The top question we hear from new clients is “why doesn’t my website show in search results?”. The answer to this question is not simple, but here is a list of first steps to get you started. I am not going to discuss advanced topics such as link building or SEO. Lets keep it simple.
Once your website is live on the internet, you must take some basic steps to let the search engines know your website exists. The first step is to register your website with Google, Yahoo! and Bing.
Submit Your Sitemap
After you have submitted your site to the top search engines you need to make sure you have a site map in xml format and it should be saved in the root directory of your website. If you don’t know how to write an xml site map there are several free services that can do it for you. XML-Sitemaps.com is one, another is Automatic Sitemap and there are others. Just search for “xml sitemap generator” in your favorite search engine.
Next you need to upload your sitemap.xml file to Google, Yahoo! and Bing. You can do this at Google Webmaster Central, Yahoo! Site Explorer and Bing Webmaster Central. Now that you have let the major search engines know your website exists and what web pages are on your site, you can start on the next steps.
List your Business
Now you want to make sure you get your business included in the search engines business listings. The first three listings you want to register with are Google Local Business Center, Yahoo! Site Explorer and Bing Webmaster Central. The next list you want to get is with DMOZ Open Directory Project. They don’t accept all sites, so please don’t take it personally should your site not be accepted, but it is an important directory for your website to be listed in.
These are just the first steps to begin the process of getting your website indexed in search engines. If you’d like to learn more about search engines and how they work, you can download a free ebook Understanding Search Engines.
If you have questions on this or other topics please email us at info@123webconnect.com.