RE: The State of Search Engines

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-hwg-business(at)hwg.org [mailto:owner-hwg-business(at)hwg.org]On
Behalf Of Judith C. Kallos
Sent: Monday, October 02, 2000 8:49 AM
To: hwg-business(at)hwg.org
Subject: The State of Search Engines


<snip>
Handling client expectations and bringing them down to reality about how
these animals work, including the oh so popular spam "Top 10 Search Engine
Listings Guaranteed" is requiring more of my time than ever.
</snip>

This ones pretty easy if they expect a guarantee simply tell them ANYONE
guaranteeing placement is using methods which are either unethical or
they are cloaking and serving different pages to different engines. This
in some cases results in a lifetime ban. Are they willing to take the risk?
I don't give a guarantee and my rates are much higher than those you
quoted. I have been retained by some of the larger Canadian sites to do SEO
and I refuse to work for anyone who expects guarantees.

<snip>
Now that the LookSmart Network (Excite,AltaVista,Webcrawler,MSN and others)
and Yahoo! are charging for pay-for-review the landscape has changed quite
a bit.
</snip>

Yahoo is definitely not JUST pay as a matter of fact if you aren't
selling something on the site you can't use the service. LookSmart is not
part of any network the sites mentioned use their results. I don't believe
it is pay only either but I'm not positive. My thinking is if it is, it
won't
stay that way. The outcry from users in regards to pay to play is loud and
persistent. The wording in regards to this on LookSmart is poor to say the
least.

<snip>
What do you advise your clients in regards to acquiring and maintaining
relevant listings?
</snip>
All you can really do is monitor and try to improve positions and keep the
site listed. This is no different than any other part of site development
the client either trusts your judgement and doesn't bother to learn or YOU
educate them about it. Ignorance of clients in regards to this is one of the
reasons I do less and less of this and charge more and more to discourage
requests. The time, the skillset(intermediate programming knowledge,advanced
html and time to learn the algorythms of engines) means no one can do this
prperly for a 100 chicks. All of the gurus and marketers in the know charge
at least that/hr. In my case it's at least double/hr. Managing client
expectations from the get go is paramount.

<snip>
Even if you know what you are doing and play by the rules - this is
becoming increasingly more difficult to accomplish as time goes on.
</snip>

I agree somewhat but just look at the list of formerly spidering only
engines you mentioned are incorporating LookSmart. There are at least two
other major engines(Lycos/Hotbot) using ODP and the netscape browser I
believe defaults to it as well. With MSIE using MSN as default that's
6 of the big eight and both browsers incorcorporating Directories into
results.

Spider only engines are a dying breed BECAUSE of the spam and the ease to
which results can be manipulated. Reviewed listings seems to be the newest
trend. SEO is now about submitting sites properly to directories and having
the knowledge about these directories and how they work. None of these
directories can be manipulated to a large extent. Quality sites will get
better recognition because they deserve it not because they can manipulate
the engines.

<snip>
I am beginning to get a sinking feeling that we will be relegated to being
listed by how each directory chooses (ala Yahoo) - leaving us without as
much control or choice over where/how you are placed.  Ever try and get
Yahoo to change the site description that is butchered or incorrect?  Even
on the Business Express plan you can't get them to modify errors on their
part.  Foe-ged-aboud-it!  ;-)
</snip>
This is a real bugaboo with me! Why must Yahoo be dissed like this for
protecting its index. Yahoo DOES NOT arbitrarily butcher descriptionions
that have FOLLOWED THE GUIDELINES! You are lucky they even list you!
SEARCH ENGINES AND DIRECTOIES AREN'T BILLBOARDS they provide a valued
service (in many cases free) to users and sites alike and MUST BE TREATED
WITH RESPECT. A description should not be an advertisement it should be a
low key DESCRIPTION of what a user can expect to find on the site. If
developers can't follow the informative and step by step guidelines
or try to use advertising copy masked as a description than they get
what they deserve.

My complaint about Yahoo is something that they should
be concerned with and that is the inability to remove dead links and update
links in the index. I have to maitain an old site just so I don't loose the
traffic that Yahoo sends.

It seems that this link would help you with problems getting
listings listed properly.

http://dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/WWW/Searching_the_Web/Directories/Yahoo/H
elp_Getting_Listed/

best regards
Da' TMeister
mailto:iwb(at)syne-post.com

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