Search Engines
One of the most popular of the true search engines is Google. Search engines use programs called robots (a.k.a. spiders, bots, crawlers) that go out and gather information about web pages on the Internet. This information is collected by the search engines and used to build their databases. Each search engine has its own set of algorithms that it uses to determine rankings, and these are subject to change without warning. However, there are two primary methods that are common to all search engines.

Word Frequency - Often a page is given a good ranking with a given search phrase depending on the location and frequency of that phrase on a web page. In particular search robots look for search phrases in the page title and near the top of the page. They also give advantage to hypertext links.

Relevant Links - The number of links to a page is important, particularly from sites that are in some way recognized as being authoritative and relevant.

Directories
Yahoo! is the most recognizable member of this category. Directories use human input (rather than bots) as the basis for their databases. To appear in a directory site, you must submit your site yourself (or pay a company to do it for you). The web sites are listed in categories and subcategories. While you can suggest what categories you would like your site to appear in, the directory has the final word in that. Directories often place a great deal of emphasis on the home page of a site.

Hybrids
Excite is a popular member of this category. Sites in this category tend to use both robots and humans to maintain their directories in an attempt to overcome the shortcomings of search engines and directories. Optimizing your site for Search Engines and Directories should cover any optimization necessary for hybrid search resources.

While every search engine and directory is different, there are some general steps that you can take to prepare your site to list well. The most important thing is to define your keyword phrases.

Define Your Keyword Phrases
Remember in last month's article about promotion, we talked extensively about defining your company, defining your product, and deciding who your customer is. These are vital steps to search engine optimization. Regardless of whether your end users are utilizing a search engine, a directory or a hybrid, they will all be using "keyword phrases" to search by. Savvy Internet users looking for a jacket online won't just type "jacket" into the search field of their favorite search engine. They may type, "mens italian leather jacket" or "mens field jacket." They will usually type a phrase rather than merely a keyword. Your job is to decide what unique phrases people looking for your product will use, pick your favorite 3 or 4 and focus your site (in particular your home page) on those 3 or 4 keyword phrases.

Copy
Understand that to rank high in your favorite keyword phrase, the search engine will have to know that your site is related to that phrase. That is where "frequency" comes into play. Each page you submit should have at least 200 words of copy on it. This text should include your most important keyword phrases, but should remain logical & readable. Also, your best keyword phrases should appear at the top of the page if possible.

Meta Tags
No longer are meta tags the end-all of web site promotion. For various reasons, the value that search engines give to these special HTML tags ranges from medium to very little. However, they are still important enough that you should spend a considerable amount of time developing them correctly. EZ-NetTools makes meta tag creation very easy.

Title Tag
The length of title that the different search engines accept varies, but you should be ok if you keep it between 50-80 characters long - including spaces. This tag should include 1-2 of your most important keyword phrases in the title tag, but do not just list keywords. Doing so can appear as spamming and could result in your being barred from the search engines (blacklisted).

Description Tag
This meta tag should not exceed 250 characters including spaces. Put in your 3 or 4 favorite keyword phrases, especially those used in your title tag and page copy. Ensure that your most important keywords appear at the beginning of your description. Again, do not just spam keywords.

Keyword Tag
This tag should not exceed 1024 characters including spaces. It is not just a list of keywords separated by commas. Use your keyword phrases. For example, a wedding planner in Dallas might enter the following:

"dallas wedding planner wedding planners dallas texas wedding planning" and so on.

Don't forget plurals. We used both "wedding planner" and "wedding planners" in the sample keyword meta tag to make sure they show up in both searches.

If you know of a common misspelling of a popular keyword that could be used to find your site you should enter it in your keywords meta tag. For example, a craft site might use "homemade," "home-made," and "home made".

Also, be aware of repeated keywords. You want to include your most important phrases, but when doing so it can be difficult not to repeat one word many times. In our example above, we used the word wedding three times. This is okay to do in order to make sure you get the phrases you need in there, but be careful not to repeat any one word excessively. Avoid using any one word in the keyword meta more than 5 times.

Conclusion
Success on search engines and directories doesn't come by "tricking" them. Attempts to do so will leave your site blacklisted and doomed to obscurity. Success comes by carefully choosing popular search phrases, designing your site around those keyword phrases and correctly designing your copy and meta tags to take full advantage of your keyword phrases. Then, when you submit your site to the search engines, they will know that your site has everything to do with those keyword phrases.