Potential customers have to be able to find you.

Making sure that your site can be found on the internet is of key importance - but there are some things you should know before spending a cent on raising your web profile - especially through search engines.

Search engines are an important source of visitors for most sites. Although there are thousands of such search facilities, the huge majority of web users rely on the very few best-known services - among them Google, Alta Vista, Excite and AOL.

The problem is, the internet is huge; the rules by which search engines display listings are complex, occasionally bizarre and sometimes unreliable; and every competent web designer knows all the "tricks" to get noticed.

Result: No amount of effort or trickery guarantees you a high listing, unless you pay for it - and that's called advertising.

Don't rely on search engines to make your business a success. Instead, treat them as just another facet of marketing your business, like having leaflets printed: work out what you want, get good advice and don't spend too much.

Search Engines: Myths and Tips

• Beware: By our reckoning, when it comes to search engines, at least 90% of "advice" found on the net is nonsense. Most of it is trying to sell you something that you don't really need.
• Experts Only: Some will try to convince you that you need expensive experts to optimise your site for search engines. Not so - it's mostly common sense. If you have a reasonably well-designed site, the key is to use accurate titles and descriptions which honestly reflect your content. Add keywords and other tags if you like, but nothing speaks louder than good content, good descriptions, good titles and overall consistency. That's what most engines look for.
• Cowboy Optimisers: Be wary of anyone who claims they can get you a "top listing",especially if they claim a "special relationship" with the search company (e.g. "We have a special deal with Google and guarantee you a top five place") - it's just not true. (How can it be, if they have six or more customers?) Google's reputation would be worthless if a select few were able to hijack the results used by millions.
• Tricks and Treats: There is an unshakeable myth about tricks which can fool search engines into giving high placements. Trust us: there aren't. In fact, most of these supposedly advantageous tricks are worse than useless - when they're spotted, a site can be blacklisted.
• Submission Services: Approach with caution. It can be helpful to have someone submit your site to the main search engines on your behalf, but it really isn't difficult to do it yourself - and you must avoid the risk of repeatedly submitting the same site, which can actually harm your chances.
• Lousy Site? If your site is no good, don't waste time, effort and money on search optimisation. Any visitors you got wouldn't stay anyway. A good site is the first step and absolute cornerstone of your online presence.
• We Emphasise: Submission to search engines is no substitute for a marketing plan. Contrary to myth, the rules of business have not changed with the internet. Far more important than search rankings is figuring out how to market your business effectively: knowing your target market and adopting the right tactics to get your message to the right people.

The keys to being found:

• Make a good site. Make it clear, descriptive, helpful and useful.
• Use Title, Description, Keywords and other meta tags as an honest, clear representation of each page's content and relevance.
• Don't worry if you aren't highly ranked for a general query ("widgets"). For most small businesses, it's far more important that you can be found by a specific query ("widget fitters, Crawley Sussex")
• Pay for early listing if you're convinced that you need traffic soon. Most decent search engines will pick up a good site eventually anyway (although it can take weeks and sometimes months). Weigh the costs and possible benefits carefully.
• Find directories that you can list in - most should be cheap or free. List yourself in business directories that are closely relevant to your own line.
• With any paid listing, if the cost is more than a few pounds - and some are hundreds - we recommend you think long and hard about the extra traffic you want, whether you'll really get it, if these new visitors will really be likely to buy from you - and even whether you can cope with the potential extra business. It all helps to put the expense in perspective.

  By the way: all Dataclass-designed sites are already optimised for search engines.