what is the best way for free to get your rankings up on a search engine. Also is there a way to submit your site to google. I've just recently created my websute www.themortgagerx.com and would like to get more traffic going there through search engines.

http://dmoz.org/add.html
http://www.alltheweb.com/help/webmaster/submit_site
http://addurl.altavista.com/
http://www.google.com/addurl.html

These are just a few... hope that helps.

-J

There is no simple answer to that except hire someone who knows SEO to optimize your site or take the time to learn how to do it yourself.

If you only do one thing it should probably be to acquire many quality links pointing to your website (with your target keywords in the link text preferrably) from other sites and directories that are relevant to your business. Just that alone would result in your site showing up for searches in some search engines.

It sounds simple but isn't - it is a lot of hard work

Well, generally speaking you need lots of content. Content is still king in my opinion. You need a website that converts as well, sure being ranked #1 is great, but if you can't get anyone to actually contact you about the services you provide that #1 ranking is moot.

Specifically speaking your website could use a lot of work in the SEO department. You should also keep in mind that it takes time to get indexed. It make take weeks or months for the search engines to really do a complete crawl of your site, so don't expect overnight results.

Which keywords are you targeting? If you're targeting very competitive keywords you're going to have to do a lot of work and wait quite a while before you will be in the top ten.

Robert,

Since you're just starting out, thought I'd share some thoughts about your site. This isn't meant to be critical. Just some things you may not know.

Search engines change their method for ranking sites quite often. But, its pretty safe to say that they are looking for relevancy as a key factor, along with quality incoming links.

Your meta tags (Page Title, Description, and Keywords) along with your site copy must all "match" to be considered relevant. Right now, you don't have a Description, and you should add one for each page. Also, your page title for your home page is MortgageRx. Not a term commonly searched for, I'd bet! Try a title with your keywords in it.

Your home page doesn't have much information "above the fold", meaning that when a visitor lands on your site, they don't see much without scrolling. That's a visitor issue as well as a search engine issue. Try putting content right at the top of the page that contains your keywords.

If you don't know what keywords are best to go after, you might want to check out WordTracker.com. Pay for a day's worth of service, and figure out which are the best keywords to use.

Another thing to consider is that your site is very wide. Anyone using an 800x600 browser setting would have to scroll from right to left, as well as up and down. Generally, people don't like scrolling, and may not stay on the site long enough to do you any good.

I'd add a Contact button to the navigation bar. And, since you have your own domain, set up a mailbox there. It can forward to your AOL account, but it looks more professional.

Your header is a bit distorted. You might want to take a look at that image file and figure out what is causing the distortion.

Hope some of this is helpful as you increase your knowledge of selling on the web!

Kathleen

This guy is not free but he's done wonders with my website.

http://www.erpositioning.com/index.html

If you want to get your site's ranking up as high as possible Ed's your guy.

We are a licensed real estate brokerage in Las Vegas. We are only 1 of 2 online real estate companies. We currently rank in most Top 10 search engines for "Las Vegas Homes" and "Las Vegas Real Estate". I've found that link-exchanging and building relationships with realtors all across the US has placed us in the #1-#3 spots consitantly. If you are interested in linking to us, we will gladly exchange links with your website.

Regards,

Amir Feinsilber
Bid4Agents.com Realty
http://www.bid4agents.com/links/links.html

To Get into the Search Engines yourself we suggest:

1. not submitting directly to Google as they don't like it and it can hurt your ranking

2. add unique, quality content to your site (no canned "reports" as they do not help as many agents have the same "reports" on their sites

3. add a blog

4. submit to dmoz

5. add as much info about your listings as possible as this is content that is searched all the time. (stainless steal, specific addresses, etc)

6. add your listings to craigslist with a link to your site

7. if you have an all flash site get a new site

8. ensure your text is actual text - not images

9. put your URL in your email signature

10. blog, blog, blog

Any questions please feel free to contact me.

Steve - steve@combustionlistings.com
http://www.combustionlistings.com

HAH! . Is this some kind of joke? Google doesn't like it when you submit your site? It hurts your ranking? Where did you come up with this idea?

Here is further support that the above statement is bunk.

This is from Google

You can read more here:
http://www.google.com/webmasters/1.html

You are correct, but people that submit themselves to google will be given a poorer page rank than those who are organicly found.

ubertor is absolutley right, and so are both of you, Its not going to hurt you to submit to google, but your never going to get the same pagerank as someone that doesn't submit.

If you are happy showing up on the 3rd page of google, definatley add yourself to google, if you want to be number one, don't do it.

Greg

This is absolutely false also. Your position in search engine result pages have NOTHING to do with whether or not you have submitted your page to google. Where are you coming up with this stuff?

Greg is right,

You'll not be penalized for submitting however doing so is merely an excercise in futility. We haven't submitted a site in years. That's just not how it's done. It should also be a HUGE red flag for self proclaimed search engine marketers that want to charge you for "submitting your site". Don't waste your money

The idea that submitting your site is somehow bad is the problem. I too have not "submitted" a site in the past 6 or 7 years, however to claim that it's bad to do so is just misinformation.