Thursday 19 July 2012

How to get your pages Indexed more quickly

Today we are going to learn how to get web pages indexed quickly, especially if you have created new pages or an entirely new website.
Getting your pages indexed in search engines is important - without being indexed, your website will be all but impossible to find.
Today we are going to cover some useful strategies for getting your website indexed fast. These include:
  • Social bookmarking & signals.
  • Submitting articles.
  • Internal linking.
  • Pinging your website.
  • Comment on authority blogs.
  • Updating content regularly.
Before we begin, here are two important points to consider:
First, you should be building links to the new page you want indexed, and not just your website homepage. It is important to build 'deep' links to all the content pages on your website, but many webmasters seem to ignore this and just build backlinks to their homepage.
For example, if you have the website www.example.com, and your new page (that you want to have indexed) is at www.example.com/new-page, then make sure you build links to that specific page.
Second, you should monitor your progress as you get new pages indexed. 
You can use Google Webmaster Tools and Bing Webmaster Tools to keep track of your website. Both of these services are free and very easy-to-use. Google also provide answers to frequently asked questions about how Google search indexes websites.
Here are the best ways to get more pages indexed:

Social Bookmarking & Signals

One of the fastest ways to get new content indexed is to use social bookmarking and social services. Many websites fall under this category, but some you may be more familiar with are:
  • Link sharing sites like Digg.com and Reddit.com
  • Twitter
  • Facebook
An excellent way to get content indexed quickly is to submit your new website or pages to websites like Digg and Reddit. These are sites where people come together to share and discuss interesting things they have found on the Internet.
Links from these sites placed in the index quickly by search engines. This means any links from within your post that point back to your website will soon receive a visit from search engine spiders.
Twitter offers another means of getting a page or website indexed quickly. Create a Tweet to send out to your followers that contains a link to the page you want indexed. As a bonus, you could get some easy traffic too!
Use Facebook in a similar manner - update your status, and include a link to your site or page.

Submitting Articles

We have already talked about using articles to build backlinks to your website. Not only are articles useful for generating backlinks, but they are also very handy for getting new pages or websites indexed.
Because article directories are such busy sites, new content tends to be indexed by search engines very rapidly. If you include a link to your new page or website then that link will be followed by search engine spiders. And it should get indexed fairly quickly.

Internal Linking

If you want to get a new page on an existing website indexed fast then internal linking can be useful. Mention your new page with an anchor text link, and update a previously indexed page to include the link (make sure it fits naturally with the content though).
'Deep linking' to new pages on your website is not just about building external backlinks. It is also important to build links within your website, which will alert search engines to the presence of new content on your site quickly.

Ping Your Website or Blog

Pinging was originally a method for bloggers to alert search engines to new content on their blogs. However, it has evolved to the point where anyone can use it to update not just blogs, but traditional websites too.
Pinging a website is a very useful means of alerting search engines and directories to updates in your content.
There are many website pinging services available online. Some of the best include:
  • Pingoat.com
  • Pingler.com
  • Pingomatic.com
If you are confused, here is a basic guide to pinging your website or blog.
Simply head over to a ping service website - in this example, we are going to use Pingoat.com.
Add your website details to the 'Blog name', 'Blog URL', and 'XML Feed' fields (do not worry if you are not actually running a blog, you can use a normal website too. Also, if the XML Feed option confuses you just leave it blank)
You then have to select the services you want to ping. Just click where it says 'General' and the entire category will be auto-filled for you, as in the example below.
getting started with pingoat


Scroll down to the bottom of the page and hit the 'Go Pingoat!" button - the Pingoat system will take care of the rest.
Search engines and other services will now be alerted to the presence of fresh content on your website or blog, and should come and crawl and index those pages.
Affilorama have a very useful blog post about why you should ping your website. That post also explains how pinging works in detail.

Comment on Authority Blogs in Your Niche

Authority blogs and blogs with an active readership and lots of new content are crawled regularly by search engines. By commenting on new posts on these blogs you can 'piggyback' off their popularity and get your own pages indexed quickly.
Traffic Travis can help you find blogs to comment on through the 'Link Finder' tool. You can search for blogs by using the 'Advanced Settings' of the too. Consult Part 4 of the newsletter series on link building with Traffic Travis for more about using this.
Another way to find blogs in your niche is by entering your main keyword in Google, along with the word 'blog'. For example, if you were looking for a blog about dog training then search for 'dog training blog'.
Try to comment on recent posts. This means many other people doing the same as you will not dilute the link back to your website; it is better to be the first to comment, rather than the last.
The best blogs to leave comments on are those that have a 'most recent comments' plugin. This shows recent comments on every page of the blog, which means your comment link will be present on more than one page (until you fall off the 'most recent comments' list, of course).
This is a very effective way of getting new pages indexed fast - just make sure that you use the page you want indexed as your website URL when commenting, and not simply the homepage of your website.

Update Your Content Regularly

Making sure you update your website regularly with fresh content is important for getting new pages indexed. If search engines get the impression that your website is going 'stale', they will be unlikely to crawl your pages regularly. On the other hand, if you keep your website fresh and updated (even updating indexed pages) then search engine spiders will keep coming back.
Part of the reason why many blogs rank well in search engines and have new posts indexed quickly is because bloggers update their sites frequently with new content. Updating traditional websites with new pages tends to take longer than creating blog posts, so it can be harder to keep content fresh.
You should not be uploading new pages to your website until they are finished either. Resist the temptation to create a new page, and then upload it in an unfinished form. If search engine spiders visit a page that is not finished, it could wind up being flagged for poor quality content.
Here is a quick recap on the methods for getting more pages indexed:
  • Social bookmarking and signals - use Twitter and Facebook, as well as websites like Digg.com, to spread the word about your new page or website.
  • Submit articles to popular article directories for easy backlinks that are followed by search engine spiders.
  • Create internal links - link from pre-existing pages on your website to new ones.
  • Ping your website whenever you create new pages or content.
  • Comment on blogs of note in your niche - look out for blogs that have a 'most recent comments' function.
  • Updating your website regularly with fresh content, this will keep search engine spiders coming back.
Wishing you every success, 'til next time,
Pari.