There
are thousands of search engines and directories in existence
today. Some of them come and go faster than the McDonald's drive-thru.
So, how do you know which ones you should keep your eye on when
it comes to the search engine optimization, submission and ranking
of your site?
Rather
than drive yourself crazy by checking your status on all the
search engines and directories out there, you should familiarize
yourself with the major players in the search engine and directory
arena. These search engines and directories are considered valuable
primarily because of their branding value. They are the major
sources of traffic generation.
The
Major Leagues
Google
Google is fast becoming the search engine of choice among web
surfers, thanks to its high relevancy and results generating
capacity. This search engine giant shares its database with
other search engines, including Yahoo and Netscape. Google is
extremely user-friendly with its clean and simple user interface.
The site tackles over 150 million searches every day, and boasts
more than 66 million unique monthly visitors.
AltaVista
AltaVista, one of the oldest crawler-based search engines on
the Internet, was acquired by Overture earlier this year. It
is a full-text search engine, therefore indexing every word
on your Web pages. When it comes to search engine optimization
and keywords, those keywords placed towards the top of your
Web pages will carry more weight than those further down on
the page. AltaVista also considers keyword tags, comments tags
and headings when determining relevance for search engine ranking.
Erratic search results and an outdated index have seen AltaVista
plummet in the popularity stakes. AV charges for listings, however
a free option is still available.
AOL Search
AOL Search allows you to search the Web as well as AOL's own
content. Formerly powered by the Open Directory Project and
Inktomi, AOL Search is now fed by Google.
HotBot
HotBot.com is an award-winning smart, sophisticated search engine
with more than 40 tools to help users better articulate their
searches and get relevant search results quickly and easily.
Lycos
Lycos.com offers Internet users a fast, easy and efficient way
to make sense of the Internet and manage its vast resources.
It combines leading Web search and navigation resources, deep
content in vertical areas, communications and personalization
tools, and a complete shopping center. Very popular in Europe,
Lycos is a crawler based search engine. Lycos has recently undergone
major "renovations" and is looking to regain it's
place amongst the worlds top search engines. Also takes results
from Fast/AllTheWeb.
Inktomi
Inktomi Corp., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Yahoo!, is the leading
provider of paid inclusion services. Inktomi was founded in
1996 with core search technology based on a research project
at UC Berkeley that harnessed the power of parallel computing.
Today, through top consumer portals and destination sites, Inktomi
Web Search provides more than half of all Web users worldwide
with the freshest, most relevant search experience. Inktomi
charges listing fees, however a free submit option is still
available.
Open
Directory
Formerly known as NewHoo, the Open Directory (or Dmoz as it
is more commonly known) is the largest, most comprehensive human-edited
directory of the Web. It is constructed and maintained by a
vast, global community of volunteer editors. Open Directory
feeds many top directories including Google's directory.
Yahoo
Yahoo, launched in late 1994, the Internet's oldest and most
popular search service, has a well-deserved reputation for helping
people find information. It employs more than 150 editors in
an effort to categorize the web and have over a million of sites
listed to it. If Yahoo search fails, its search results are
also powered by Google.
MSN
Microsoft's Internet portal entry features the LookSmart directory,
international search sites, personalization, special features
and integration with Hotmail e-mail. Fed by numerous engines,
most noteably LookSmart. Aside from getting its results from
Looksmart, MSN also derives results from Inktomi - both of which
charge for listings.
Fast/All
the Web
Has recently undergone major renovations and is steadily gaining
in popularity. FAST plans to charge for listing although listing
is currently free.
(Back
to top)
