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**Updated site**
There is another area of the site called Search engine
Secrets with more information on this topic.
Overview of the Search Engine Placement Strategies
Combining the earlier strategy to improve search engine placement and positions with
what I'm going to discuss now will save you time and frustration. If you don't have any
idea of your search engine position you will waste a lot of time just trying to figure out
if your listing has even been indexed yet. These services will at least save you looking
through the first 200!
Remember for each query there is probably millions of matches. If you have used my
method of using lots of index files using these services will allow you to query them for
each index and chances are one of them will be in this narrow search. Provided that you
haven't spammed the engine finding one of these will mean all the pages are listed
somewhere on the engine and only need improvement to raise them.
If you have no information as to whether you have been indexed I've found if you
followed my advice and used a descriptive <title> a query for the entire title will
find your listing at or near the top making it easy to find. I can say this with a fair
amount of confidence because I have tested it at the sites listed earlier and it had me
ranked #1 every time. This makes sense because we know that title is a big part of how
sites are ranked. A title query that doesn't result in you being at or near the top means
you need to work on your title choice more.
At Excite they have a feature that allows you to ask for "More Like This". An
index file of a domain will result in all listed files on that domain coming up so if you
know the placement of an index file on your domain query for that it will save a lot of
time at Excite.
I know what you're thinking, "I'm listed but how do improve it?" Simple play
follow the leader!! I'm not sure about earlier versions of Netscape and MSIE but I know
for sure that a right click on your mouse produces a drop down menu that allows you to add
book marks in versions three and up.
In case you're wondering using this method you don't have to go to the site to book
mark it. This gives you a ready made keyed in list to work with making the job easier and
faster later.
I query the engines four or five ways for each index and then add the top ten for each
query to my bookmarks. A few will show up several times so have your thinking cap on while
your doing it. You can even put them into different folders for each engine and different
query.
Check the summary and unless they are ranked third or higher ignore them more on why
shortly. If they are in the top three these would be very good candidates for info on how
to raise your placement but put them in a separate folder or write them down.
You're probably wondering why I said to separate off topic sites. There is a bonus to
this system that is extremely useful for other promotion needs. Specifically, if you're
following the plan outlined in the initial article for the promotion site then you should
be ready to start your quest for reciprocal links. I don't know about you but I can't
think of a better place to start then these! I say this because so many people use the
engines to find jump points to start a search for information.
To take this further our good friends at Virtual Promote have allowed me to take an
excerpt from the Gazette which describes how to get the links to these sites resulting in
even more sites to link to. The article is featured in the promo site this month so when
you finish here head on over there's a link at the bottom of the page. So, by spending a
few minutes here you have found the sites to help you improve your ranking and the
information that will allow you to get as many reciprocal links as you want.
Incredible luck would be to have one or two sites consistently at the top of all five
of the biggies for all of your queries. Keep in mind that one of the keys to this plan is
to promote on an ongoing basis, not just a one shot deal. I say this because if you want
to remain at or near the top in all of the engines you will probably have to keep
submitting the site to get it to the top and and maintain it. This will require patience
or the engine will regard you as a spammer and perhaps remove all your pages so don't try
to do this over a short period of time.
A site that rated high for several queries at more then one engine should be only used
for a reference for those engines. Don't use it for the others or you will just end up
spamming the engines to raise yourself in all of them. Perhaps they haven't even tried for
placement at that engine. A situation like this requires a little more investigation to
get the information. Webmaster T comes to the rescue again! You have to look no further
then the reference page which lists the keys to all engines. In some cases these are
numbered to let you know the sequence the engine uses to produce the rankings.
To finish this I'll only say a successful promotion doesn't just happen. Have a
PLAN and work the PLAN because we all know that you have to PLAN TO SUCCEED! Success
doesn't just show up at the door. It always has an invitation and your PLAN is your
invitation.
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