Web Site Promotion 101

So, you've designed a compelling web site that you're eager to show the world. Every day you add fresh content and tweak your pages to make them prettier, more informative and faster to download. It's gonna pay off, you tell yourself, as you upload several new pages to your web server. Midway in the afternoon, you stop what you're doing to check your traffic reports You're excited and eager to confirm just how successful your web site is. Waiting for your site statistics to finish downloading, your glee turns to dread when you learn that only two people visited your web site all day. What's a disillusioned Webmaster to do? Submit Your URL To the Search Engines Search engines are by far the most popular way to find information on the Internet. Getting your site listed, however, is a chore, and it is oftentimes frustrating because results are not quick to see. Although there are automated services that promise to get you listed on thousands of web directories and free-for-all (FFA) links pages, it is recommended that you manually submit your site to the top search engines. Be forewarned that it takes weeks (sometimes even months!) to get listed. Set up a tickler file to do site submissions on a monthly basis. Resist the temptation to submit more often, because your hard work will go up in a puff of smoke if your URL gets banned for spamming. The following list is not all inclusive, but it is a good place to start with your search engine submissions. Free Submissions:

AltaVista

ExactSeek.com

Google

Hypermaze.com

Open Directory Project

iWon

REX

Scrub The web

SplatSearch.com

The YellowPages.com

Try America

whatUseek Network

Gigablast

CompletePlanet

Aesop.com

Jayde

Very Good Search

compilers.net

SearchIt

Jadoo

W8.net

Claymont

AUCTION.com

a2zsol.com

JoeAnt.com

Gimpsy

GoGuides.Org

Paid Inclusion:

Position Technologies

DigitalWork

Site Submit

Yahoo!

Pay-per-click:

Pay-Per-Ranking

ePilot

Espotting

Espotting

goClick.com

Kanoodle

LookSmart

Overture

Directory-Specific Search Engine:

AllSearchEngines.com

Swap Links With Other Web Sites With more than 3.2 billion web pages competing against yours, you can't rely solely on search engines for web site promotion. In my experience, the second most important web marketing strategy is reciprocal links. When I come across an excellent online resource, I add it to my "related links" page, and, if it's appropriate, I contact the Webmaster to see whether they might be interested in swapping links with me. More times than not, the response is positive. Since relevant, high-quality links coming to your site from other sites is increasingly important in getting good search engine rankings, I recommend that you put establishing linking partnerships high on your marketing to do list. Conclusion Like building a web site, promoting it to the world is hard work, but I guarantee your sense of accomplishment will be well worth the effort when you start to see results. More importantly, visitors! Joanne Glasspoole is a Webmaster and freelance Web designer. Visit her Web site (http://www.glasspoole.com/) for Internet and technology news, insightful articles, and links to excellent Webmaster resources to help you grow your online business.