INCREASING WEB SITE TRAFFIC BY REGISTERING

INCREASING WEB SITE TRAFFIC BY REGISTERING

WITH SEARCH ENGINES: HOW TO DO IT FOR BEST

RESULTS

By S. Hunter

Once you have a web site, the next most important step is getting traffic. One way to do this is by registering your site with popular search engines. This will allow web surfers searching for specific information to more easily find what you have to offer at your site. Examples of popular search engines are; HotBot, AltaVista, Yahoo, Webcrawler, Lycos etc.

There are 3 ways to do this:

1) You can register your site yourself by visiting each of the large engines yourself and submitting your web site address, key words and a description of your site. This can be quite time consuming but is fairly easy to do. Just follow the instructions at each site.

2) You can make use of the "Submit-It" type services where you enter your information once into a form and then click on each of the search engines to submit from that site. One example of this kind of "one stop submission" is Scott Bannister's www.submit-it.com. Some argue that these kinds of registrations aren't as effective; our research shows there really is no difference between using this method or going to each site directly to submit.

3) You can pay a registration service to input key words, a description and register your URL to the various search engines. If you haven't got the time, or the ability to create the meta tags discussed below this may be the option for you.

Whether you do the registrations yourself or pay someone to do it there are some things you can do to increase your ranking and the search results. Remember that in indexing your site, some search engines analyze the content of your page, some the title, and some the metatags so a combination of the suggestions below is suggested.

1) Be sure that meta tags are inserted into the HTML of your web pages. If you are using Microsoft FrontPage to create your web pages, it is easy to insert the proper meta tags. If you are using another type of page designer, consult your help files for how to do this.

From your tool bar, Select File, then Page Properties, then Custom, then click on Add. When the Meta Variable window appears type into the the word description, then under the type in a few sentences about what your site is about using descriptive specific words.

Click on "OK" when you are done. Then do the same for key words by clicking on "Add" then typing keywords separated by commas in the . Below that in the type in as many keywords as you can think of that describe what your page is about that might logically be used in a search. When done click "OK" and you now have metatags inserted in your web page.

2)In both your meta tags key words, and when entering key words into the search engines, use plural words when appropriate. A searcher is more likely to use "dogs" as a search word then "dog".

is filled in with a title that encapsulates what your page is about.3) Make sure your web pages all have titles. To check this, on your Microsoft FrontPage tool bar, click on File, then Page Properties, be sure that the

Example: "A1 Automobile Repair" is a better title than "A1's Web Site". Having a page title that begins with a letter early in the alphabet will sometimes product a better ranking with alphabetical directory style sites. For example, Alibaba Market Research Associates, as a page title may get a better ranking then, Market Research by Alibaba & Associates.

4) Use key words throughout your web site pages, but try and use the most common key words close to the top of your web pages. For example if your site is about nutritional supplements, make sure those words and related words like vitamin, and health products also appear in the body of your web page several times where possible. Many designers include a descriptive phrase at the very top of each web page to produce better search engine rankings.

5) It's recommended that you register not just your home page URL with the search engines but also your secondary linked pages using key words where possible.

6) Before you pay a service to register your site with 6,000 search engines, know that there are only about 25 - 50 search engines that people routinely use to search or information on the web. The more sites you are registered with the better, but, know that 80% of your traffic from search engines will come from the top 7 - 10 engines.

There you have it some ways to get some traffic to your site by registering with the major search engines. If you would like to explore this topic in more detail, visit sites like Webcrawler and AltaVista that explain how their index and ranking system works.

Register your site free at this site too, www.worldsearchcenter.com

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Sandi Hunter is Co-Founder of Worldprofit at http://www.worldprofit.com

For all your on and offline design needs, go to World Design Services at http://www.worlddesignservices.com

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