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Getting
positioned for people to find you
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Search
Engines
A search engine
is a Web site on the Internet which someone
may use to find desired Web pages and sites.
A search engine will generally return the
results of a user's search ranked by relevancy.
The formula for determining what is the most
relevant varies. |
Positioning
There's no magic way to put your page into the top
10 positions of every search engine
automatically.
However, there are many proven techniques which we've
used and our customers have used to move into the
top 10 and even the number one slot for your chosen
keywords
and phrases.
The dividends it pays in increased traffic will be
well worth the effort!
Most people tend to drop the ball at this point, not
realizing the enormous amount of traffic the search
engines can generate for your site, if you know how
to make yourself visible in them.
Keywords
Refers to any
word or phrase the user might search for in
order to find your Web site or a page on your
site.
Each variation of a keyword, such as the plural
form of the word, is treated like a separate
keyword.
Phrases (i.e., a string of multiple keywords)
is generally used interchangeably. |
How
the Search Engines Work
If you've used the Internet at all, you should be
very familiar with what Internet Search Engines
do. You've also noticed that its sometimes hard to
find what you're looking for, even with a fairly specific
search.
Your potential visitors will have the same trouble,
unless you do a little leg work to make sure you're
listed well for the keywords
that are important to your Web site.
Just in case you're unfamiliar with how the engines
work, here's a brief explanation: Most engines "spider"
the Web looking for new pages to add to their database
or index. You can wait for one of these spiders to
locate your site but you could be in for a long wait.
The better approach is to go to their site (or a site
submission service) and tell them about your new Web
site.
 Once your pages are added to the index, people can
do a search on the Internet for various keywords to
find pages that "best" match their search criteria.
Appearing within the first few pages of the search
is critical to people finding you.
These matches will be ranked or positioned in order
of importance. This is called your Search Position.
The exact rules they use to rank pages for
relevance are generally kept a secret and change often.
However, many of these rules can be determined through
simple observation.
Search
Positions
When someone
on the Internet wishes to find something,
they'll generally go to one of the popular
search
engines and perform a search on one
or more keywords.
Most engines will then rank the matching pages
with the most "relevant" matches first.
The position your page places in this list
is your search position. It is very
important that you appear near the top of
these lists to have a chance of people finding
you. |
Choosing
Keywords!
(very important!)
Target the wrong keywords
and all your efforts will be in vain. Choose the right
keywords, and you'll see your traffic skyrocket. Therefore,
think long and hard on what keywords people are likely
to use to find you.
Make lists of keywords and them combine them into
two or three word phrases. For example, you rarely
want to target a single keyword since with the billions
of words indexed on the Web now, generally one word
simply won't cut it.
 People learn quickly that if they type in "real estate"
or "properties" that they get listings for real estate
from all over the world! Now it would be nice if you
popped up there on those extremely broad keywords,
however, a better use of your time is to PAIR the
generic keyword with something more specific.
You might get lucky and rank well on just real estate
since it's in your page too, but if not, at least
you'll rank well on "Boston real estate", which will
be far less difficult to achieve a top 10 or top 20
listing for.
These keywords will also bring you far more qualified
prospects!
The Bad News
 Submitting is not enough Unfortunately, simply
submitting your pages is only part of the job. With
millions of pages in dozens of search indexes, the
odds of many people finding you are still not very
good without careful planning.
Even after you submit, the page can often be dropped
later for no apparent reason or never be accepted
at all. Search engines
are not yet 100% accurate. But considering the sheer
volume they deal with everyday, its understandable.
The main reason submitting is not enough are your
search positions.
It takes some follow up, revision, and resubmitting
of your pages to improve your positions on the search
engines. If people search for a keyword
or phrase and can't find you, then you might
as well not be in the search engine index at all!
Getting Results
There are many tips that can help you get a favorable
listing in most cases. Unfortunately, there's no 100%
way to always be listed first, particularly since
the rules change continually and vary by each search
engine.
 There's also others
trying to achieve the same position. However, you
can stay ahead of your competition with only a minimal
amount of maintenance time. You can also stay ahead
of much of the meaningless "junk" that's piled up
on the Web and in the search indexes.
There are many tips that are proven to be effective
to improve rankings, many of which we've used ourselves
on our own Web sites and watched quality traffic increase
dramatically.
Those tips (or tricks) are different for each search
engine and rules are constantly changing. We get
monthly reports informing us what rules have been
changed by what engine. As a result the art of Positioning
has turned into a new science and at VisionFriendly NC
we are proud to be among the few that specialize
in that science so we can help keep you as visible
as possible. |
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