As seen on www.titan-seo.com website:

What are the major search engines, and what do they do?

About 90% of internet searches are done on the three major search engines, Google, Yahoo, and MSN. Some individuals searching the internet are looking for information on a product or service, while others might be specifically researching companies that they would like to do business with.

The task of the search engines is to bring up relevant websites when an individual types in a search term. The results that the search engines bring up are links that go to pages on websites located on the World Wide Web.

Why isn’t my website found in the search engine results?

Your website may be buried somewhere in the results pages of the search engines, but it might not be on the top pages. When you type a keyword or keywords into a search engine, a vast number of pages are typically displayed. If you aren’t on the first few pages, chances are just about no one is ever going to find your site.

There are two ways that you can position your website to come up towards the top. The first is with natural or themed search engine marketing, and the second is with PPC (pay per click) marketing, whereby you pay the search engine each time an individual clicks on the link to your website.

How do search engines work?

Search engines are computer programs that are setup to organize websites and online information. Google, MSN, and Yahoo all operate in a very similar manner with specific variances occurring on a smaller scale.

The organization process starts when a search engine sends a spider out to your website. The spider is a program that is in charge of collecting the code that makes up your site. Want to see what your code looks like? Go to your website and in your browser’s top menu bar click on “source”, “page source,” or “view source.” The code that you see there is the same code that the search engine spider will see when it comes to your site. So what does the spider do with this code?

The spider reads and collects the code off of each and every page that it visits on your site. Assuming that your site is coded in a way that the spider can understand, it will continue throughout your site and collect every page it finds. Once it collects these pages, they are put into the search engine’s database, also called the index.

A cached copy of the information the spider found on your website is kept in this database. This is the information the search engines will reference whenever they look for relevant websites to rank. But, having your site indexed in the database is only the first step. You still need to convince the search engines that your site is important enough to rank highly for popular keywords.

The three major search engines use a variety of filters to determine the relevancy and the importance of your site. These filters look for elements such as keyword themes, linking architecture, keyword relevance, coding parameters, linking popularity, and many other important parameters that determine your overall rankings.

These filters use algorithms to determine how each website should rank, and which keywords they should rank for. A website that is optimized properly using a themed search engine marketing strategy will do very well in the search engines.  One that is not may never be found by your potential customers.

How can I improve my natural rankings?

Improving your natural rankings is a long term strategy that is quite involved and complex. This strategy should be implemented by a team of experienced professionals who have a proven record of themed search marketing success. Unfortunately, there are numerous ways that you can adversely affect your rankings if optimization is done incorrectly or too aggressively. Be careful, and make educated decisions before making changes.

Where can I learn more about search engine marketing?

Our solutions section and our services section each have a wealth of information on search engine marketing. If you would like to learn more about search engine optimization as it relates to your company and your industry, we can furnish you with a no-cost, no-obligation proposal. We will include pertinent data about your website and those of your competitors, as well as information on the strategies we recommend to make certain that your potential customers are attracted to your website and its products and/or services.