As soon as you register your domain name, send it to Google!

Even if you have not built your site, or by writing a copy, or even think about their content, enter your domain name to Google. In fact, even if not fully articulated your business plan and marketing plan, enter your domain name to Google.

Do not wait!

There are two reasons for this. First, get the search engines has always had time for a new site. Even if you do everything right, it takes months before your site is still indexed, and months before you start to rank well. As a general rule, never wait for the top positions within 6 months of submitting your site to Google.

The second reason is a recent phenomenon called "Google Sandbox. Many SEO experts believe that the websites 'sandboxes' new Google. Each time it detects a new website, which retains its rightful ranking for a period of time that determines whether your site is a genuine, credible place in the long term. This is to discourage the creation of SPAM websites (sites which serve no useful purpose except to increase the ranking of some other site).

By submitting your domain name to Google as soon as you register, you're establishing a site history even if the site has no content. By the time you've built your site, written your copy, and developed the rest of its content (in writing of its business and marketing plans), Google probably will not see the need for sand box.

If you wait until launch day to submit your site, you will spend a month or two (maybe more) sitting in the sandbox watching potential customers spend their money elsewhere.

How to submit your site to Google

Do not waste money by paying someone to submit your site to Google. It's easy!

Just go to http://www.google.com.au/addurl.html, enter your URL (domain name) and a few comments or keywords to describe your site. Then click "Send". That's all there is to do. You only have to do it once, and only for the top-level page (ie homepage).

Google robots will crawl your website the next time you're away from home. Of course, this does not guarantee that you will be included in the results.

IMPORTANT: As mentioned above, which takes time to make your site appear in search engines. This is partly because search engines are big and slow - especially when it comes to new sites. It will take a minimum of 6-8 weeks before your site is indexed.

How to submit your site to other search engines

There are hundreds of Internet search engines. It is a lucrative business, after all! But do not worry, studies suggest that the 11 best search engines account for about 90% of web traffic. In other words, if you have the top 11 covered, there is no need to subject the rest.

Moreover, at the time of writing, most of the top 11 is not actually accept submissions. The only ones that do are Google (described above), Yahoo and MSN. Here is a list of available submit pages.

• Yahoo - http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html (offers free registration)
• MSN - http://search.msn.com/docs/submit.aspx?form=WSDD2 (offers free registration)
• Alta Vista - covered by Yahoo submission
• Netscape - covered by Google submission
• Fast / All the Web - covered by Yahoo submission
• Ask Jeeves / Teoma - at the time of writing was not accepting new submissions
• Hotbot - at the time of writing was not accepting new submissions
• Lycos - at the time of writing was not accepting new submissions
• AOL - on the date of writing was not accepting new submissions
• Looksmart - at the time of writing was not accepting new submissions

Do I have to submit my site to search engines?

As a general rule, no.

With about 8.8 million pages indexed (approximately 76% of the Internet), Google is number 1 when it comes to search engines. It is argued that once Google has indexed your site, search engines will others. In theory, do not really need to submit your site to Google, either because he is always looking for new content and eventually find your site on their own. Google actually says: "Given the large number of sites submitting URLs, it is likely that your pages can be found in an automatic crawl before they make to our index through the URL submission form." ( "Google Information for Webmasters" - http://www.google.com.au/webmasters/1.html # A1) Personally, I would not take the risk).

That said, it certainly does not hurt to submit your site to other search engines (especially if they have not developed any content for it yet).

Conclusion

It is not necessary to be an SEO expert or an SEO copywriter to submit your site to Google and other search engines. And you need not pay anything for it. Just do it. And if your domain name is new, you have to do it now!

Submit happy!