META tags tutorial,search engine submission,submission software--Virtually Ignorant

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Virtually Ignorant - Turning Web Newbies into Internet CEO's!

Submit Your Site to Search Engines (AKA Our Meta Tag Tutorial)

Now that you've got your web page built, you've found a host and uploaded your files, and you've put the finishing touches on the website, you may want to let the world know about your site. While sending email to all your relatives may help, the world at large often relies on "search engines" to find interesting web sites. A search engine is a program, often on the Internet itself, which searches for words that the user gives it. These words that the user types in are called "keywords". The search engine then looks within a database for records that include those keywords. After finding a number of sites with these keywords, the search program will then apply an algorithm or a mathematical formula, to rank the pages. Different algorithms are the essential difference between search engines. Many sites use the Open Directory Project for their database, but you will get widely different results depending on how the site weights different factors. The results page is then displayed with some or all of the records found and usually includes links to the locations of those records, that is your pages.

Many search engines use automated software called robots or spiders to search text and codes on web pages to store as data in their databases. Another common way that search engines acquire their list of keywords is from submissions. Many sites ask for a "description" of your site when you submit your URL (Universal Resource Locator, or the address of your site), and they use words from that description as keywords. Some sites provide separate boxes for you to enter your keywords.

What all this means is that if you want people to visit your site, there are several things you can do that will prepare it and help others find it when they do a search. The algorithms used by the search engines weight certain things more than others.
Some of these things are:

Use of keywords in the first paragraph of your webpage.
Use of keywords in your <title> tag.
Use of keywords in your META tags.
Use of keywords within submissions.
Some rumors of use of keywords in the domain name, file name, or directory name.

Using keywords in the first paragraph of your webpage

Using keywords in the first paragraph of your webpage will help your page come out higher on the search engine results, which means that more people will see your page listed. Try to make sure that your page has some keyword content on it at the beginning, not just images or promotional hype. The more real content you have on your page, the more likely you will be ranked better under those keywords that relate to your page. We've read that key words in the last paragraph are also weighted more heavily than in the middle of the page. The important point here is to make your page relevant to the keywords you are targetting.

A really cool tip we read (oops, forgot to note where, so we are here by guilty of not giving credit to the author) for keeping your actual content above your very often left hand navigation bar is to use a very small table cell, ideally 1 x 1 pixel in a table like this:

1 x 1 gif This is your content area
PUT LOTS OF KEYWORD RICH CONTENT HERE, CUZ BOTS LOVE IT, ESPECIALLY GOOGLE, WHICH IS WHERE YOU WILL GET MOST OF YOUR TRAFFIC

Navigation items here
In fact you can embed a really cool table, or your button images no problem

Using META tags in your header or page (otherwise known as our Meta tag tutorial)

META tags are just another HTML tag that you can put in the <HEAD> </HEAD> element of your webpage. Generally one uses a META tag for description , and one for keywords at least. Review WebTutor if you need a refresher on what a tag is, and what an attribute is. Briefly, the syntax for META tags is like this:

<META name="description" content="your page description here">

Remember that in your <HEAD> tags you usually have a <TITLE> tag for your page title. You will also probably want to have a keyword Meta tag:

<HEAD>
<TITLE>Your Page Title </TITLE>
<META name="description" content="Your page description here">
<META name="keywords" content="Your keywords go here, separated by commas">
</HEAD>

The search engine will usually sometimes results of your page like this:
Your Page Title
Your page description here

There is usually no limit to the number of keywords you can use, though repetitions can confuse the search engine or get you banned for spamming. Also, ranking of the search is usually higher if your keywords appear somewhere in the text of your site. In fact, some engines are said to drop your ranking to the bottom of the internet abyss if you have a keyword listed in your meta tags that does not appear on the page. There is much more to learn about META tags, but these two tags will already help you in submitting your site to search engines successfully.

Using keywords when submitting your site

A large number of search engines use information that you provide when you submit your pages to their site. When submitting a page, you should try to use as many keywords as possible, and include them within a sentence in the description box of such a search engine submission. While these are the basics of page submission, you may really want to take advantage of a submission service to get the highest ranking you can on a search engine. Most people will not really look past the first 10 to 20 search results from their search, so your ranking on the search will determine the traffic you get to your site.

To sum up, we read this tip on Jim's World Search Engine Discussion Boards:

Once, Twice, Thrice
Once in the page title, twice in the description meta tag, and thrice in the keywords meta tag.
Don't put word repetitions right next to each other either - use them in phrases, and keep three words in between the repetitions.

To target the best keywords, try Word Tracker. We are very pleased with the service. You can use their program to see which keywords get the most traffic, but have the least number of competing websites. This algorithm is called a Keyword Efficiency Index (KEI), and helps you figure out a niche in the search engine keyword race. They also have a Free Trial which is more limited than the full package, but still very helpful.

If you look at our search box page you'll see that we have a lot of links to different search engines. We've read rumors that pages that actually link to the engines rank better!

Some free Submission Services

Beware that some free services harvest your email. Also, claims that there are 9,000 search engines that you should submit to are bogus. Probably about 10-20 will bring you traffic.

Do It Yourself Submission Software

Submit Wolf
Trellian has a whole great array of useful software for webmasters. The Submit Wolf software can help you automate your own site submission, as well as help you run your own submission business. The software allows you to add links to over 1500 pages at once. Try the free trial version first, and buy it if you like the results.
We also used to list here Web Position Gold, but use of it can really risk you getting banned from certain search engines, so we have removed our recommendation of it.

Do It Yourself by Hand

Honestly, this is the best way to go. Noone knows your site like you do. The links at spider-food.net take you right to the submission pages. For the Search engines, it takes half an hour or less. More time is needed to properly submit to the directories, since you must be careful about the category you choose.

Note: Yahoo! and Open Directory Project are actually directories, not strictly search engines. We discuss directories further on.

Have a professional do it

Another less popular solution with folks starting out is to pay a professional Search Engine Optimization company to optimize your site for search engines. When you are making your first personal homepage this may not sound like a solution you need, but when you are starting your first multi-million dollar e-business, it's a good investment. We recommend you try 1design4life search engine positioning. When you need it done professionally, it's best to hire a professional.

And if you don't believe us that it's better to submit your site yourself by hand, we will still provide you with a service that will auto-submit your site to the top ten search engines:

Free Top Ten Search Engine Submission!

Find out how to insert this at your website!

RECOMMENDED LINKS

Read about Pay-per-click search engines: tips, techniques, and recommendations. By Elisabeth Archambault.

Word Tracker -- target the right keywords to get the most traffic.