When most people talk about SEO, or search engine optimisation, they consider Google to be the most important of the search engines. In all honesty, this is a sensible assumption. Google are by far the most popular search engine and, because the algorithms they use change so frequently, they are also one of the more challenging of all the engines. Reaching the top spot in Google can yield hundreds or even thousands of search visitors every single day. These visitors are so sought after because they are highly targeted visitors that are looking specifically for the topic of your page.
The first step to promoting your site is obviously to create the site and have it populated with top quality content. Once that is completed it is necessary to get your site indexed by the search engines. There are essentially three different methods of doing this, via a direct search engine submission, a directory submission, or through an inbound link from a site already indexed by Google. Google actually prefer the latter method because they believe that is how the web should be surfed and, so, how it should be judged.
Directory Submission – Effective But Extremely Lengthy Wait
The problem with relying on directory submissions is that while they are given reasonable weight by most search engines it can take a long time to be either accepted or not. Directories are large collections of websites broken into categories and usually subcategories. Human editors visit each and every site to determine whether a particular site is worthy of a place in the directory and only if this editor determines this to be the case is the site accepted.
Unfortunately, this can mean a wait of several weeks or even several months. In terms of being indexed by Google, one of the most beneficial directories to use is the Open Directory Project, also referred to as the ODP or DMOZ. While Google do use this directory and index it regularly it can take two to three months to get a response from them.
Google Submission – Effective But Extremely Lengthy Wait
Google Submitting directly to Google is another viable solution. The Add URL page of Google is simple and quick to complete, but again the problem is the amount of time between submitting and acceptance. Again, it can take as long as three months or possibly even longer. Google do not always inform webmasters of their decision so you could be left in the dark for sometime.
Inbound Links – Highly Effective And Incredibly Quick
Inbound Links are the currency of the Internet. The more inbound links you receive the higher up the search engine rankings you are likely to appear. Google, in particular, view an inbound link extremely highly and award weight to links according to how popular the linking page itself is. This means that a link from a page with a high PR or with a large amount of traffic is given more weight than a brand new page with very few visitors or low page rank.
Using the inbound link theory is generally much quicker. As a general rule, Google index sites every month or so but sites that are updated more regularly are also indexed more regularly. In particular, article directories that add content numerous times every day are indexed on a frequent basis and can provide a superb way to quickly get indexed by Google and have the pleasant side effect of providing numerous links and some direct traffic.
How To Gain Links Within A Week Using Article Directories
The process is simple enough. Write an article based on the same topic as that of your site, include a link in the short “About The Author” paragraph at the end of the article and include good keyword anchor text. There are literally hundreds of article directories on the Internet. Some take less than a day to include your article while other, more popular sites, may take a week or so. Once your content is on site it is just a case of waiting a couple of days for the Google spider to crawl by and index the page, follow your link, and subsequently index your page. Using this method you could be indexed in Google and receiving a number of powerful inbound links in less than a week; certainly a big improvement on the three month waiting list with DMOZ or Google themselves.