming and many search engines penalize these sites, and may even remove them from their searches.
For more information, check out Search Engine Watch.