Internet Business 101

Internet Business 101 : Search Engine Primer

Search Engine Primer
Author: Jason A. Martin

Unless you started using the Internet 5 seconds ago, you probably have used a search engine. Search engines are how most Internet users find websites. It is important that your website(s) are listed in the prominent search engines and listed high—the higher the better. This article is not meant to be a complete course on issues related to search engines, rather a quick overview. Check out other articles within Internet Business Entrepreneur for more.

For starters, steer clear of all services which offer to submit your website to the search engines for a fee. You may have seen these before. Company X offers to submit your site to thousands of search engines for $x. Companies like this offer absolutely nothing of value. Currently, a few major search engines and directories account for nearly all of the quality search engine traffic on the Internet. They are:

• Google
• MSN
• Yahoo
• DMOZ – open directory project

Many other search engines and directories use the results from these engines. The best way to get into these search engines is to get a link from a site already indexed in them and let them find you with their bots. In the case of Yahoo, you can pay to get indexed rapidly if you so desire.

Another type of company to stay away from is one who guarantees you a top 10 position in any search engine. Typically these companies will just rip you off. One common tactic is to get you to list many key phrases and then pick the easiest least competitive one to guarantee you on. The bottom line is they can’t do anything you can’t do quickly.

Keyword: A single word entered by a user in a search. Example: Widgets

Key Phrase: A group of words entered by a user in searches. Example: Free Blue Widgets

Bot: Term used to describe an automated program that performs programmed functions. In the case of search engines, a bot comes to your site and reads it then returns the data to the search engine.

It is vital that you learn about search engines and how to optimize your site for them. They will become a force in your marketing efforts. Start at this site and read everything.

SEO: Search Engine Optimization – used both as the act of optimizing your site and being someone who does this for a living. Should you not wish to do your own SEO work, you would hire a SEO specialist.

Today, getting your site listed properly takes time. To get listed in the ODP can take weeks to several months. It is important that you are not impatient and do anything against the guidelines. Our there are many companies which claim to have secret techniques or ways to get you listed high and fast. This is a guaranteed way to crash and burn.

Search Engine: An automated site like Google where users can search for sites and get a display of results based on the term(s) entered.

Directory: A human based site like the ODP that functions much like a search engine but all site entries are categorized and reviewed by human eyes before appearing in the directory.

PPC: Pay per click. There are services out there like Overture where you can place your site under keywords and key phrases then pay per click received. With these sites, website owners bid against each other for the cost per click to be paid and your ranking is determined by your bid.

I won’t touch on PPC sites too much here but will in other articles in our site. Google offers a PPC model in their search engine called ad words. It works the same as the PPC description above. Before going into this part of the promotion world you should do extensive reading and thinking. It is not something to just jump into.

Jason A. Martin has been conducting business on the Internet for 11 years. He is a free-lance writer on many topics and is currently working on obtaining a degree in Journalism and Law.

His official blog can be viewed at: Jason A. Martin

©2005 Jason Andrew Martin LLC

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