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submission tips
html & page design
- Keep HTML as simple as possible
- Keep the most important textual information at
the top of the html
- For users - so they don't have to scroll
- For Search Engines - include keyword phrases
which are in the meta
tags
- Using tables etc can mean text is further down the html
than the user sees on screen
- Consider using a layers based design - you can
use css to position the layers with textual content at
the top of the html even if they're further down the visible
page
- If keywords are also links - increases
their efficacy
- Use keywords in your <h1 - h6> heading
and subheading tags
- Each page should have lots of keyword rich
content for its topic and corresponding meta
tags
- Include textual hyper links to important areas
of the site from the home page
- Call files / folders / domain (and
subdomain) names something descriptive - directories
like this (acts as another keyword)
- Include a site map, linked to from the home
page
- Means the search engine will be able to index
the whole site quickly and easily
- Put all JavaScript & CSS in seperate
files
- Include a robots.txt in the root of the site
directory detailing js and css files to be excluded
from indexing
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meta tags
- The meta
tags (in the <head> tag of the HTML
of each page) for title, keywords and description
should be utilised to their full value, and match keywords
that appear in the body the page
- Don't use the same meta
tags across the site - each page should have
its own
- Optimise your meta
tag information
- View source on sites of the same genre as yours
that come up highly on search engines and directories
and see what keywords they use
- Check your site
stats to see which words and phrases your users
are searching for
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submitting
- Submit manually to each search engine/directory
once
- Usually submit your home page (and any other
key pages from your site on some search engines - they
each have limits)
- Be careful (i.e. don't spam)
about the ones which use each other's databases:
- Excite, Magellan, City.net and Webcrawler use
the same database
- AOL Search, AltaVista, AltaVista UK, Dictionary.com,
DogPile, Go2Net, Google, HotBot, Infospace, Lycos,
Netscape Search all use Open Directory
- If your site hasn't appeared after 4-6 weeks -
repeat submission
- Submit to the correct category in directories
- Some search engines base their listings on link popularity
- how many other sites link to yours? - are there any sites
which may be willing to link to yours?
- Referring sites have to be of good quality and/or
similar subject area
- Use the "final comments" box where they have one - last
chance to make an impression
- Read all the Search Engines/Directories "How to submit
your site" sections before submitting (most have them)
- Consider "buying your way in" - Yahoo,
LookSmart etc have the option to pay to have your site
reviewed within a few days
- Doesn't guarantee listing, just that your site
will get reviewed quickly
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what not to do
- Re-direct any page (you want listed) using JavaScript
- Probably includes the js to get out of frames
some people put in their <body> tag
- Definitely includes the JavaScript re-direct
to detect browsers for plug-ins
- Have no real HTML content on the home page
- This is especially true for graphics-heavy "splash
pages" and Flash enabled sites
- Include a "hidden" paragraph in a small font size
or the same colour as the background - some search engines/directories
(e.g. Yahoo) will actually penalise for this - considered
spam
- Especially if this hidden content is also just
a list of keywords
- Put insufficient text links on the page, so there's
nowhere for the search engine to spider
- Put all navigational links in layers/javascript
- the search engines can't always spider through
- This can include rollover images as links
- Use frames - search engines can't spider them
- In the search engine results, the site will be seperated
into the individual frames
- If you MUST use frames - make sure there are navigational
links in each frame used
- And always use the <no frames> tag
- Use spamming
techniques - it will get you barred from search engines
and directories
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improving the listing
- Analyse site
stats
- Which keywords people are searching for - change
meta
tags and content accordingly
- Which search engines/directories are/are not
putting traffic to the site
- Click-through rate improves site listing
- See if / where users are clicking "Back"
button - negative effect on listing
- How long users stay on site / pages - can improve
listing
- Ensure the page design is not detrimental to search
engines spidering your site
- Possibly have information rich pages
- About things users would be interested in
- Updated frequently - visitors return for updates
- Possibly moreover.com newsfeeds?
- Link these info rich pages from site map
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