What's the secret to getting your website listed on search engines?

[RevolutionStartsNow]

I have a consulting business and I need to get my new website listed. Should I pay a service to do this for me, or is there something I can do myself?

Any advice is appreciated! Thanks, DUers.

[FormerDittoHead]

1. Most important tip...

Have a link to your website on other websites. The more the merrier.

Avoid "free for all" link websites, however (they let you put your link for free) - Google commonly BLACKLISTS websites posted on them.

There are many, many tips, as well as books and computer based tutorials, etc., but the one I listed above is the most important thing.

Here's a great series of articles for your reading:
http://search-engine-secrets.net
http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/

[RevolutionStartsNow]

2. Thank you!

I will read the articles, thanks!

[RoyGBiv]

3. Times have changed ...

When I first put together my website, I had to go around to all the search engines and submit it to be included, and then I had to badger other website operators to link to my site because the search engines then weren't really the best way to get noticed.

All that paid off I guess because I'm linked-to all over the place now apparently. My site turns up in two of the top three hits for the name of the person it's about, and the top ranking goes to an article I wrote for a commercial website and links back to my site.

I'd hate to do that all over again, which is why I've never moved it to a hosting company and given it a relevant URL.

[Lisa0825]

4. Indexed, but no hits?

I know the website I am in charge of updating is listed with all the major search engines, because when I search it by name, there it is. But the combinations of keywords that SHOULD cause hits do not. I mean, not at ALL, not just low on the list. I heard that meta tags aren't of much use anymore. How else does one get associated with specific keywords?

Muchas gracias!

edited to add: FWIW, we are listed on petfinder.com, referred to in numerous newspaper articles, listed on at least a dozen other resuce sites, etc.

[FormerDittoHead]

5. Some important tips...

First off, meta tags ARE used. The common suggestions ARE important.
http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/article.php/2167931

Relevant domain names ARE important. Page titles DO count.

The best tip I ran across lately was that your website be 100% WWW compliant. Sure your website works in all browsers, but it may not be WWW compliant.

You can check for this using the tool at: http://validator.w3.org/

(btw: it's a pain in the butt getting everything 100%, but a recent test showed a COMPLETE turnaround for Google results because of this one factor).

The website cited above is a fountain of good advice...

[Lisa0825]

6. Terrific! Thanks!

I saw that site once before and forgot al labout it, since I wasn't involved in anything on the web at the time. Thanks for the tip!:-)

[Jersey Devil]

7. Learn to use meta tags

These are descriptions placed in the head area of your web page that are picked up by the search engines.

If you google "meta tag" you will find many sites that describe what they are, how to use them and even some sites to help you generate meta tags for your website.

For instance, here are the meta tags for DU:

<META NAME="description" CONTENT="Democratic Underground provides political satire and commentary for Democrats. Home of the Top Ten Conservative Idiots. Plus a great Discussion Forum.">
<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="democratic underground democraticunderground.com democrats partisan commentary discussion board forums top ten conservative idiots top 10 republican">

[Lisa0825]

8. Thanks everyone! It's starting to work!

I have only made a few changes so far, since I am limited on time. So far, I changed all the pages so that each has a relevant title. I changed some of the text to get keywords mentioned on more pages. I added a couple more keywords. I re-submitted to Google and a few others, this time using internal pages with more text, because our webmaster had made the index page a splash page with little more than a cutesy logo on it.

In ONE WEEK, we went from not showing up at all when our most important keywords were searched to being #61! I realize 61 isn't great, but at least it shows the changes are taking effect! Google cached our pages within a day of re-submitting. I don't know if that was coincidence or if they are always that fast!

Searching other keywords got us to anywhere from #2 to #20, but those were very specific. I still plan to make more changes as time permits. Thanks again for the input. It's working!:-)

[Lisa0825]

9. Just one month later, and we're #1 on our google search!

Thanks for the advice y'all!

Here is how my shelter went from not even showing up at ALL on a google search on our desired search terms to showing up at #1!

1) I re-submitted to all the big search engines with a different page. I had submitted the basic url, but it is just a splash page with almost no content (not my idea), so I changed to our mission statement page and re-submitted.

2) I submitted to Google Directories.

3) I added the link to my siglines here and on another site, plus got us added to a few more related sites.

4) I removed the title tags from the header (which resulted in a basic title that was the same on every page) and instead put a unique, relevant title on every page.

5) I changed the meta tags to add more info. What I noticed was totally lacking was location, so I added nearby towns and state.

I made these changes gradually over the last few weeks. Google cached us again on May 5th, and now we are in the top 10 for several keyword combinations!

I just wanted to share my news so if anyone else is looking for tips, they will see that some pretty simple steps really helped a lot!