# How to bring my website to the top of google? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 18, 2013, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572 "2013-10-18T13:42:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 9\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![tellyworth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/977dab/32.png) [@tellyworth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tellyworth)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2013, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/21 "2013-10-18T21:11:20Z")
There is no magic in SEO. Google puts the most interesting web sites at the top. Is your site interesting? Do people actually want to read it? If not, that should be your first step. As Mangetout says, a blog can help, if you update it regularly (say, weekly). I can give a few pointers if you like. Also, heed the advice above about avoiding shady methods. Ask yourself this: are you optimizing your content, or are you gaming the system? If you’re trying to game the system, it will come back to bite you one day. ---
**Author:** ![Blakeyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecd19e/32.png) [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2013, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/22 "2013-10-18T21:47:02Z")
> [@Leaffan](#): > > What rule? I just looked the Wikipedia pages for 3 or 4 companies I used to work for. Large companies don’t have a problem getting into Wikipedia because they generally do notable things and have plenty of sources pointing to them. I don’t know what size of company you’ve worked for. But small businesses are rarely going to be able to meet Wikipedia’s notability requirement, and since there’s also a “no promotional materials” rule, there’d be nothing to base a Wiki article on. ---
**Author:** ![Leaffan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leaffan/32/299_2.png) [@Leaffan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaffan)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 1:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/23 "2013-10-19T01:21:40Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Notability. Not every small company rates the space. There has to be value beyond promotion and yellow-pages content. > [@Blakeyrat](#): > > Large companies don’t have a problem getting into Wikipedia because they generally do notable things and have plenty of sources pointing to them. I don’t know what size of company you’ve worked for. > > But small businesses are rarely going to be able to meet Wikipedia’s notability requirement, and since there’s also a “no promotional materials” rule, there’d be nothing to base a Wiki article on. Ignorance fought. Thanks. ---
**Author:** ![Habeed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a587f6/32.png) [@Habeed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Habeed)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/24 "2013-10-19T01:59:14Z")
One I actually know about personally : truck driving. You do need a class A drivers license and a clean record, however. But if you have those 2, and you are willing to work for the bottom of the barrel trucking companies that hire rookies (Werner is one of them), they’ll pretty much offer you a job after a phone call. They’ll even keep hounding you if you change your mind… ---
**Author:** ![AaronX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7bcc69/32.png) [@AaronX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AaronX)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/25 "2013-10-19T06:06:44Z")
> [@Blakeyrat](#): > > Particularly important for search ranking is creating a [site map](https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/156184?hl=en). Oh, is THAT what they’re for? I see them on so many sites, but I’ve never heard of anyone using one. ---
**Author:** ![MannyL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@MannyL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MannyL)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2013, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/26 "2013-10-19T16:00:38Z")
> [@Dog80](#): > > I have a small company named after my last name, which is also unique (I am the last descendant of my very small family). When I google the name I get results from company directory listings instead of my website. > > Is there any way to bump my website to the top of google searches? I think the problem is your business site has more links to it then your personal site so it comes up higher in the rankings. ---
**Author:** ![Blakeyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecd19e/32.png) [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2013, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/27 "2013-10-22T17:37:03Z")
> [@AaronX](#): > > Oh, is THAT what they’re for? I see them on so many sites, but I’ve never heard of anyone using one. You might be a bit confused. Human-readable site maps are indeed pretty old-school-- they’re pretty rare now and not necessary for a quality site. The site map Google wants is for machine consumption. Basically, instead of having Google guess the layout of your site, you can tell it exactly how your site is laid out, and you can also tell it how often content is likely to change-- for example, a blog index might change daily but a homepage might only change once a month, if you provide Google with that information it’ll index your pages more often. This also allows Google to list a few extra links to your site when it comes up in the results. For example, if I search for “Ford”, I get: Ford Focus - CompareFord.com‎ [www.compareford.com/‎](http://www.compareford.com/%E2%80%8E) Find Your Nearest Ford Dealer Today & See Focus Offers! Build & Price - View Current Offers - Locate a Dealer - Search Dealer Inventory Those links at the bottom – Build & Price, View Current Offers, Locate a Dealer, Search Dealer Inventory – are defined in the website’s site map. If you don’t have a site map, Google can’t place those extra links because it’s not sure exactly how your site is laid-out. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2013, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/28 "2013-10-22T18:19:47Z")
Isn’t that result of a search on Ford the advertisement that appears at the top of the search results? ---
**Author:** ![Blakeyrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecd19e/32.png) [@Blakeyrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blakeyrat)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2013, 9:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572/29 "2013-10-22T21:28:24Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > Isn’t that result of a search on Ford the advertisement that appears at the top of the search results? In that specific case, I chose the first result that wasn’t an ad. Note that Google gives different results to different people based on location, history, A/B testing, etc. So just because I got [fordcompare.com](http://fordcompare.com) as the first result doesn’t mean you necessarily will. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-to-bring-my-website-to-the-top-of-google/671572.md?page=1)