Hey guys....got a question on search engine ranking...

I have a website that I launched 6 or so years ago for a local small family owned business...it was real cheesy but whatever.... its at http://www.dreamscape.com/sievetek

its been on the first page of almost every search engine, ever since. Get lots of traffic which means lots of sales. (duh). They are very happy with it.

Well as time progressed and they got bigger they wanted a bigger better site to go with their bigger better company, and their new name. You can find the new site at
http://www.oxygenplusmedical.com

I still hav some tweaking to do to the template on some pages, but all in all they are 100% happy with it, except for the most important part. I cant seem to get this page to rank at ALL on any search engines, except for LookSmart. Even then they are ranked so low its not worth searching for.

Do you guys have any tips or pointers that can help me get ranked on search engines? Their last resort is a bunch of sponsored links. At least that way they will be one of the first links, at a hefty cost

thanks guys

Well as far as Looksmart, all their listings either come from their ppc program or Wisenut for their free listings.

For your positioning, you need to do some research on what your keywords are. You can use this free tool: http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchi ... uggestion/

These keywords are what you want to focus your site around.

A few opinions...

1/ Get a DMOZ listing as well as other directory listings
2/ Get links from other sites to build up your Pagerank
3/ Optimize your title tag
4/ You need to make some text links at the bottom of the page that copy your side navigation. This will ensure you get fully spidered and pagerank passed.
5/Use heading tags for your headings

Anything else, you can find here on Ozzu.

You should use a proper redirect. clean up your tile, use keywords first in title, and if they really need the company name, which is irrelevant, put it on the end. Consider keyword prominence more so than density. Thats what I would do.


aarrgh

thanks for the info guys aaarrrgghhhh, lol, what do you mean by a proper redirect? Is the way I did it incorrect, or is there just a better way to do it?

also, how long does it typically take to get listed with DMOZ, provided they list you?

it depends on how fast the dmoz editors take to get your site listed. In some categories, it can take up to a year.

have you submitted your site to dmoz?
-best to do it asap and forget abt it cuz u may go crazy waiting for your site to be added. lol.

yeah, I just added it to DMOZ this morning. I was going to submit it to Yahoo but it looks like they require an annual $300 fee for commercial sites. Problem is, when I try to call them, the recording always always says they are in a meeting lol I say they need to stop gossiping around the water cooler, and answer the phones!

for the yahoo submission, 300 usd is for "instant inclusion". You can try a free submission program.

try. http://www.submit-express.com

it submits to some engines...

Make sure you write down the category you submitted to DMOZ and keep the date. This way, you can contact http://www.resource-zone.com after a month, then 6 months, to see what is the hold up on your site submission.

As far as Yahoo Directory, yep there is a 299.00 fee. I find it is worth it. I get tons of top positioning in Yahoo from the actual Yahoo Directory listing, plus if it's a good category you can get a nice PR link. Make sure you use your best keywords in the description, thats very important.

apparently there is the $299 fee to get included, with no guarantees of placement. Thats to be expected. They are contemplating going with Pay Per Click, where they can determine their ranking. At least they will definitely get traffic, and hopefully sales:)

The better the optimization of your title, description, the better your chances of getting good positioning in the Yahoo Directory and the Yahoo search engine itself. I have about 25 clients and at least 15 of them have excellent positioning in the Yahoo search engine, and it's their actual Yahoo directory listing that is showing.



Where did you hear this? I do not see how changing the directory to ppc would bring in more sales? They already have Overture sponsored listings and the Overture Site Match program which costs per click. Are you saying that the directory itself would be ppc?

no no no, sorry i should have been more clear. They are thinking of going ppc with overture, and would be able to dictate their ranking on their most important keywords, and in turn be listed on many other search engines.

Do you think that I should have them pay the $299 fee and see how that goes? It seems it would be much cheaper in the long run

It all depends on if you having trouble getting positioning in Yahoo search. Your not going to get a ton of traffic/leads/sales from the directory itself. You will get the traffic if you create a good tit;e/description for that Yahoo Directory listing and then it gets good positioning in Yahoo search.

thanks for the info...

alternatively, you can look to business.com to get the site listed..

get it listed in as many places as possible, at the same time, make sure the fees paid for the site listing is well worth it....