Authorized Designers - Homestead.com8 SEARCH ENGINE MARKETING
Typically, search engines are completely automated, and they are comprised of a large database that is queried through their Web page. A typical user will enter a search term when searching on the Internet. If that search term is not present anywhere on your web page(s), your site will not come up in the Search Engine results. Web site owners can add their site to this database by filling in a form or two, which instructs a "spider" to visit the submitted *URL.
*URL (Uniform Resource Locater): Absolute
A Complete path, or address, of a file on the Internet. Sometimes called a complete URL. URL's are the global addresses of documents and other resources on the World Wide Web.
A search engine works by sending out a "spider" to fetch as many documents as possible. Another program, called an "indexer", then reads these documents and creates an index based on the words contained in each document (site-page). Each search engine uses a proprietary algorithm to create its indices such that, ideally, only meaningful results are returned for each query. There are actually three different kinds of search sites: search engines, search directories (i.e. Yahoo!), and Meta searchers.
The Web is a lot like a really really big library. There are millions of things out there, and if you know the URL (in effect a kind of call number) you can get them. Since the Web has books, movies, and pizza joints, the number of ways you might want to look things up includes all the things a library uses, plus all the things the video store uses, plus all the things the Yellow Pages use, and lots more.
The problem at the moment is that there is hardly any meta-data on the Web. So how do we find things? Mostly by using dumb, brute force techniques. The dumb, brute force is supplied by the wandering web robots of search engine sites like Google, Altavista, Overture, Lycos etc. These sites do the equivalent of going through the library, reading every book, and allowing us to look things up based on the words in the text. It's not surprising that people complain about search results, or that the robots are always way behind the growth and change of the Web.
Your website absolutely MUST be listed in the first 20 to 30 search results, or you'll get almost zero traffic from the search engines.
WEB DISCOVERY
Banner Ads: 1%
Targeted E-mail: 1.2%
TV Spots: 1.4%
"By Accident": 2.1%
Magazine Ads: 4.4%
Word-of-Mouth: 20%
Random Surfing: 20%
Search Engines: 46%
META SEARCH ENGINES
What is a meta search engine? A meta search engine is a search engine that searches other search engines! i.e. Searches Google, or Yahoo for instance! These engines query a host of databases simultaneously and returns the results to you in one list. True meta search engines represent a significant advancement in the science of searching the web.
The major advantage of a meta search engine is the ability to access a cross section of engines on the web thereby greatly enhancing the coverage of your search. And a good meta search engine provides significantly more coverage than any one engine can, all within the same few seconds it takes to search any one engine.
META searchers include: Ask Jeeves (http://www.askjeeves.com) and Dogpile
Because META Search Engines only query other databases, you can't add your URL. However, if your URL is listed in the databases it checks, your site will come up in relevant searches.
WEB PROMOTION
“Without promotion something terrible happens… NOTHING!!
P.T. Barnum, 19th Century Circus & Sideshow Promoter
Are you looking for ways to increase traffic to your website? Of course you are.
If you are a web developer/or site owner, you should know how your customers and website visitors use the search engines. For example, if you are a graphic designer it will be very useful to know what searches your potential target audience is doing. This will allow you to find the best combination of keywords for your website.
It's worth taking the time to make your site more search engine friendly, because some simple changes may pay off with big results. Even if you don't come up in the top ten for your target keywords, you may find an improvement for target keywords you aren't anticipating. The addition of just one extra word can suddenly make a site appear more relevant, and it can be impossible to guess what that word will be. In terms of website building you can build the most interesting site, however, if people do not know about it, they will NOT come. So what can you do then to promote your site?
Do not forget in all your efforts to promote your site, that the site itself is perhaps the most effective tool to promote your business. If your site is well-designed and you offer a product or service customers want, your customers will tell their friends, family, colleagues, even complete strangers, about your site. Selling customers on your site and product or service leads to the most cost-effective means of advertising – word-of-mouth advertising.
Also, remember that while search engines are a primary way people look for web sites, they are not the only way. People also find sites through word-of-mouth, traditional advertising, the traditional media, newsgroup postings, web directories and links from other sites. Many times, these alternative forms are far more effective draws than are search engines. Often search engine marketing articles ignore the fact that a large portion of Internet users - that know exactly where they are going because they have seen a site address on another website, on a flyer, etc. Sometimes it is more important to get one customer who wants to find your site, rather than 100 visitors just browsing sites in a search engine.
So, instead of chasing the 1st page ranking on all search engines, you may wish to put your energies into offline promotions, listing your site in the yellow pages, newspaper classifieds, trade magazines or other areas. Be creative! Sometimes the simplest idea is the one that brings you the most customers.
Finally, know when it's time to call it quits. A few changes may be enough to make you tops in one or two search engines. But that's not enough for some people, and they will invest days creating special pages and changing their sites to try and do better. This time could usually be put to better use pursuing non-search engine publicity methods.
- Use the “Recommend This Site” element in your web design/layout so your visitors can send your site address to others if they feel they would be interested.
- Add "customer testimonials" to your site to lend “credibility” and “showcase” your best customers.
- Use “Mailing List” elements to set up a “Customer Mailing List” for promoting sales or providing information about new products or services. i.e. Newsletters
- Add a “Guest Book” element to collect visitor comments.
- Revise and update your site content to give customers a reason to return. Keep your site "fresh".
- And last… Don't obsess over your ranking. Even if you follow every tip and find no improvement, you still have gained something.
FACTS
84% of online American adults have used search engines. That amounts to 108 million people. On any given day, 56% of those online use search engines. No surprise here—we know from Jupiter Research and other sources that searching is the second most popular online activity, just behind email.
- 92% of those who use search engines say they are confident about their searching abilities, with over half of them, 52%, saying they are "very confident."
- 87% of online searchers say they have successful search experiences most of the time, including 17% of users who say they always find the information for which they are looking.
- 55% of searchers say about half the information they search for is trivial, and half is important to them.
- 50% of searchers say they like search engines but could go back to other ways of finding information; 32% say they can't live without search engines; and 17% say could let them go tomorrow.
- 47% of searchers will use a search engine no more than once or twice a week; 35% of searchers will use a search engine at least once a day.
- 44% of searchers say they regularly use a single search engine, 48% will use just two or three, 7% will use more than three.
- 68% of searchers say that search engines are a fair and unbiased source of information; 19% say they don't trust search engines.
aI have researched keyword combinations of sites with good listings on various search engines.
aI have used META keywords tags on EACH page within my site, using different combinations to get better listings for various searches.
aI have used META-Page Description tags on each page.
aI have used META robots tags to protect any pages I do not wish indexed from being spidered, and to ensure others are listed.
aI have utilized keywords/phrases in my pages content to ensure better listings in various search engines that spider my content.
aI have made sure my site is finished before submitting anywhere, or pretty darn close anyway.
aI have tested the compatibility of my site on various platforms with various browsers.
aI have validated my code to make sure there are no errors.
Not thinking too much about the title of your page(s) is one of the most common oversights people make when creating a Web site. Not all search engines use your title as a criteria in determining your relevancy for any given search, however, most do!
Once you're sure that everything is done, it's time to start getting the word out about your site!
Search engines work by using frequency and number of links -- Link Directory/Exchange Pages are critical!!. Keeping this in mind, you can affect the ranking of your website, by reciprocating. It is becoming increasingly more difficult to influence criteria. Site "Popularity" and "*average visiting times", weighs more heavily when ranking is decided.
*How long a visitor hangs out in your site.
The formula, to achieve a high ranking, is constantly changing for most search engines. Sure, you can still do well, for a short time on a couple of engines, but to consistently do great on more than a few, you may need help.
Some search engines like Overture, Lycos, Teoma, etc. provide web-based utilities that give us clues about the popular searches being made.
The formula, to achieve a high ranking, is constantly changing for most search engines. Sure, you can still do well, for a short time on a couple of engines, but to consistently do great on more than a few, you may need help.
Some search engines like Overture, Lycos, Teoma, etc. provide web-based utilities that give us clues about the popular searches being made.
KEYWORD UTILITIES
You need to bid and buy the top spot. So Overture has a tool to find a suitable combination(s) of keywords. You can also use this software to find a suitable bid price at Overture.com for your combination of keywords.
To use the software, Click on the 'Overture' tab in the program and type in the main keyword(s), then press 'go'. The software will connect to the Overture website and retrieve all the related searches for that word. Similarly you can use the 'Yahoo' or 'Teoma' tabs. Double clicking on an entry in the list will cause that entry to be looked up.
Yahoo.com
They offer a keyword suggestion list that tells you the related searches that are usually performed. This normally has about 100 related keywords and is very useful.
Teoma.com
Similar to Lycos they offer a ‘related searches’ box that lists other related search words. Note: You are likely to get maximum number of possible suggestions with the Overture & Yahoo tools and minimum number of suggestions from the Teoma tool.
GoogleKeywords.com
Resource URL: www.GoodKeywords.com (Freeware)
They offer a keyword suggestion list that tells you the related searches that are usually performed. This normally has about 100 related keywords and is very useful.
Similar to Lycos they offer a ‘related searches’ box that lists other related search words.
Note: You are likely to get maximum number of possible suggestions with the Overture & Yahoo tools and minimum number of suggestions from the Teoma tool.
SITE POPULARITY METER
Alexa.com
Ever wondered how much traffic your competitor’s website is getting? Check it out. See “www.Alexa.com”. In the Web-Search box type: www.CompetitorURL.com
This is a free web navigation tool that also powers the 'Show Related Links' information in Internet Explorer and the 'What's Related' button in Netscape. They also rank every web site according to the number of times Alexa users have visited the site in the past six months.
Alexa user base is very large and is a very good representation of relative web traffic. Of course it takes into account only Windows users.
The "Site Popularity Meter" retrieves this information from Alexa and provides it in a clean tabular display. Simply type in the URL, click 'Go' and the software will retrieve the ranking and the number of Alexa links. All information is displayed in a nice table. You can right click within the list for various options. You may click on the list headings to sort the list (rank wise, site wise, etc.)
Use Site Popularity Meter to:
- Find how your site compares with that of your competitors.
- See how popular your competitors are.
- Plan your web site promotional efforts more efficiently.
- Check usefulness of an advertisement campaign on a particular site.
- Find sites that are useful to you for link swapping.
- Resource URL: http://www.itoolpad.com/products/sitepop/
SEARCH ENGINES SUBMISSION ESSENTIALS
SE Submission
A Complicated Subject!! Getting Listed -- "Search Engine Submission" refers to the act of getting your web site listed with search engines. Another term for this is search engine registration. Getting listed does not mean that you will necessarily rank well for particular terms, however. It simply means that the search engine knows your pages exist.
Think of it like a lottery. Search engine submission is akin to you purchasing a lottery ticket. Having a ticket doesn't mean that you will win, but you must have a ticket to have any chance at all. SE
Optimization
Improving The Odds -- "Search Engine Optimization" (SEO) refers to the act of altering your site so that it may rank well for particular terms, especially with crawler-based search engines.
Returning to the lottery model, let's assume there was a way to increase the odds of winning by picking your lottery numbers carefully. Search engine optimization is akin to this. It's making sure that the numbers you select are more likely to win than purchasing a set of numbers at random.
Placement & Positioning
Ranking Well -- Terms such as "Search Engine Placement," "Search Engine Positioning" and "Search Engine Ranking" refer to a site actually doing well for particular terms or for a range of terms at search engines. This is the ultimate goal for many people -- to get that "top ten" ranking for a particular keyword or search terms.
SE Marketing & Promotion
The Overall Process -- Terms such as "search engine marketing" or "search engine promotion" refer to the overall process of marketing a site on search engines. This includes submission, optimization, managing paid listings and more. These terms also highlight the fact that doing well with search engines is not just about submitting right, optimizing well or getting a good rank for a particular term. It's about the overall job of improving how your site interacts with search engines, so that the audience you seek can find you.
SEARCH ENGINES - BUDGET
Budget
Despite the rise in "paid participation" programs offered by search engines free search engine submission is still possible. However, using the paid programs that are offered will speed up the listing process and almost certainly generate more search engine related traffic for your web site. Given this, it is highly recommended that any site owner establish a search engine submission budget. This is true whether you are running a commercial web site, a "hobbyist" site in your own time or a site for a non-profit organization.
Budget - Yahoo
How much to budget? At minimum, you MAY want to cover submission to Yahoo's human-compiled directory for one year. This is because the flat $300 annual fee that Yahoo charges may help ensure that major crawler-based search engines pick up your home page quickly.
Huh? Pay to be in human-compiled results in hopes of influencing crawlers? Crawlers analyze links from across the web to decide which pages they should pick up and potentially rank well. Being listed in Yahoo's human-compiled directory is potentially one of the best links you can gain, to influence crawlers.
It may be that crawlers will find your page and perhaps rank it well even without the benefit of a Yahoo link. So if money is tight, wait two or three months after you launch your site and see how you do. If you still aren't doing well with crawlers, then spending the money with Yahoo may help you.
Budget - FAST!
Often, those who launch new web sites want to appear in search engines right away. A key way to do this is by using paid placement programs. The budget below will get you going for at least a month, in most cases. After that, it may be that you'll have some "natural" or "free" listings appearing. When this happens, you could potentially stop doing advertising -- though a wiser course is to continue with advertising as insurance against potential problems with your free listings.
•Overture (GoTo): $50•Google: $25TOTAL: $75Register Regionally -- Register regionally instead of nationally; i.e. with sites like Yahoo. They will still add you to their main database; however, you will get registered much quicker regionally.
Bottom Line -- Now let's put it all together. Here's the ideal amount you would budget, if you want to show up in the widest range of important search engines within a matter of days:
•Yahoo: $300•Paid Listings: $75TOTAL: $375If your goal is to be seen right away in as many places as possible, you'll set aside the amount shown above, in the combined budget.
If your goal is to be seen right away in as many places as possible, you'll set aside the amount shown above, in the combined budget.
Search Engines: Continued - Page #2
