Key pointers for Search Engines on Getting Indexed

02 November 2011

Getting a site indexed by a search engine can be a frustrating experience for anyone first starting out. It can sometimes take several weeks for this to happen, causing a lot of concern to people. There is the Web Position Submitter which will advise you on estimated times for indexing on each search engine.

This information does give an indication of when it will happen but it does not change the fact that a wait to get a site indexed can be a long one.

Site indexing times have a little luck attached to them though, and if you submit your site just before a search engine refreshes their database, you could find that the wait is only a few days, but you have to lucky for this to happen.The real problems occur when a site is submitted for indexing and you have waited the time that you have been told yet you still have not been indexed. There are a few pointers that may help solve this dilemma and these are listed below:

1. Make sure that you are not already indexed as search engines will not inform you when you are finally indexed

2. Ensure that your web pages have been uploaded to your site before you submit them

3. Make sure that you have created non-framed versions of your pages

4. Create static pages that search engines can easily find

5. Understand that search engines will ignore special symbols

6. Make sure that no text is embedded in graphics and that there are no multimedia files, Java applets or XML coding

7. Limit page sizes to less than 60k

8. Remember a search engine will only travel two links away from a page

9. Remember that a search engine spider will ignore the site if it does not get a response from a site

10. Know that a search engine will ignore or even reject a site if it thinks that there is any spam suspected on a site

11. Avoid using meta refresh tags or redirects

12. Know that Yahoo!, Open Directory and others use a human to review a site

13. Know that some search engines will not index pages that are on many common free web hosting services

14. Know that some search engines will not allow pages that cannot be accessed by a home page

15. Ensure that a site that is submitted is within the recommended limits

16. Understand that search engines may lose submissions through technical error or bugs

The best way to deal with a problem mentioned above which may be the cause of a submission not being indexed is to make the required adjustments and re-submit the site to the search engine. If this fails to solve the problem then the best way forward is to contact them directly by email or by calling the search engine and asking them to investigate the problem for you.

You will receive a reply explaining why a site has not been indexed for whatever reason it happens to be. The chances are you may have to wait for a response from them either way you contact them. The most basic thing to remember is that most search engines assume that the pages on the site have been optimized in order to receive top rankings.