Knowing the different Search engines
So, it’s your first time on the Internet and you’d like some information on “cars”. Where do you go? There are so many search engines and directories, which one do you start with?… Which one is best? Which of the many search engines really matter?
Well, the best search engines are usually the most popular and most used ones. This will be true for both the Web site owner as well as the Web searcher/consumer.
Here’s the reason: More often than not, the well-known/popular search engines tend to promote themselves very well and have strong relations and strategic alliances with other Internet powers (AOL and Netscape immediately come to mind). This alone will bring in lots of traffic, especially when compared to the lesser-known search engines.
If you are a Web site owner and your site gets listed high with one these well-known search engines, you’re guaranteed a ton of traffic to your site (a good thing, especially since it didn’t cost you any money!).
For the searcher/consumer, a well-known (hence, very wealthy and commercially backed) search engine will generally give more dependable and accurate results. These search engines will work faster, load quicker and are more likely to be well-maintained and upgraded regularly to keep up with the rapid growth of the Net!
Before getting into the specifics of each search engine, let’s first define the differences between the two primary types of search “services”.
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Search Engines |
Search engines use robots called “spiders” to index (categorize) your Web site. You submit your Web site and/or page to a particular search engine and the “spider” will index your submission.
Here’s how it works: A spider (which is also called a “crawler”) visits your Web site, reads your page… and then follows links to other pages within your site. This is what is meant when someone says your site has been “spidered” or “crawled”. The spider will also return to your site on a timed and regular basis (say once every couple months) to look for any new changes.
Once the spider has all your information, it goes back home to the search engine where it will begin to “index” what it has found. Most of the time, it can take a while for new pages (or changes that the spider finds) to be added to the index. Thus, your Web page may have been “spidered”, but not yet “indexed”!
Until your site has been indexed (added to the index/search engine listing), you are NOT yet available for search (you don’t exist yet as far as consumers are concerned).
Now, some promotional “gurus” say that you don’t have to actually “submit” your Web site/pages to these “deep” search engines because in theory, these robots are “spidering” new Web sites everyday and supposedly they will find and index your site (eventually).
But the reality is that unless you have links from other sites leading to yours, OR you have registered your site with one of these search engines, your Web site will NOT be indexed - hence, you will never exist!
[I’ll explain this in more detail later, but make sure that you submit all of your pages to the search engines. Don’t wait for them to spider you!]
Examples of some of the more popular search engines that use “spiders” are:
- AltaVista
- Excite
- HotBot
- Infoseek
- Lycos
- WebCrawler
Next come the…
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Directories |
Directories will NOT list your Web site and will never become aware of your existence unless you register with them. More often than not, they will only register your home page and not your sub-pages.
The main difference between directories and search engines is that directories will “categorize” Web sites. Hence, if your Web site has to do with cars, you will be indexed under the category of “automobiles” or “cars” or some other relevant topic.
This difference alone will usually make directories a more “relevant” search engine. Examples of some of the more popular directories are:
- LinkStar
- LookSmart
- Snap
- Starting Point
- WWWYellowPages
- Yahoo! (the most popular of the bunch)
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