How do I submit my pages to the different engines without having to change them?

Question:

Stephen,

Although there is a lot of good information here, what I really need is a good general strategy.

From the material I get that the algorithms are different from engine to engine. By focusing on the eight engines profiled, I cover 90% of the Internet population. However, submissions to each engine should be individualized to get the advantage and not incur any penalty. What works for one engine may get me kicked off another.

Since submission time varies from 2-8 weeks, I can't just submit a page in a specific optimized format, wait for it to be indexed, and change it for submission to another engine. Since crawlers come back periodically, if the page has been "de-tuned" from that engine and "re-tuned" to optimize another engine, I could get bumped off the first.

How do you approach this issue from an overall strategy perspective? Sorting this all out is very important to me. Would greatly appreciate any help you can offer.

Paul

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Answer:

You are correct, you can't just submit a page...

These days, the key to success on the internet is to have several pages. This is very easy to accomplish... (unless you have one of those "free" sites and are limited by your provider -- if so, we can assist you in getting great service for as low as $30 a month -- with upper level domain name and up to 10 megs of space).

Here's what we do with our own pages... Our main site(s) are programmed in such a way that they fit reasonably well with all of the engines. In other words, we use keywords & descriptions that work with the engines that use tags and we add keyword density wherever possible without detracting from the content of the page.

In addition, we use our on images and also a reasonable amount of keyword text at the top &/or bottom of the page.... there are no engines that object to these procedures and many recommend them in their FAQ's.

To give ourselves and our clients an added advantage, we also make additional pages that "point" to our site. These pointer pages, or side doors are easy and quick to design. They can also be duplicated easily and adapted for another search engine. Normally, they offer a short description of what we offer and links to the main page(s) on our site... sometimes they have small file byte sized graphics, sometimes just text, and sometimes they are even "redirect" pages.

These"pointer" pages are short and sweet... keyword dense and designed specifically for the particular engine that we are submitting to.

By the way, the engines that respond most favorably to pointer pages are Infoseek, Excite, and Lycos.

Now, keep in mind that once someone finds a page (any page) that is linked to the rest of your site, they have found your site.

By using this strategy, your "main" pages remain "unoffensive" and, if written intelligently in a generic sort of way, themselves have a very good chance of scoring high in a search.

On the other hand, the pointer pages, Meta keyword loaded pages, and keyword dense pages give your site that extra chance of scoring high on the search. In the meantime your main pages remain fixed... you don't need to change those very often -- only the "side doors' into your site need to be changed and updated.

To see an extreme example of what I am talking about, go to Lycos and search "hawaii" ... #2 on the list you will see a simple "re-direct" page that points to a main page on one of our sites. We borrowed this technique from someone who was using it on Lycos for a "sex" site and we decided to try it as an experiment -- it worked.

There are many tasteful ways to accomplish the same result. For instance, You can use a menu page that is keyword dense that points to your other pages on your site.

Just like in print or TV advertising, nothing works better than saturation. Today on the Internet, saturation is what the professionals are using to succeed... at a fraction of the cost of print or TV advertising... however, it does take some work and also some time to create the additional pages... as well as some maintenance -- yet still at a fraction of the effort it would otherwise take to "break bread with the big boys" out there in the international world of commerce.

And, yes -- it can take up to 2-8 weeks to find out if what you are doing is working, that is a reality of the net. (That is also a reality of most print advertising as well)

We recommend that you design your pages (site) according to the guidelines in the book and, when ready, submit them as your best shot -- some of them are very likely to work and whatever does not, will give you the info you need to redesign and resubmit... to a large degree it is still a numbers game even though the dice are now loaded in your favor... And there will never be a time when "trial and error" is not part of the equation.

As to getting kicked off a search engine? ...We have seen some pretty flagrant "tricks" that you'd think would get someone kicked off an engine -- but they did not... Unless you use irrelevant keyword spamdexing combined with 100's of pages intended to saturate every category imaginable (many people have actually done this -- don't!), we don't believe you will have any serious problems with getting kicked out of an index. (exception YAHOO - they only take straight forward pages... no tricks and they will just ignore you if you try)

Your best bet is to always analyze what your competition is doing... search the web using words that you'd expect others to look for you with. See who comes up... analyze their pages and determine what technique(s) caused them to score high.

Then, design entry(s) into your site using their page as a template -- only make yours better -- and use the improved versions as side doors into the rest of your site.

By doing this you have two things going for you...

1. You know the page you used as a template is acceptable to that particular search engine
2. You also know that you are emulating what is already working. Don't try to re-invent the wheel.

Thanks for your question, Good luck ...and I trust this will help you