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Search Engine Optimization
Search engines are one of the
primary ways that Internet users find web sites.
That's why a web site with good search engine
listings may see a dramatic increase in traffic
everyone wants those good listings. Unfortunately,
many web sites appear poorly in search engine
rankings or may not be listed at all because they
fail to consider how search engines work. Let’s go
forward and explore first the two major ways search
engines get their listings, and then see how search
engine optimization can especially help with
crawler-based search engines.
Information on this page has been drawn from the
help pages of each search engine, along with
knowledge gained from articles, reviews, books,
independent research, tips from others and
additional information received directly from the
various search engines.
The term "search engine" is often used generically
to describe both crawler-based search engines and
human-powered directories. These two types of search
engines gather their listings in radically different
ways.
Crawler-Based Search Engines
Crawler-based search engines, such as Google, create
their listings automatically. They "crawl" or
"spider" the web, then people search through what
they have found. If you change your web pages,
crawler-based search engines eventually find these
changes, and that can affect how you are listed.
Page titles, body copy and other elements all play a
role.
Human-Powered Directories
A human-powered directory, such as the Open
Directory, depends on humans for its listings. You
submit a short description to the directory for your
entire site, or editors write one for sites they
review. A search looks for matches only in the
descriptions submitted. Changing your web pages has
no effect on your listing. Things that are useful
for improving a listing with a search engine have
nothing to do with improving a listing in a
directory. The only exception is that a good site,
with good content, might be more likely to get
reviewed for free than a poor site.
"Hybrid Search Engines" Or Mixed Results
In the web's early days, it used to be that a
search engine either presented crawler-based results
or human-powered listings. Today, it extremely
common for both types of results to be presented.
Usually, a hybrid search engine will favor one type
of listings over another. For example, MSN Search is
more likely to present human-powered listings from
LookSmart. However, it does also present
crawler-based results (as provided by Inktomi),
especially for more obscure queries.
The Parts of a Crawler-Based Search Engine
Crawler-based search engines have three major
elements. First is the spider, also called the
crawler. The spider visits a web page, reads it, and
then follows links to other pages within the site.
This is what it means when someone refers to a site
being "spidered" or "crawled." The spider returns to
the site on a regular basis, such as every month or
two, to look for changes.
Everything the spider finds goes into the second
part of the search engine, the index. The index,
sometimes called the catalog, is like a giant book
containing a copy of every web page that the spider
finds. If a web page changes, then this book is
updated with new information.
Sometimes it can take a while for new pages or
changes that the spider finds to be added to the
index. Thus, a web page may have been "spidered" but
not yet "indexed." Until it is indexed -- added to
the index -- it is not available to those searching
with the search engine.Please call us at
469.223.6798 for your next Web Design Needs.
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