Search engines can take one of several forms. Firstly there are pure search engines such as Google (the leading search engine), which send out spiders or robots to scan web pages.

Next there are meta search engines such as dogpile, which combine search engine results from multiple search engines.

Then there are directories, typically these have some search characteristics of pure search engines, but require websites to be manually submitted and reviewed before inclusion.

Directories often have human editors.

How do I get a good ranking in search engines? I am asked this a lot!

The key factors:-

By Salihu Ibrahim. http://www.ebizstartups.com

How can one get a good ranking in major search engines ? This is a question, I'm sure, agitates minds of every newbie as well as professional webmaster. Even those that are doing well are fighting to keep their place. But isn't there a way to consistently appear in a good position at major search engines? I think there are ways to achieve this enviable position. One of ways is what this article is all about. That is, consistently build one way inbound links to your site. Getting other webmasters to link to your site without you linking back.

Link Popularity, link prominence or link reputation is one of most important elements search engines use to know if a site is an authority site. That is a quality site. However, like all other search engine ranking criteria, webmasters have found ways to beat this hurdle of link popularity. This they have done by exchanging links with one another. This is called reciprocal linking. You link to me and I to you and both of us have increased our link popularity by one.

Webmaster have realized importance search engines attached to link popularity for top search engine positioning and have therefore resorted to reciprocal linking. However, in near future this strategy will become obsolete, because these links are artificial links. Not generated voluntarily. And so they do not indicate a site as being an authority site.

The purpose of reciprocal linking is to increase link prominence for top search engine positioning and not necessarily for benefit of web surfers. The search engines will recognize this. I predict that they will start taking this into account when they are changing their algorithms . The webmaster that will survive is one that consistently builds one way inbound links to his site. These types of links are best. It portrays a site as being an authority site because site is linked to naturally by other webmasters. Without reciprocal links. Webmasters would not like to link to just any site unless there is some benefit for their site or site visitors. In this modern world nothing goes for nothing. A webmaster will only link to your site if there is some benefit for his site.

Why webmasters would link voluntarily.

Now in order for you to succeed in this one way inbound link building strategy, you need to know some of these benefits that lead webmaster to link voluntarily. If you like, call it carrot. In accepting and eating carrot webmaster is led to link to your site. Let's look at some these benefits before we look at how they can be used to entice webmasters to link to you.

1. Webmasters would want to provide good, important and timely information for their visitors. If your site has this information, they will readily link to you. They could for example, point their visitors to a free resource at your site. 2. Webmasters recognize fact that providing good information creates a good image for their site. Visitors will get to know that site is a good resource site even though resource might not be located there. This keeps visitors coming back again and again. 3. There is also benefit of linking to an authority site. Search engines do award some points for linking to an authority site. Contrary to popular belief that this reduces overall link popularity of a site, it actually benefits that page . This is my practical experience.

Now how do you acquire these one way inbound links?

1. Provide some useful resource at your site. This is a very powerful incentive for webmasters to link to your site. More so, if this resource is free. It could be a free tool , free software download, free content etc. This gives an incentive for webmasters to point their visitors at this resource. Some resources you could provide are:

(a) Link popularity check tool (b) Meta tag generator (c) Search engine page analyzer (d) Free CGI scripts (e) Search engine page ranking check tool etc.

For free and paid scripts go to Hotscript.com or Searchscripts.com. There you will find all kinds of scripts that perform specific functions. Or you can hire a programmer to write a custom script for you. You will find programmers at many sites such as Elance.com.

2. Write good articles and submit to article sites, article syndicate sites and ezine announcement sites. Your article will be published along with your byline with a link pointing to your site. Make sure that text link has your keywords in it and not your domain name. For example, < a href=" http://www.ebizstartups.com" rel="nofollow"> home base business ideas and not www.ebizstartups.com