a la mode
news & marketing tips — posted July 14,
2005
Not getting ranked on search engines? Here are five
questions to ask yourself
As you know, the
single most important thing you can do to increase your XSite's
ranking with search engines is to have other relevant websites to link
to yours. As long as the websites you swap links with are live and
legitimate, search engines will count that link as a "vote" for your
site, thereby increasing your site's popularity in the search engines.
Plus, if the site that has a link to yours is already indexed, you
will also receive a visit from the spiders that visit their site.
Whether you
launched your XSite today or several months ago, it's important to
keep in mind that no one can predict when your site will get ranked on
a search engine. That's because search engines keep their
ranking criteria confidential and most won't disclose how often their
spiders —
computers that visit web pages to see what they are about
—
"crawl" websites.
In fact, Google
says this: "We add and update new sites to our index each time we
crawl the web. We do not add all submitted URLs to our index,
and we cannot make any predictions or guarantees about when or if they
will appear … The best way to ensure that Google finds your site is to
have pages on other relevant sites to link to yours. Google's
robots jump from page to page on the web via hyperlinks, so the more
sites that link to your pages, the more likely it is that we'll find
them quickly."
If, despite your
efforts, you're still concerned about your search engine rankings, you
may want to ask yourself the following questions:
Do my content
pages reflect me and my business? Customize your content pages to
reflect you and your business. If all you've done is activate those
pre-built content pages we're provided you, search engines won't see
them as a unique entity and may even flag it as a duplicate site.
Try to include your business name within the text of the provided
content pages. Or, re-word some of the text to reflect the way you
would speak to a customer or the way you do business.
Did I include a
site map?
Having a page that lists all the links on your XSite gives search
engine spiders an easy way to crawl through your site and gives your
visitors an easy way to find information of your site if they're
having a hard time. To add a site map go to Step 6 of your XSite's Wizard and activate the "Site Map" page.
Did I set up my
XSite's footer?
Along with your company name and contact information, you should also
include Site Navigation in your footer so your site has text links to
your XSite's content pages. Not only will it increase your
XSite's "crawlability," it will also be an easy way for customers
using slower dial-up modems to use your XSite. To do this, go to
Step 8 in your XSite's Wizard and click on the box under "Site
Navigation."
Does my site
contain broken links?
Check any outside links on your XSite regularly to make sure
they're active. Broken links keep search engine spiders from
properly indexing your site.
Do each page's
description and keywords effectively represent the content on the
page?
Each page of your site should have an enticing description and
include unique keywords. We have pre-populated the keywords and
description sections of your XSite with the terms we have found to be
the most effective for your marketing, including the counties you
selected as part of your coverage area. However, to make your site
more "spider-friendly" you need to personalize both sections to
reflect your business and local area market. For example,
combining the words "real estate" with your region, city and even a
neighborhood within your city or other keywords specific to your local
area can help your site capture a more relevant search return.
To view your
content page's keywords and description, go to Step 6 in your XSite's
Wizard and click on one of the content pages you've activated and
scroll down to "Page Options."
Understanding
the new doorway forms on your XSite
In the
last edition of the Agent e-Newsletter we described some of the
new lead capture tools available on your XSite. One such tool is
the doorway form, which is a form that your visitors see before they
can get to their requested page. When a visitor fills out
the form,
you get detailed contact information on their first visit, which can
automatically be added to a particular contact group for follow up.
There are
two categories of doorway form settings that are available on your
XSite:
Page specific settings.
These allow you to specify individual pages (e.g. your
listings pages) to be preceded by a doorway form. Your visitors can
either fill out the form to continue, or can simply click "cancel" to
continue (unless you've specified that form is required).
Global
doorway settings. These allow you to establish
"triggers," which automatically activate the doorway form of your
choice through the natural course of a visitor browsing your site.
For example, if you changed your settings to permit three page views
before a doorway form appears, then a site visitor can only view three
pages in your site before a doorway form will prompt them for
information. This would then continue to prompt them to fill out the
form every three pages they view until they either fill out the form
or exceed the maximum number of times you specified the form should
appear
The new doorway
forms available on your XSite can be a very useful tool for capturing
leads, but they can also be frustrating to a visitor if used too
much. For best results, use the doorway forms in places where
the destination content is of particular interest and value to your
visitors, such as your listings, videos or certain mortgage
calculators.
To create doorway forms for your XSite, click on
"Lead Generation Tools" in the My Office area of your XSite. |
