Search Engines Explained
What Are Search Engines?
How Do Search Engines Work?
How Do Search Engines Rank Web Pages?
What is Keyword Relevancy?
What is Link Popularity?
What are Search Engines??
A search engine is a database system designed to index and
categorize internet addresses, otherwise known as URLs (for
example, http://www.insitemediadesign.com).
There are four basic types of search engines:
Automatic: These search engines are based
on information that is collected, sorted and analyzed by
software programs, commonly referred to as "robots",
"spiders", or "crawlers". These spiders
crawl through web pages collecting information which is
then analyzed and categorized into an "index".
When you conduct a search using one of these search engines,
you are really searching the index. The results of the search
will depend on the contents of that index and its relevancy
to your query.
Directories: A directory is a searchable
subject guide of Web sites that have been reviewed and compiled
by human editors. These editors decide which sites to list,
and, in which categories.
Meta: Meta search engines use automated
technology to gather information from a spider and then
deliver a summary of that information as the results of
a search to the end user.
Pay-per-click (PPC): A search engine that
determines ranking according to the dollar amount you pay
for each click from that search engine to your site. Examples
of PPC search engines are Overture.com and FindWhat.com.
The highest ranking goes to the highest bidder.
How Do Search Engines Work?
Search engines compile their databases with the aid of
spiders (a.k.a. robots). These search engine spiders crawl
the Internet from link to link, identifying Web pages. Once
search engine spiders find a Web site, they index the content
on those pages, making the URLs available to Internet users.
In turn, owners of Web sites submit their URLs to search
engines for crawling and, ultimately, inclusion in their
databases. This is known as search engine submission.
When you use search engines to find something on the Internet,
you're basically asking the search engine to scan its database
and match your keywords and phrases with the content of
the URLs they have on file at that time. Spiders regularly
return to the URLs they index to look for changes. When
changes occur, the index is updated to reflect the new information.
How Do Search Engines Rank Web Pages?
When ranking Web pages, search engines follow specific
criteria, which may vary from one search engine to another.
Naturally, they want to generate the most popular (or relevant)
pages at the top of their list. Search engines will look
at keywords and phrases, content, HTML meta tags and link
popularity -- just to name a few -- to determine the value
of the Web page.
What is Keyword Relevancy?
Relevancy is a term used to define the importance of keywords
in relation to a Web site. Relevancy also applies to how
appropriate the keyword is toyour offerings.
The majority of the "big" search engines and directories
out there scan pages using various formulas to determine the
relevancy of any given keyword or phrase. While the particular
algorithms will differ from search engine to search engine,
most often the relevancy is determined by measuring the frequency
of a keyword or phrase in the text being searched.
What is Link Popularity?
In simple terms, link popularity is the measurement of the
number of other Web sites that include a link to your Web
site somewhere on their site. Each search engine, depending
on their specific algorithms, determines it differently. If
your link is included on a site that has high link popularity,
your link will carry more weight with the search engines.
Conversely, if your link is on a site with relatively low
popularity, your link carries less weight.
The text that you link on your website helps explain to the
search engines just what they can expect to find on the page
you're linking to. Every page on your site will contain textual
links to other pages within your site. We may also utilize
a site map. This makes it easier for the search engine spider
to find all the pages on your site.
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