:: Search Engine Promotion ::

:: Part 2 - Search Engine Budget ::

Despite the rise in "paid participation" programs offered by search engines (as explained more on the Buying Your Way In page), free search engine submission is still possible. However, using the paid programs that are offered will speed up the listing process and almost certainly generate more search engine related traffic for your web site.

Given this, it is highly recommended that any site owner establish a search engine submission budget. This is true whether you are running a commercial web site, a "hobbyist" site in your own time or a site for a non-profit organization.

The Minimum Budget: Yahoo

How much to budget? At minimum, you need enough to cover submission to Yahoo. This is because the flat $300 annual fee that Yahoo charges will easily pay for itself in traffic for most people, especially when compared to paid listing programs described later in this tutorial.

That's the absolute minimum recommended budget for any site. Again, you can get listed for free, as will be explained in this section, but your traffic will be higher if you set aside the amount shown above.

I Need To Be Listed Fast!

Often, those who launch new web sites want to appear in search engines right away. In these cases, you'll need to budget more money. By paying an "inclusion" fee to some of the crawler-based search engines, you can shorten the usual month delay of appearing to only a few days. The one-time fees are shown below (approximate fees, and are subject to change), by the major crawlers that offer such programs:

Crawler Budget *
Inktomi $40
AltaVista $40
FAST (via Lycos) $30
Ask Jeeves/Teoma $30
Total $140

I said these are one-time fees, but as later discussed, you'll see that they are charged on a six-month or yearly basis. Don't worry about that. For the bare minimum submission effort that this section discusses, calling them one-time fees is correct, as you shall see.

Paid Listings Are Also Fast

Another key option to getting listed faster is to consider using paid listing programs. The budget below will get you going for at least a month, in most cases. For LookSmart, it will cover you for a year.

Paid Listings Budget *
LookSmart $230
Overture (GoTo) $50
Google $25
FindWhat $25
Total $330

Now let's put it all together. Here's the ideal amount you would budget, if you want to show up in the widest range of important search engines within a matter of days:

Search Engine Submission Budget *
Yahoo $300
Crawlers $140
Paid Listings $330
Total $770 first year
$300 min. add years

Again, you can get listed without spending a penny, as will be explained on the following pages. However, if your goal is to be seen right away in as many places as possible, you'll set aside the amount shown above, in the combined budget. At the very least, it is highly recommended to budget enough to cover Yahoo.

(* all prices discussed are in US funds)