Search Engines & Marketing Your Web Site

Dr. Soe, Dr. Westfall & CIS Dept.California Polytechnic University, Pomona, Updated August 2010http://www.csupomona.edu/~rdwestfall/451common/searchplace2.ppt

Agenda Introductory exercise:

Googlewhacks How do Search Engines work? How do you get your web site

listed? Search Engine exercise Internet information issues

Googlewhacks identify two words, NOT in

quotation marks, that get only one result in Google

examples (used to work) Exercise: find another

Googlewhack

Search Engine Placement Search engines return lists of links

based on search words entered by user Most users only look at 3 - 10 items in

search output before changing words Placement--how high a web page is in

the listings--is critically important in generating traffic from search engines

High Search Engine Placement

"We can guarantee you a top 10 ranking" what's it worth? how can they do it? Ixquick search on telecommuting

productivity does not include Google, bur see next

page

High Search Engine Placement Google searches on specified words

telecommuting productivity Westfall research Mrs. Westfall (also try

Norwalk Brethren Elementary) textbook ripoff

notes

Types of Search Engines Spiders, webcrawlers, robots

automatic indexing of key- and other words

Google, list of others

Web subject directories built by humans who review web pages Yahoo!, Open Directory (Yahoo used to look

like this)

Hybrids = spiders + humans

How Web Crawlers Work

Automated index building crawlers or spiders (indexing robot

programs) go to web sites examine pages & extract indexing

information may simply locate words may identify key words, phrases, links

store data in search engine’s database with URL for page

Search Engines Deliver Indexes

User requests information via search page Query engine searches database Delivers list of web resources

creates results web page based on search Listed in order of a calculated index value

index values based on search words, and also on "popularity" of site

but usually preceded by "paid placements"

Automated Index Building Problems

No standards HTML Documents are not structured so

that robots can extract routine information:

Except for <meta> tags: keywords, description, publication date, author, etc.

Robots index text, not graphics, movies, etc.

Search turns up inappropriate documents

Some Results Not "Genuine" Sponsored links at top or side of

page Overture pay for placement is now

owned by Yahoo! Google AdWords

only pay for click-throughs

Web DirectoriesBuilt by Human Indexing

Analyze site’s purpose Classify sites by broad subject area

hierarchical classification schemes Yahoo! - has many people reviewing

web site submissions doesn't have to accept submissions 6 week delay unless pay for priority

service?

Meta Search Engines Don't have their own databases or

indexing instead, combine results from other

search engines Examples

Dogpile, Clusty Ixquick (top 10 listings from other

engines)

Specialized Search Engines Search Engines & Specialized Direc

tories List of search engines (Wikipedia) Search Engines Directory Specialized Search Engines and Dir

ectories (many for educators)

Buzz Monitoring: 26 Free Social Media Tracking Tools

Google: specialized "search engines"

Search Engines Ranked by % of 16.7 Billion US Searches Google 65.8% 10.3

billion Yahoo 17.1 3.4 Microsoft 11.0 2.1 Ask Network 3.8 0.6 AOL LLC 2.3 0.4Source:

comScore Releases July 2010 U.S. Search Engine Rankings

Global Search Rankings Google 69.7% Yahoo 5.4 Bing 4.8 Baidu (China) 4.6 Yahoo (Japan) 4.4Source:

Microsoft and Baidu Gain Share on Google. Strategy Analytics, 2010, Q2

Search Engines Ranked by Pages Indexed (billions) Yahoo! 19.2* (Aug. 2005) Google** 11.3 (Aug. 2005) MSN 5.0 (Nov. 2004) Ask Jeeves 2.5 " "* web pages (+1.6 B images, etc.)**

Google Now Knows About 1 Trillion Pages (July 2008)

Get Site Into Directories Directories (e.g., Yahoo!) require

careful selection of search categories & keywords

Search for your keywords on Yahoo! to find appropriate categories

Yahoo! asks for a 25-word description of content make it really good to impress human

indexers

Targeting Spiders

pick "keywords" that people would use to find a page like yours

make these keywords prominent in your web pages, especially in the entry page

Top Search Engine Ranking Factors for Google

Search Engine Ranking Factors | SEOmoz

Meta Tags keywords meta tag used to be

important <meta name="keywords" content=

"telecommuting, research, telecommuting research, telecommute, telecommutes, telecommuter, telecommuters">

many search engines ignore them now because of widespread attempts to use them to manipulate rankings

Meta Tags - Description even though not used much in

rankings anymore, contents of following tag are shown in Google page listing <meta name="description"

content="Westfall research and papers on telecommuting, telecommuting productivity, telecommuting economic analyses, telecommuting strategies">

Keywords for Spiders All keywords are not created equal;

spiders give heavier weights to: keywords in the <title> (more than

once?) keywords in <h1> and other headers keywords in other text near top of page keywords in links (seen by user or in

URLs) bold faced keywords? italics? How Search Engines Rank Web Pages

More Keywords for Spiders Use keywords frequently, but don't repeat

same word more than once in a row OK: pizza pizza not good: pizza pizza pizza pizza pizza pizza

Use variations of keywords (plurals) Use keywords in alternate text for images

<img src "file.jpg" alt="[keywords]"> SEO quizzes

Links for Spiders Number of pages linking to a site

has become extremely important Google pioneered this if high ranking pages link to a site on

the same topic, it must be good Quality of links is also important

need to be relevant both to page they are on and to linked page

Trying to Fool Spiders Search Engine “Spamming” (16 flavors)

spiders are being programmed to detect it Examples:

repeat hidden keywords (bottom of page) like background color, or <font size=1>

keywords not related to site content irrelevant links: "link farms" or "link stuffing"

(ethical issues)

"Black Hat" SEO Tactics Black Hat SEO (web page) Bad SEO example page Anti-link management

forged emails asking for removal of links to competitors

"Black Hat" SEO (Google search)

Fake Sites on Search Engines Security researcher Jim Stickley

created a phony site for a real credit union redirected visitors to real site

phony site got #2 ranking on Yahoo and #1 on Bing ahead of even the credit union's real site

Google Blacklist It's not nice to try to fool Google!

GoCompare.com had an 87% decrease in web traffic after being blacklisted by Google

search on "Google blacklist"

Register your Web Site with Search Engines

Register individually with top sites Yahoo!, MSN, Open Directory Project

(goes into Google, etc.) Try site submission web sites?

Submit Express 75,000 search engines, $29.95

“Change content, resubmit every so often?

"I can guarantee a top 10 …" Junk mail and web sites True, but…

not for your 1st choices of key words Use relatively unique combination

of several words, and then them load into key parts of page (<title>, <H1>, etc.) probably not many people will search

for this combination of words e.g., telecommuting productivity

Guaranteed Top 10 Listing Use misspelled words

including 2 words ran together (no space between)

Use unique combination of words keep adding unrelated words to a

search until you find combination not found on any other page

Manually submit page and put links to it on another page(s) that's in Google

"Google bombing" drives traffic to other pages by

links and keywords Google search on failure Google's AdWords ("Why these…") pages linking to new biography URL

Scam Website Clusters Scam promoters set up hundreds of

search-optimized sites about the scam when you look for more information, most

search results say good things about it example: try searching for keywords from

Magic Words that Bring You Riches page and see how hard it is to find criticisms

Search Engine Exercise Search for your keywords on any

automated search engine For top 2-4 sites, look for keywords in:

<meta...>, <title>, <h1>, <a href="…>, <img… alt="…>, etc. (use View, Source)

words in page, esp. near top also use Google advanced search (click

Date, etc. then put URL in Find pages that link to the page:)

Report any patterns you see

Site Submit Exercise Identify a site to submit

find sites in Google related to Cal Poly Go through the process of submitting

to a search engine or other submittal site

Take notes, report back on experiences: how long it took information required, etc.

Locate Information on Internet

Search Engines, Directories, Meta Search Engines, On-Line Indexes

Pages with information on specific topics

White & Yellow pages Usenet News On-line newspapers, magazines, radio

and TV channels

Evaluating Information Quality

Source of site: Educational institution (e.g., MIT) Professional organization (e.g., IEEE) Government agency (e.g., NASA)

Ratings by independent evaluators Corroborating evidence: multiple,

reliable sources

Quality of “Did You Know?” YouTube video that “went viral” exercise: identify statements that

probably are not true count passive references e.g.,

"predictions are" 2010: Data doubling every 11 hours

(do the math!)

Citing Web Information Whenever you use someone else’s

ideas, you have to cite them Format for a research paper

American Psychological Association (APA) Beckleheimer, J. (1994) How do you cite URL's in a

bibliography? Retrieved [month day, year], from [URL]

Graphics: if owner gives permission, follow their directions for giving credit