Search Engines, which ones and how?

[creative55]

hi, We are currently in the process of finalising our male grooming products business, we want to be listed in all the search engines. How do we add our website to the engines. I understand their crawlers will pick them up but they still havn't and we dont want to start paying for adwords yet either. we are not listed on any of the major aus search engines.

Any suggestions would be apreciated, aswell as any thoughts on the website

Thanks

[digitalfunstuff]

Hi,
I think at least you will have to go to Google to register your web and it will take the at least 1-2 months for them to come and crawl your website.
Then you will have to register for Yahoo and you will have to pay for inclusion, which is fater.

But I think it's best for a new site to go with Google Adwords. If you don't get traffic to your website, how can you get sales.

There are other directories which some are for free and other's have link backs.

We have been on the web for approx 1 year now and we still use Google ad words. It will take up to 18 months for your to get decent organic search results. I'm still waiting myself...

[creative55]

Thanks digital good help, If we start with ad words straight away will we be listed in google if we type in something like baxter shaving products into google, or does that take time, I think adwords adds your site within 48 but feel free to correct me as im not sure, I just had a look at your site, (nce site by the way) , and I noticed you dont have those ugly looking tabs at the top of your products list that say Local Prices and International prices, How did you get rid of them? if you look at our website you will see what I mean, it really drags down the classy feel.

Thanks for your help

[digitalfunstuff]

Hi Lachlan,

Yes, it pretty quick to get onto Google once you have registered approx 24-48 hours. You basically have to choose your keyword and your bid amount to see which position you get. Another good thing about Google Adwords is that you can cap the max daily amount you want to spend. Hence you won't get a massive bill at the end of the month.

We choose the search term digital cameras and all related to that term and our per click rate is currently 13cents per click, we probably in position 7-8. But it all depends on what term you are bidding. For our search term it's very competitive and hence the high price. But I assume your search terms will be lower and for the same amount you'll get a high position.

Basically, as a new site you will have to pay for clicks until you get higher in the organic search results which can take ages. I'm still struggling...

As for the International and Local prices, I remember David (from Ezimerchant) telling me to click no GST for international prices. Can't really remember, maybe you can ask David.

[creative55]

Thanks annie, Yes i spoke to one of the ezimerchant moderators and they helped me remove that problem, My brother used adwords to start of his business (www.bodybuilding.net.au) and now he get up to 6 orders a day. Looks like that is the way to go , although he says be prepared as its not cheap. I will also pay for a high ranking on yahoo. Traffic Traffic Traffic apparently and it makes sense, I think a good way to go about free advertising is through affilates, although i still dont know whether to go through clixgore or contact each related industry website manually.

Thanks

[adrianlacy]

I will not pay anyone for listings with the search engines with exception to MS BCentral Submit It which I payed a small amount a couple of years ago - they automate submission to many and assist manual entry with key engines - In particular, they point out the do's and dont's for your site - ie they will prevent you getting blackbanned, ensure you are not over/under saturating a certain keyword, etc.
Critical to your rankings is google - they really only seem to look at content - particulary your index.htm page - make sure its full of description for everything - might look a little cluttered or messy but it works (googles own homepage is actually a 'how not to' present your homepage - they're just huge enough to not need to worry)
Google will take approx 6 weeks to start listing as long as you have your content right - DO THIS FIRST. then they crawl every 2 weeks looking for changes. Once you list well with google, all the other engines seem to as well.
I'd check your site but what is it?
Hope this helps

[creative55]

hey adrian thanks for the advice,

the site is www himonline com au

(didn't put dots in as i dont want this page coming up when you type him online in google)

From your advice it looks like i need to add more content on the front page.

i would apreciate it if you had a quick look for me

thanks

[adrianlacy]

Had a quick peek - looks good
I think your title, meta description and keywords are good
On a homepage - index.htm - the repetition (up to 3 times) of each major product, category or keyword will make engines look and notice relevence to a search.
I intend to add photos to 'gloss up' my homepage, but you'd notice i've crammed info and repetition into it with text, including the category names on the left (which are also scanned).

One major thing I've noticed more recently with google is that they don't bring up the detailed description page as frequently as they used to - seem to bring up the category with the brief description more - as a result I am now copying my detailed descriptions across to the brief description, and in many cases not worrying about the detailed at all. After adding products I always search 2-3 weeks later to check ranking - always good and not affected by no description on detail page. This however may not apply on other search engines, but hey, who doesn't use google! As you can tell, I completely ignore all other engines!
A note on reciprocal links - someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I heard google pays zero attention to blatant link exchange. You need quality incoming links, which tend to come from link generating sites requesting reciprocal link - ignore it and enjoy their incoming link. Don't link to others - you want them all coming to you. You'll also find that some search engines will include every internarl link on your site back to you homepage - therefore the more pages, the more links.
It takes time for a good listing (months usually), and is essential to ask customers and others what keywords THEY would use looking for your products - these may be different to what you expect - these are the words your need all over your site pages.

Make sure you MANUALLY submit to google, and any other major engine. List 3-5 most important pages.
Maybe some of this info is incorrect or outdated - if anyone thinks so let me know - however it definetley works for me.
Good luck with your listing

[dferguson]

To submit to google as Adrian suggested please visit www.google.com/addurl

[sexytoyboxaustralia]

If you just leave a link to your site lying around on the web somewhere, such as by putting your address in your signature for forums, signing guestbooks, etc., google finds your site pretty quickly. I uploaded the semi-built shabby-looking version of my site so that the banks could assess it for my merchant account, and within about 12 hours of using my url in a tech help forum google had found it and ranked it. It probably doesnt do a lot of good if it gets ranked when you don't have any product descriptions or anything done yet though...
That said don't post meaningless threads saying "good morning" to everybody just get your name out there :)

[creeky]

Link building goes a long way particularly if they have a good google rank as well.

Would suggest you hit up your suppliers/manufacturers to put a link on their where to buy page.

[niko]

It doesn't hurt to do it amongst ourselves either. If anyone wants to link exchange with me let me know.

[niko]

I also forgot to mention, as we import distribute GPS (Global Positioning Systems) and your interested in reselling them then go to www.gpstechnologies.com.au and put in your details in the dealer app.

[topee]

If u can get your web on dmoz.org, it helps with the ranking in google too.

[Ocean storm tackle 1]

I have found to get listed in google for some fairly major key words it has helped to modify the content template and add some links down the very bottom of the page.

The links should be to relevant pages in your website preferably that also are content rich. The use of title tags for the links I have found also help in getting all my major keywords in the top ten in google. be carefull with how much text you put in the bottom of your content though you dont want to over do it. you can see an example of what i have done on my home page.