How to get found -- Search engine basics
Making your website visible to search engines
How do people find your website?
Self Marketing
Of course the site should be listed on your business cards. It should be listed on your emails. It should be listed on any paper promotional materials you may produce. These techniques are in your control, and if you don't use them, you are lessening your opportunity to bring visitors to your site.
Plan to be seen by search engines
For those people who don't have the opportunity to learn about you from one of the methods listed above, being listed in one of the several search engines is the key to attracting visitors. A search engine is a website that will list websites matching key words the searcher provides. Google, MSN Search, and Yahoo are popular search engines. If you want to learn more about how search engines work, see the links below.
Briefly, your site gets noticed by search engines this way:
- Title tags contain keywords that searchers use to find a site like yours.
- Your header tags and site content that uses those same keywords and provides information about those key phrases
- Your site refrains from using javascript and graphics as a replacement for text. Search engines ignore graphic images and javascript. Many site developers will make their sales pitches based on splashy graphics, nifty javascript doo-dads or flash movies. These techniques are all useful in certain situations, but to rely on them for the fundamental aspects of your site is to be totally invisible to the search engines.
- When other websites link to your site, this can improve your search engine position. In fact, the more relavant links to your site the more important your site appears to the search engine. The more important the site that links to your site is, the more weight is given by the search engine. While you can't control who links to your site, you can ask other sites to link to yours. You can check Chamber of commerce, or other business promoting sites to see if you can list your site with them. You can write articles for other websites that highlight your experitise. These sites will then link to yours. Its not magic, it takes time and creativity, but by being active in the world wide web, you can slowly add links to your site.
So, to be the most visible
- Make use of all of the paper resources you have, and word of mouth to spread the word about your site
- Make sure your site is designed with searching in mind. Don't be seduced by those who make web sites that are more 'eye-candy' than information
- Find ways for other sites to link to yours.
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