I’ve just created my own website for the first time.
how do I get Google and other search engines to index it?
Most search engines including Google, allow you to submit your URL for indexing. Here is their page:
Note that this is a request and not an order. It may take months for it to happen and may never happen in some cases if you don’t have much content. Rinse and repeat with the others you care about. They tend to cross-pollinate as well.
There are services that claim to do the same thing for you in bulk. I would generally steer clear of that type of thing.
Well, I put up movie reviews on my site. The last one I put up was on October 9; not quite in Google (though the link where I mention it is). However, the review I put up a month before is definitely there.
I never did anything to tell Google about anything. They just find it on their own.
I do search engines optimization for a living and the easiest engine to get into is MSN. So first submit the site there.
Google will put weight, as does Yahoo, to having a proper XHTML site so make sure it validates. Also use a Google site map and if that is too much for you then at least make a valid site map for your users.
Search engines HATE flash and javascript so if you want it indexed make sure you are linking with HTML and not through flash or javascript.
Use the Meta Tag for a description as Yahoo and Google pull off the Meta tag for a description. They no longer use keywords but I always throw in five to seven UNIQUE key words for EACH page.
Make sure all your links are linked using a keyword, your images are keyword titled. For instance if you have a picture of your kitty, don’t put alt=“kitty.gif” put alt=“My cat Tiger at my website.com”
Getting a site indexed is fairly easy it is getting it high enough so people can see it.
SEO research indicates people virtually NEVER change Google setting so they only get the standard 10 results per page. THough you can get up to 100 results if you tinker with it. SEO research indicates 90% of people will NOT look beyond the second page, and 99% will not go beyond the fourth page.
Inbound links from quality sites help you rise on Google. They are giving you page rank
Also check your site in as many Google Data Centers as possible. They often have different results. For instance my webpage will appear at number one in five or six of the data centers but on two other Google Data centers it fails to appear at all
People thing when you search Google you always get the same results. FALSE. It depends on what Google Serach Data Center you are directed to. You can check several Google Search sites at once. Google may take months to synch their sites.
Also Google also gives an initial boost to sites. So your site may bolt to the top for a week then disapear, then come back, then go up and down. It takes over a year before you will see your true actual placement on Google. By then they probably will have tweaked their methods again