By Dawn Rowlett
Search Engine Positioning Specialist

FIRST -- OPTIMIZE!
Before you even think about search engine submission options, your web site should be optimized for the best possible rankings for your important keyword phrases.

SECOND -- Get Linked!
It's always best to have quality incoming links to your web site before you submit to any search engine. Many of today's popular engines will place a large part of their ranking algorithm on the number of quality, incoming links that are pointing to your site.

IMPORTANT -- Manually Submit Your Pages
When you are ready to submit, we recommend that you submit manually to each of the major search engines. Do not ever use a submission software program and do not hire a company who claims to submit your site to hundreds or thousands of search engines. More than likely, they will be using an automated program that can penalize your web site.

Basic Submissions
Most search engines offer a free submission program. This is your best option if your budget does not allow for paid submissions.

Paid Inclusion Submission Programs
When a search engine offers pay inclusion submissions, this method is always recommended over the basic free submission options.

Unfortunately, paid submissions do not normally include spidering your entire site. Your paid submission will include the page that you submit only. When it is possible, submit all of your important pages through paid submissions. However, this can get very expensive. If your budget doesn't allow you to submit all of your pages, submit the rest of your pages through basic free submissions.

If your web site has not been optimized and prepared for your keyword phrases, paid submissions will not guarantee any specific rankings.

What Page To Submit?
Depending on the engine, you may be submitting all of your important pages or just your main page. Other engines don't require submission at all and actually prefer to find your web site through other links pointing to your web site from other sites.

Search Engine Submission Guidelines:

• Google: Prefers to find your site by other quality sites linking to you.
• AltaVista: Submit all of your important pages. Only 5 pages can be submitted per day through free submissions.
• AllTheWeb: Submit only your most important page through basic submissions.
• Lycos: Submit only your most important page through basic submissions.
• Inktomi: Submit all of your important pages. Only 1 page per day can be submitted through free Inktomi submissions.

No Submission Required:
Search engines such as AOL, MSN, HotBot, IWon, Netscape and Excite wont require individual submissions. Submit to the major search engines and your listings should be picked up by other engines that don't require submission, as long as your web site is optimized for your keywords.

Submission URL Formatting
You should always submit your site the same way. If you submit http://www.mysite.com, always use that format. If you submit using http://mysite.com, always use that format. We prefer to submit NOT using the www. Never submit using your IP address. Avoid cutting and pasting your URL when submitting. This can cause potential problems. The time you will save by cutting and pasting is not worth the potential trouble it can cause.

Indexing Time

Paid Submissions: 14 days or less depending on the engine.

Free Submissions: 14 days - 4 months.

No Submission: Will depend on the number of links and the quality of the links pointing to your web site from other sites. A minimum of 10 quality links is recommended for indexing in Google within 3 approximately months.