1) - only 16% of all the web pages submitted for registration
to the Internet search engines are successfully registered or
indexed.
2) - 95% of business web sites that are indexed by the search
engines list outside of the top 30 of searches returned on
popular keywords for their business category.
What does all
this mean?
Simple, your site is invisible to potential customers
searching the Web for your products. So what options do you
have? The most sensible and economical is to employ specialist
services to improve your search rankings, where in most cases a
radical improvement can be attained at a reasonable cost.
The
following are FAQ's we often encounter from businesses wishing
to improve their search rankings:
Q - How do I get my site listed on the search engines?
A - The easiest way is to submit your site directly to the
search engine, usually through the 'add URL' section on the
search engine homepage. The search engine 'robot' will then visit
your site and index your pages. Search engines are programmed to
examine the pages of a site and record specific information in a
manner that permits easy retrieval of relevant pages when called
to do so during a user search. Our recommendation is to focus on the leading engines - around 16
or so - and to avoid services that offer bulk submission to
hundreds of engines that nobody uses.
Q - I have submitted my site but it still does not turn up in
searches, why?
A - Be certain that your site is fully prepared before you submit
for search indexing. Many sites are simply rejected by the search
engines because the designers have not followed important
guidelines when constructing the site, or have been over zealous
in 'cramming' pages with keywords in an attempt to influence the
search engines. There are many tactics that result in penalty or
even 'banning' of the entire site for spamming or blatant
attempts at manipulation of the search engine. You must also be
patient, it can take anywhere between 2 days and 5 months for your
site to appear. Be prepared, be patient.
Q- What specific information should I include on my site to
attract favorable search rankings?
A - The type of information the search engines look for, and how
they handle the information, varies with each search engine. To
have a site that ranks well with more than one search engine
requires a good deal of effort, the details of which extend beyond
the scope of this report. Suffice to say that if you are serious
about achieving good results on most popular search engines, then
you will need to acquire a detailed knowledge of how they work.
Basic requirements of constructing a well prepared page include
the following:
TITLE Tag - use around six words, do not use your company name
unless it is a 'branded' name, use keywords at the start of the Tag
and do not repeat them.
META Keywords Tag - focus on popular keywords and use the most
popular at the start of the Tag. Avoid word repetition unless
offering synonyms.
Exercise caution when offering plurals and upper/lower case
variations. Avoid using superfluous words that do not appear on the
page. 12 to 14 words is average and most effective.
META Description Tag - Use 16 words max in most cases and avoid word
repetition. Use keywords but don't use key phrases or strings of
words that appear in exactly the same combination in other tags.
ALT-IMAGE attributes - name your images using single instances of
keywords.
Heading Tags - use them to encase headline text or bullet points.
Body Text - use at least 250 words and make use of keywords
positioned in the body text. Try to start the first sentence of the
first paragraph with a keyword and repeat the word one more time in
the paragraph. Use the keyword/phrase around three other times on the
page.
