You've just built a website and can't wait to start popping
up in the top listings of search engines. After all, you've
paid this company even more money to create "optimized,
search engine friendly pages, start building links and add
lots of fresh content." If it takes weeks and months for the
search engines to notice me, do I have to wait that long to
see if the money was worth it?
No! It's true that it takes time…weeks, even months to build
up your web presence, but there are ways to follow your
progress. It's important to note that if you already have an
established Internet presence and wish to further optimize
your site, it usually happens much faster than a site that is
brand new with a brand new domain.
If you are already listed in various directories and your
existing website has been up and running long enough the
search engines have probably already indexed your site and
those linking to it. (to see if your site is indexed with a
particular engine, in the search field type
"site:http://www.yourdomain.com"). As you modify your pages
and add new content the process of moving up in search rank
is much swifter than starting from a brand new, un-indexed
site. ? The ranking process has an inherent unchangeable
variable of time. Sponsored search listings are one of a few
ways around this hurdle to get you to the top instantly while
the search spiders dig through your new site. But for the
long haul, while you wait for that big chuck of cash you just
paid your SEO to start returning, here are some ways to tell
if he or she did you justice.
Ways to keep tabs on your progress:
Monitor Search Engine Positions
If you're a brand new domain name the first step is to watch
for yourself to be indexed. Chances are that your optimizer
submitted your site to the most prominent search engines at
the very least. While the search crawlers will ultimately
find you on their own, there is some merit in submitting your
site manually. It may take some weeks before a check of
site:http://www.yourdomain.com reveals any activity though.
Take care not to be over anxious and resubmit your site. That
will only hurt your efforts.
Once you find yourself being listed by particular keywords in
a search engine, monitor how your rank moves every week or
so. (Frequently, the more you add fresh content, the sooner
the crawlers will return to your site.) Change the preference
settings in search engines to speed up your research efforts.
Google will display up to 100 results per page, MSN up to 50
in "advanced search." This makes it much easier to find
yourself if your down in the 300th position. Don't be
discouraged though! Being listed even at 300 is an
accomplishment. And as you optimize you will see your listing
move up in the ranks.
Visitor Tracking
The best, and easiest way to see who is reaching your site by
search engine and particular keyword phrase is to implement
some sort visitor tracking system. These are not complicated
and can cost only a few dollars a month. Take a look at a
company like http://www.webstat.com for example.
A small piece of code is placed on each page you want to
track. When you log into the online service, you can tell the
exact word and phrase someone used to reach you and from what
search engine... not to mention scores of other useful data
about your site traffic. This quickly gives you a snapshot of
which keyword phrases are most successful and in which
engines. This data is invaluable to further optimize your
pages.
Are your top search engine rankings on par with the industry
percentages?
Again using visitor tracking you can see if the people
reaching you by Google are close to the percentage of people
that use Google compared to MSN or AOL. If the industry shows
that overall 25{f searchers are using MSN and 5
ycos, your results should be similar. If they're not, it's a
sign that some modifications might be in order.
Monitoring these processes will show you that there's
actually quite a lot of activity. And there's nothing more
exciting than watching that 300th position search climb to
the first page!
