As an intro to “Search Engineering” We would like to give you some information.  There are some misconceptions regarding the Internet in general and the SE (search engines) in particular that need explanation before attempting to get listed.  SEngineering is a tough hurdle to begin with, and one that never ends. It might be a good approach to explain what SE’s are NOT, and dispel some myths before even starting the positive steps.             

Myth #1: There must be an easy way to get to the top of the major search engines... 

For example:             Let’s say your business provides clowns for parties, what happens when your potential customers try to find you?  66,333 web pages are listed on Infoseek when you search for the word “clown.”  You are shown 10 of them at a time.  What gives your web site any more chance of getting listed on the top than the other 66,323 pages?

            If it were really easy to figure out exactly how to get placed on the first page, everyone would do it.  Then, however, everyone would still not be on the first page. It’s just like the freeway at rush hour traffic. You want to find a direct route home. So does everyone else.  So what happens?  There is competition for the top 10 seats.  People are trying to take away the top spots every day.  They are always trying to fine tune and tweak their HTML code and learn the next little trick.  The best players even know dirty ways to “bump off” their competition while protecting their own sites.  You can rest assured, SE’s are watching for these “spamdexers.”  If they catch them, they kick them out.

Myth #2: As soon as my site is submitted to all the rest of the search directories, everyone will find me...

            It takes time for the computers to process all of the hundreds of thousands of requests that they have everyday.  Even if you know the latest tricks and are able to write a Web page that would sort to the top of the list, you are still not going to see that page show up for several days or several weeks.  A lot of people assume it is something that happens instantly.  This is probably because of outrageous claims like ‘Put your site on 300 search engines for $39 dollars.”

            Keep in mind that you will never be on all the search directories.  There are several hundred around the world.  Most people can only name about than 10 of them.  Even if you automate the submission process, you can’t automate the ranking process since each directory has unique criteria for sorting and listing the pages.  A computer is not able to determine which categories would give you best exposure or rewrite your headline to make it stand out on the page.  More unfortunately, many useful resource sites are now simple depositories for automatic submissions, so no one will ever look at the pages that are listed there.

           Many people are using the "free" and "easy" ploy as a come-on for an upsell opportunity. Anything worth doing is worth doing well! This has never been truer of anything than SE's. If you want the traffic and the exposure, you are going to pay for the education (and I've already spent thousands on my Education), or you are going to want to find a company who can provide with this service. There is no other way to do it. It is NOT magic. It is NOT luck! It takes time, effort, and knowledge. Then it takes continual monitoring to keep the position you worked so hard to get in the first place. This service is not needed for all web sites. The question you should ask yourself is, "How am I going to attract traffic to my web site." Then you make the decision.

           Now let's get to the positive! There are many approaches to high rankings in the SE's, at least as many as there are SE's themselves. Each SE has it's own algorithm(s) and processes for ranking, (and remember, these are constantly changing). A Search Engineer has subscriptions to the newsletters and forums to ALL the resources just to keep current.

           Quite often the client will have Keywords or phrases in mind (it's helpful to ask) but they are often from their point of view instead of the customer's. There are ways to zero in on the "correct" ones from the starting base of the clients words.

           Checking Results is the most time consuming of all steps because it never ends! We will use our various resources and tools for this step and can supply charts, graphs, and text showing the results as well as comments and suggestions.

           In addition, we can continually monitor the search words that people are using to find your pages. This tells you which of the SE's are producing, which pages are successful, and what keywords they used. This feedback is essential. We'll want to keep identifying new words and themes that can be used to create additional "intro" pages. The SEngineer doesn't change the site; he only changes the "intro" pages this is an on-going process of creating different pages to see what works!