Attracting customers using search engines 
by Mark Roper, January 2005
Introduction
This article is intended to explain what the different types of search engines are and how they can be used as a marketing method to attract customers to your website.
What is a search engine?
A search engine is a website which is designed to allow people to search using specific keywords or phrases and returns a list of relevant websites. They can be used to bring visitors to your website. There are several different types of search engines - traditional, directories and pay per click.
Traditional Search Engines
Traditional search engines 'crawl' your website by looking at every page on your site and analysing the content. The resulting information is stored in a large database. Most of these types of search engines are free, although some charge to have your site added quickly. On the free search engines most allow you to submit your site to be included - however one disadvantage is that it can take weeks or months before the search engine will 'crawl' your site and include you in the search results. With these sort of search engines, the position your website comes in the results is mainly dependant on two things:
- a) The content of your pages. The more relevant keywords and descriptive text your pages have, the better. However this should not be abused - if you repeat the same keyword(s) hundreds of times on a page, you will most likely be banned from the search engine.
- b) The number of other pages linking to yours. The more pages that link to you, the more important your website is considered to be and the higher you will be in the results.
Directories
A directory is a website which lists other websites by categories and sub-categories - often 100's of categories. For each website there is usually a 1-2 line description of that website. Users can find websites by either browsing to the required category or by searching using keywords or phrases. Most directories use humans to manually add or edit website listings so it can take a long time to be included, following a request. An example of a popular (and free) directory is DMOZ.
Pay Per Click (PPC)
Pay Per Click (commonly known as PPC) is a fairly new method of attracting visitors to your website. As you might have guessed, you pay for every click which somebody makes - i.e. everytime somebody clicks on the link to your website, you pay a certain amount of money. With PPC you decide which keywords you want your website to appear under and how much you are willing to pay for each click. Then when a user searches using those keywords, your website will appear in the results. The more you are willing to pay per click, the higher your website will appear on the results. One of the biggest advantages of PPC is that the visitors can be highly targeted (by using specific keywords) and thus more likely to turn into customers. One PPC scheme is Overture, but the most popular PPC website, is the Google Adwords scheme. You may well have seen Adwords adverts on the right hand side of Google search engine results.
Why is it worth being listed in a search engine?
If your website was not in any search engines, it would be very difficult for potential customers to find and visit your website. The only way to attract visitors would be by showing your website address in offline materials, such as brochures and business cards. If your site was listed in a search engine you can gain many more visitors and potential customers, with little (or no if you wish) additional expense.
What should I do now?
If you do not yet have a website, but are thinking about one, it is important to choose a website designer that has knowledge of search engine optimisation, since the actual design and coding of your site can affect it's results in search engines. ropernet IT have experience and a good understanding of search engine optimisation. If you require a website to be developed or your existing one to be updated, please contact us .
Did you find this article useful? To be informed about new articles and other news, please sign-up to our free newsletter.
About the author
Mark Roper is the proprietor of ropernet IT. ropernet IT supply web design & development, site hosting, stock photography and domain registration services. For full information please visit www.ropernetit.co.uk
This article is copyright ropernet IT 2005. If you wish to reproduce or publish this article in any form, please contact us.