Working with ShopSite

ShopSite Search Engine FAQs

Here is a list of questions and answers about using Internet search engines to market your store.

• How do I get my store listed in search engines?
• How can I get my store ranked higher in search engines?

How do I get my store listed in search engines?

Most search engines will eventually find your store, but you want to do everything you can to speed up that process. There are several companies on the Web that will submit your site to the major search engines, usually for a fee. However, if you have a little time (it doesn’t take much), you can save your money by submitting your site yourself. Most of the search engines have a page where you can submit sites to be indexed (though there is no guarantee as to when that will actually happen). For example, the page for submitting sites to Google is www.google.com/addurl.html, and the page to start the submittal process to Yahoo! is http://docs.yahoo.com/info/suggest/.

How can I get my store ranked higher in search engines?

Improving your store’s ranking in search engine results is a tricky issue, and each search engine uses its own formula to determine ranking. Here are some points to consider, though:

• Many search engines index and rank your site based on the words that appear in your pages. Try to write clearly, and include all the words you can think of that people might use when searching for your products. Do not try to fool the search engines by repeating words or using words that don’t really pertain to your site -- most search engines are advanced enough to detect this and may downgrade your site.
• Some search engines consider how many other sites point to your site, and how well-ranked those sites are. In other words, if a lot of important sites point to your site, then your site will be ranked higher than if no other sites have links to your site. Try to exchange links with other sites related to what you sell. For example, if your store sells soccer equipment, try to exchange links with sites that provide soccer information.
• Search engines also look at special HTML "meta" fields in your pages for lists of keywords and descriptions. If you have ShopSite Pro or ShopSite Manager, be sure to fill in the Meta Keywords and Meta Description fields for each page in your store.

ShopSite Help and Resource Center February 13, 2004 Give Feedback

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