Search Engine Optimization-Web Crawlers

The terms web crawler, automatic indexers, bots, worms, web spiders, and web robots are programs or automated scripts with browse the World Wide Web in a methodical, automated manner. The term web crawler is the most commonly used term.



Web crawlers are a tool used for search engine optimization.



Search engines use web crawlers to provide up to date data and information. Web crawlers provide the requested information by creating copies of web pages that the search engine later processes. Once the information has been processed the search engines indexes the pages and are able to quickly download the pages during a search. The process of web crawling is a key factor in search engine optimization. Search engine optimization is the art and science of making web pages attractive to search engines. Computer people call the process of using a web crawler to rank a website spidering.



Some search engines use web crawlers for maintenance tasks. Web crawlers can also be used for harvesting e-mail addresses. The internet is a gaping ocean of information. In 2000, Lawrence and Giles manufactured a study that indicated the internet search engines have only indexed approximately sixteen percent of the Web. Web crawlers are designed to only download a tiny amount of the available pages. A miniscule sample of what the internet has to offer.



Search engines use web crawlers because they can fetch and sort data faster than a human could ever hope to. In an effort to maximize the download speed while decreasing the amount of times a webpage is repeated search engines use parallel web crawlers. Parallel web crawlers require a policy for reassigning new URLs. There are two ways to assign URLs. A dynamic assignment is what happens when a web crawler assigns a new URL dynamically. If there is a fixed rule stated from the beginning of the crawl that defines how to assign new URLs to the crawls it is called static assignment.



In order to operate at peak efficiency web crawlers have to have a highly optimized architecture.



URL nominalization is the process of modifying and standardizing a URL in a consistent manner. URL nomalization is sometimes called URL canonicalzation. Web crawlers usually use URL nomilization to avoid multiple crawling of a source.



In an attempt to attract the attention of web crawlers, and subsequently highly ranked, webmasters are constantly redesigning their websites. Many webmasters rely on key word searches. Web crawlers look for the location of keywords, the amount of keywords, and links.



If you are in the process of creating a website try to avoid frames. Some search engines have web crawlers that can not follow frames. Another thing some search engine are unable to read are pages via CGI or database -delivery, if possible try creating static pages and save the database for updates. Symbols in the URL can also confuse web crawlers. You can have the best website in the world and if a web crawler can't read it probably won't get the recognition and ranking it deserves.

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Search Engine Marketing-How it Differs from Search Engine Optimization

Search engine marketing is a set of marketing methods used to increase the visibility of a website in search engine results pages. Types of search engine marketing include; search engine optimization, pay per click, paid inclusion, and social media optimization. Search engine marketing differs from search engine optimization which is the art and science of making web pages attractive to internet search engines.



Non-profit organizations, universities, political parties, and the government can all benefit from search engine marketing. Businesses that sell products and/or services online can use search engine marketing to help improve their sales figures.



Some of the goals of search engine marketing are to develop a brand, generate media coverage, and enhancing a reputation, and to drive business to a physical location.



If you do not feel confident enough to try your own search engine marketing there are several companies that will be able to help you out for a price. If you decide to go with a search engine marketing company take your time and shop around, find a company that really suits your own businesses search engine marketing needs.



Stay away from companies that promise top rankings. Most companies that promise tope ranking are more interested in your money then they are in keeping your business. Quite often this type of company will charge you top doller, spend a few days making sure your website has a few basic requirements and that is the last you hear from them. This type of search engine marketing company is not really interested in repeat customers.



Tread carefully around companies that promise first page rankings on the major search engines like Google and Yahoo. Make sure these companies are talking about sponsored listings and not just natural listings. Companies that are only after natural listings traditionally charge a large monthly fee, using a small portion of the money on sponsored listings, and pocketing the remainder.



The false promise most commonly used by shady search engine marketing companies is the money back guarantee. Generally if you read the contract very carefully you will lean that these companies have a very strange idea of major search engine. Companies that have a money back guarantee typically don't deal with the search engine movers and shakers like Google and Yahoo, instead they use small obscure search engines that are hardly ever used.



The Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) was created in 2003 to offer the public educational resources about search engine marketing and to also promote search engine marketing. Currently SEMPO represents over 500 global search engine marketing companies. Sempo is happy to offer their resources to the public for free. SEMPO has offers search engine marketing training courses for any and all interested parties who would like to expand their knowledge of search engine marketing. SEMPO's objectives are to teach search engine marketing strategies, techniques, and successful practices, to increase the availability and quality f its professionals, and to offer training courses that will help to establish a benchmark for search engine marketing. The cost of a SEMPO training course can range anywhere from five hundred dollars for a fundamentals of search marketing class, to over two thousand dollars for an advanced search advertising course.

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What to Look for in a SEO Company?

The search engine has laid down its rights to be depicted as one of the basics of the Internet. It has consolidated its power in terms of aiding surfers do their Internet-related activities. It has been found out that 9/10 Internet users utilize search engines to be able to look for the information that they need.



The search engine optimization has become a full-time sunshine industry. Many companies have been established to do search engine optimization-related jobs. There is a great demand for these kinds of services because search engine optimization has a long learning curve and will take much time from people who would want to do this themselves.



As we all know, there are a lot of hoaxes and scams out there in the Internet. It seems that as the Internet grows more and more complex, so do the scammers. In hiring the services of a SEO company, there are many factors that one should consider, given the fact that this endeavor will cost money and can make or break the website.



This article tries to give tips on how to choose a SEO company to hire. Here are some of them:



1) Assess the service of the SEO company



As with any other company-seeking endeavors, service is always the key dimension that one should look at. There are many ways of pre-assessing the service of a SEO company towards it customers. One can try to inquire by placing a call or by sending an email to the company. Depending on the courtesy and time of response of the company, one can initially assess its service.



2) Search engine optimization takes time



In hiring the services of a SEO company, one should always take into mind that search engine optimization takes time. If a company promises to deliver unreasonably fast results, they are probably making a fool out of you. Search engine optimization requires research and research requires time.



The normal SEO process takes around a month or so. No effective SEO efforts can be done in a week or two.



3) No guarantee



There are many factors to consider when optimizing search engine hits. Search engines use different algorithms and their spiders can vary. A SEO company which promises to make a website number 1 in search engine listing may be pulling the legs of its customers. A legitimate SEO company will be straight-forward and honest and will tell its clients that no single company can give a guarantee to the top spots in search engines. Remember that search engine optimization is not a comprehensive and exact science. It is more or a trial and error game than hard science.



4) Reports



A good SEO company will be able to tell its clients details regarding the standing of their websites. They will be able to track the developments of their clients’ websites in terms of their keywords, links and more importantly, their rankings in the major search engines.



5) Testimonials



A testimonial is the most powerful tool in proving a company’s worth. A satisfied customer is always a good indication of the effectiveness of a company’s operations and will always be the most credible piece of information about its integrity. If one can, he should find people who have garnered benefits from hiring a SEO company or at least try to validate the testimonials which are claimed by the SEO companies that he is choosing from.



6) Price



The price of the services of an SEO company should never be the main factor to consider when hiring it. Yes, it is important to consider the costs but one should look into the whole picture. A higher price will not necessarily mean that the company is better than the cheaper ones. One should also avoid companies which offer unreasonably low prices. Again, search engine optimization is no joke and one should expect to spend to be able to get results.



7) Other commitments



Make sure that the SEO company is primarily involved in search engine optimization and does not treat it as a sideline. SEO takes effort and dedication. A paying customer deserves to get results and his demands should not be put on the side lines.



One should be careful in hiring a SEO company because he will be spending much important money for its services. Also, if one hires an inefficient SEO company, he will be losing time and a lot of opportunities. Take in mind the basic tips above about selecting a SEO company and choose the best one which suits your needs.

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Why is Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Important?

The Internet has provided ways to revolutionize how we live our daily lives. It has crawled into the different dimensions of human lives- business, communication, information dissemination, personal relationships. People have made a paradigm shift towards using the Internet to aid them in their daily activities.



With this context in mind, many people are continuously struggling to get noticed in the world of the Internet. Websites are growing like mushrooms everywhere, every time. How can one’s website get past the millions of other websites and eventually be noticed by its target audience?



Search engine optimization aims to achieve the goal of getting more visitors to a website by helping it get higher rankings in the search engines. This simply means that search engine optimization’s goal is to make a website appear on the first pages, if not the first page of a search done through the search engine.



There are two ways to be able to get noticed by search engines. One is through pay-per-click-advertisements. A good example of a pay-per-click system that is employed by search engines is the Google Adwords system. It has created a hype and has given Google around 5 billion dollars in terms of revenue per year. Webmasters can place their bids to be shown when a keyword is searched by a surfer. The highest bidders will get their sites to appear first when the search is being done.



The second way of getting high rankings from search engines is through organic searches. Search engines evaluate websites by using what they call “spiders.” These programs scan the websites and collects information about them. They then collate the information and pass it on to the search engine. This area is primarily the main arena of search engine optimization. It utilizes a set of methods to be able to get search engines to list the website on high ranks.



Traffic



The main purpose of search engine optimization is to increase the traffic generated by a website. Websites are built to be seen by Internet surfers and search engines can help it achieve this goal.



The power of the search engine should not be underestimated. It is one of the building blocks of the foundation of the Internet. A survey showed that 90% of all Internet users employ search engines to aid them in their Internet-related activities. Google, the dominant player in the search engine industry, generates 70% of all search-related Internet activity.



People and Search Engines are alike



Search engines behave like people. They like websites which contain substantive information about a certain topic. The best sites usually appear first in search engines because people like them as well as the search engines.



Search engine optimization does not only generate traffic, it helps maintain the traffic. The behavior of the search engine is indicative to the behavior of the people who visit the website. Search engine optimization leads to the optimization of a webpage or a website. It will lead to a website which is more organized and a website which contains substantive information.



Target Audience



The use of the search engine to be able to target one’s target audience is one of the most effective Internet marketing strategies. It is not like other on-line marketing techniques (such as email marketing) which can lead to a lot of leakages in terms of targeting the right audience.



Search engines segment the market and connect the right people together. People search for topics which they are interested in and this is the main strength of search engines in connecting markets together.



Cost Effectiveness



One can do search engine optimization under the assumption that he knows what he is doing. Search engine optimization is a full-time job and has a very long learning curve. This is why most people would resort to out-sourcing the job to experts who are good at what they do. One should be cautious, however, in hiring a search engine optimization company or consultant. Factors such as pricing and service should carefully be assessed before signing a deal. If done properly, search engine optimization is a very cost effective way of getting more people to know about one’s products or to know about a certain issue or event that a website is disseminating.



SEO is very important for websites since it determines the position of the website in comparison with its competitors. It does not only generate traffic from the targeted audience but is also a cost-effective way of optimizing the website.

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Search Engine Optimization: Art and Science

One of the basic components of the Internet is the search engine. A search engine, as its name implies, helps people look for pertinent websites and web pages which contain information based on the keywords that the surfers have encoded. A survey revealed that around 90% of Internet users utilize search engines in doing their Internet-related activities.



Websites are developed for the main reason of being viewed. They are portals which provide information that are intended to reach their target audience. This is the main context which explains the importance of search engines.



Being listed in search engines is one thing and being listed on the top lists of the search engines is another thing. When someone searches for a certain keyword through the search engine, the most popular websites appear first and are usually the most visited websites. There are factors that search engines consider when they rank websites according to keywords. This is the main task of search engine optimization (SEO).



SEO?



Search engine optimization consists of methods which aim at improving a website’s ranking in search engines’ listings. SEO has become one of the sunshine industries that are related to the Internet. There are multiple ways on how to do search engine optimization and many companies have dealt into this business.



How do Search Engines Operate?



To be able to appreciate the beauty of the art and science of search engine optimization, one must be able to understand how search engines work. One may not be able to fully grasp the nitty-gritty details of search engine optimization operations, but he can appreciate it to a level that he realizes the importance that it plays in effectively marketing his website.



Search engines rank websites in different ways. A website can primarily be listed by a search engine as a sponsored link or a pay-per-click advertisement or as a result of organic search.



With the continuous development of search engines, many search engines have introduced paid advertising. Website owners can actually bid to be displayed on top of the website listings of search engines. The most popular example of this system is the Google Adwords system, which is displayed at the right-hand side corner of the browser when one uses the Google search engine.



A website can also be listed through organic search. Search engines use “spiders” and “robots” to be able to assess the contents of a website and they then relay the information to the main search engine system so that when a surfer searches for a certain topic, the websites which are organized to contain that topic appear first. Search engine optimization is aimed primarily to be able to do certain things to a website so as to achieve optimal organization to reflect a certain keyword or topic.



History of SEO



Search engine optimization can be traced back to the mid-1900s. During those times, the search engines initiated the cataloging of the contents of the Internet. Webmasters needed to submit their websites to different search engines to be able to get the attention of the engines’ spiders. The spiders collected, collated and reported the information to the search engines. The engines would then arrange the websites according to topic and displayed the websites when the keyword or topic is searched by surfers.



Meta tags were used by webmasters to be recognized by the search engines. Then, abuse of meta tags became rampant, causing websites to dominate searches that are irrelevant to them. Search engines began to fight back by using more complex algorithms which took into consideration other factors such as the text that is contained within the tile, the domain name, the file names, the keyword density, the keyword proximity, and other such factors.



Today



Today, the newly developed websites don’t need to submit to the search engines to be noticed. Spiders today are capable of tracking down websites even through links that are in the website. The use of a site map or hypertext links can help the spiders to navigate the site.



The industry of search engine optimization is a booming one. As the Internet takes people’s lives into more advanced stages, it has become more and more important terms of information dissemination, business development and communications. Having one’s website noticed by search engines is a good way to start the whole Internet journey.

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