AltaVista (search engine), provides its own results using a crawler to index information for its database. Paid results/listings come from Overture, while secondary results come from Open Directory.

AOL Search (search engine), primary and paid results both come from Google. Secondary search results are pulled ftom Open Directory.

Ask Jeeves (search engine), paid results come from Overture with secondary results coming from Teoma. Directory results are from Open Directory by way of Teoma.

Google (search engine), crawler based providing its own primary and paid results. Directory results come from Open Directory.

LookSmart (directory), paid results are their own, secondary search results are from Inktomi.

Lycos (search engine) primary results come from Open Diectory, secondary results from Fast and paid results from Overture and their own fee-based submission program.

MSN Search (directory), with results coming from LookSmart. Paid results provided by Overture with secondary results from Inktomi.

Netscape Search (search engine) primary results from Open Directory, secondary results from Google, and paid results from Overture.

Overture (pay-per-click database service) Not actually a search engine, Overture provodes paid search results for many of major search engines. Such as;

All Web AltaVista AskJeeves Excite iWon MSN HotBot Netscape Lycos Teoma

Open Directory (DMOZ) (directory) All content in this human-edited directory is from direct submission.

Yahoo! (directory) paid submissions from its own fee-based program and Overture. Secondary search results from Google.

For more in-depth detail on this interwoven web of search results see following pages.

Search Engine Providers Chart http://www.searchenginewatch.com/reports/alliances.html

Search Engine Results Chart http://www.searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/results.html

Search Engine Relationship Chart PDF file format, need Adobe Acrobat Reader installed. http://www.bruceclay.com/searchenginechart.pdf

-------------------------------------------------

Larry(Momp) owns Momp's Web Design and MWD News newsletter. In addition to web design service, site includes a web design reference library for webmasters.

Momp's Web Design: http://www.mompswebdesign.com/ MWD Newsletter: http://www.mompswebdesign.com/mwdnews.html Contact Momp: mailto:momp@mompswebdesign.com

Larry(Momp) owns Momp's Web Design and MWD News newsletter. In addition to the web design service, the site includes a web design reference library for webmasters.

Keeping an archive of articles on your website builds your knowledge base. You can refer visitors to your articles when answering their questions. People searching for information on topics you have written about will find your articles listed in their search results. Once they arrive at your site, maybe they will buy something from you: if you know so much about planting bulbs, maybe your site is place I should buy my bulb-planting books.

Other Offerings

What else can you add to this mix? Think about adding professional gardening book reviews, a gardening book club, FAQ's about gardening, gardening articles, a rating system for books, audience book reviews, and other gardening-related topics. Adding this type of information gives your visitors more reasons to keep coming back to your site. Offer free tools, create a forum. Set up a newsletter for your audience with your topic, adding in a discount for your product for newsletter readers. Give your audience a reason to come back to your website.

What Results Can I Expect: Google PageRank

A primary example of how this works is Google's PageRank. One of most important aspects of ranking for Google and other search engines is good content. Google wants their search engine users to find what they are looking for, a successful search experience for their users. The keywords included in your site are important; after all, those are terms your potential visitors are searching for. Now not only do you have your catalog pages and ordering information, but you also have a more in-depth treatment of topics you have addressed in your articles, book reviews, and other materials. More keywords in more places means you have a better chance of matching a potential visitor's search.

So how can you "rise above" other online gardening bookstores out there in search engine listings? Link popularity can be next important piece that allows you to differentiate yourself from rest of pack. All other things being equal, search engines that pay attention to link popularity will list your site higher in their results if you have more links coming back from other sites which have a focus related to yours. In other words, if your gardening bookstore has a number of backlinks pointing to it from websites of gardening clubs, nurseries, and so forth, your site will be seen as more authoritative. The more authoritative a website looks to Google through link popularity, higher that site will rank. After all, if all these other gardening-related sites point to your site, they are demonstrating that you have something important to say. That is another reason why it is important to have your material published on other websites.

Conclusion

Maintaining good content is a stepping-stone for your visitors to delve in deeper to your website. Taking time to build your content and provide for your audience will pay off in good search engine ranking and returning visitors.