Question for computer geeks...

[RobinP]

How do I make a website I created come up first in a search engine query? THANKS!

[MichelleH]

I'm not a computer geek (by far) but I've heard this is not in one's controll. They come up in order based on which ones get the most hits. (most to least)

Hope this helps.

[pffida]

There are fees you can pay to be at the top of a search. I've heard they're pretty substantial. I did a quick google search on the term "search enging hits" and there are several interesting articles that give some good ideas, none of most costing nothing but your time. Good luck.

[pffida]

Sorry for the typo. The search was "search engine hits". (I'm so used to typing on my BlackBerry where it usually corrects my misspelled words.)

[Merridith]

Hi Robin:

Here are some ways that you can improve your website's ranking - but you won't have absolute control. The ranking systems that the search engines use are proprietory and their criteria keep changing (I'll skip the reasons why - but they're legitimate reasons).

1. Make sure that you have good quality meta data.
2. Make sure that your url name also accurately describes your website (bonus points from web crawlers if it does!).
3. Make a descriptive name <title> in the chrome for the page contents acurately. There are billions of "untitled" websites out there. Name EACH page of your website uniquely.
4. Submit your URL to the big search engines - Google, MSN & Yahoo. Use a submission engine to auto-submit to the rest of them.
5. Use links. The more people who are linking to your website, the higher the ranking you will get assigned. The quality of the links count too. For instance if Shoppers Drug Mart linked to YOU it counts more than Joe's Hair Clips.
6. Give yourself about 6 weeks for recognition to take place. Google for instance does a full inventory about once a month (that's if you don't submit to it)
7. Make sure that you give a good <content> description after your title. This is the one liner description that shows up when someone Googles for a website matching yours. People use that to decide whether to visit or not.
8. More hits = higher rankings
9. Update your website FREQUENTLY. This will also help push you up the rankings.

Good Luck!
Merridith