Is it laziness? Is it narrow or closed mindedness? Is it lack of direction?

Maybe I’m just lucky. I stumbled upon the right information online early in my online business to avoid this pitfall… For some reason, people think when you have a website, there is only one way to promote them and make money. And that’s why they will ultimately fall someday!

Gee, I get all this Google traffic and make some good money… And then one day Google changes something in their Algorithm and their business is toast… I know it’s cliche, but don’t put all your eggs in the Google basket. Not even just Google… but search engines in general.

The reason I brought this up today is because someone called anything other than SEO (Search Engine Optimization) a fad… Wow.! The reason he said that is because I said that Webmaster’s have to evolve and think outside to the Search Engine box. And I guess there are types of websites that thrive in the Search Engine environment or don’t care if they make money… and that’s fine. But if you want to make a living online and make some money, you have to expand your horizons.

The things I was suggesting are not fads. These are techniques and ideas the are tried-and-true methods that have been used for years to make a lot of people a lot of money… People (that I know) have made millions of dollars online without ever giving Search Engines… and even Pay Per Click advertising… any attention at all. They don’t care. They don’t need them. I’m not going to get into all the different ways you can make money or get traffic without search engines in this one post, but they are out there…

Don’t think I’m saying I don’t think search engines aren’t a good way to get free traffic. They are! At the very least though, go after multiple engines… don’t get stuck on Google…

I think long term. There are things you MUST do to protect your long term objectives. Just worrying about SEO isn’t going to secure that.

Sumitting to search engines is largely a waste of time and money. I spent a lot of money submitting to search engines in my early days before I was told that I was being robbed… Many submit sites claim they are going to submit your website to 150,000 or more search engines. That’s bogus. There are only a handful of SEs that are worth worrying about. The rest are spammers…

Search engines use spiders or crawlers to crawl the net to find sites on their own. They do this by following links from other sites.

Repeated submissions to the search engines will not help. SE’s will rank the most important and relevant sites first and not those the submit repeatedly. If submitting to search engines did help, everyone would be doing it… They’re not.

A moderator in another forum I hang out in put it best:

“So why do search engines have a “Submit URL’ form?
The only reason I can think of is that its a public relations exercise. You feel good that you have actually done something after having submitted. Keep in mind that the ‘submit a url’ is probably a bit like the ‘close door’ button on the elevator — it doesn’t work either, but you still push it.”

They are also used because often clients expect it. The clients expect it that’s why you’ll see a lot of web designers and SEOers have to offer submit services because they may not get the biz if the client sees another with the service… Submiting has been so Hyped up that it’s a hard battle to win.

I strongly feel many website submit services are a scam. They’re just taking your money for something that isn’t necessary…

So How Do You Get Indexed by Search Engines?

Links to your website. And to rank well the more important and relevant those links are the better. If you’re just starting out, submitting to directories is a perfect place to start…

You will get spidered quicker and more often if you get links to your website. Much faster than submitting. And you can find a lot of FREE directories.

For any site I put up, one of the first things I do is submit to as many directories as I can. Because some of the directories (not all of them) get spidered all the time. When a search engine’s spider goes through a website, it follows links off of that website.

So let’s say you have a directory that you submitted to that gets hit by the spiderbot daily, well as soon as your link gets added to the directory the spiderbot will pick it up and follow it to your website…

It may not do a deep crawl right away, but eventually if you create enough content it will… content is important. The bots feed off of it and will visit more often if you add fresh content frequently.

I’ve used this strategy very effectively. I get visited daily by the SEs. And the best thing about it is that it’s free. A few years ago I spent $50 per month for a service to submit my website… wasted money.

It does also help to put your URL in your signature of any Public Forums you’re in. The SE’s crawl forums like crazy as well…

BTW, there is nothing wrong with it; it’s a common practice. I’m even in forums where they actually encourage you to place your products or new deals etc. in your sigs. It’s beneficial for the community as a whole. I may need what you’re offering…

DMOZ is important, but don’t get obsessed with it. A lot of people get angry or freak out about not getting listed. If you do, it’s a bonus.

Submit your site only once. If you submit again you are sent to the back of the line. There is no guarantee you’ll even be listed.

I really believe that it is better to get one way links to your website (not recipricol). Search Engines like Google use inbounds to weigh how important your website is. If people are linking to your website naturally, that’s a very good thing. Recipricols are artificial and I think SEs can pick up on that…

One of the best way to get links is to create content that people want to link to… that’s sound simple, but it’s very important. I have pages designed just for that purpose.

I know you asked how to submit to SE’s etc., but it really is a waste of time and money. And time and money is precious in this biz. SEO is not just about keywords, density, and meta tags. Your linking strategy is one part of the formula. There are really no shortcuts. You just have to take a systematic approach and hopefully your website offers something the SE’s eat up.