Search Engines

[Tatsujin]

I'm a nub at this and I wanna understand few things. I have a website and well, I wanna make it famous, or let "more hits" occur for my website. So recently I've been getting mail to submit for search engines (and I was even offered to be a webmaster for a hentai site, 40 dollars per person who registers through me >_>;. But anyways ... is there a good one out there I should subscribe to? Is it a waste to do that?

[queenmetroid]

I'll tell you right now, there's no surefire way to jump to the top of search engines. I know you've read you can do it, and there are steps you can take to help yourself, but it's not a magical process. It's usually a long process, and results from people finding your site and clicking on it. The more hits you get, the higher you'll go. You can help your site by having lots of related keywords sprinkled around as well. If you've heard anything about HTML meta tags, don't bother with them, most search engines ignore them. (If you haven't heard anything about them, it doesn't matter.) You should definitely submit your site to every single search engine out there. Also, have your site get linked to from more important sites. Google gives weight to a site that's been linked to from a larger, more important site. You can do research on what search engines put relevance on what, but don't expect the sky in a day, a week, or a month. It'll take a lot of patience.

[Tatsujin]

I'll tell you right now, there's no surefire way to jump to the top of search engines. I know you've read you can do it, and there are steps you can take to help yourself, but it's not a magical process. It's usually a long process, and results from people finding your site and clicking on it. The more hits you get, the higher you'll go. You can help your site by having lots of related keywords sprinkled around as well. If you've heard anything about HTML meta tags, don't bother with them, most search engines ignore them. (If you haven't heard anything about them, it doesn't matter.) You should definitely submit your site to every single search engine out there. Also, have your site get linked to from more important sites. Google gives weight to a site that's been linked to from a larger, more important site. You can do research on what search engines put relevance on what, but don't expect the sky in a day, a week, or a month. It'll take a lot of patience.

I actually want more hits, rather than to sky rocket all the way to the top. I mean, there's just jagizillions of websites out there, so yea. Thanks for the tips, tho'. They'll help.

[Xiong Chiamiov]

The phrase you're looking for is SEO.  I can't give you any advise on it (I'd rather have my sites be less popular, so I don't have to deal with the load), but knowing the right terminology helps when you're looking for something.

[Mele]

I'm a nub at this and I wanna understand few things. I have a website and well, I wanna make it famous, or let "more hits" occur for my website. So recently I've been getting mail to submit for search engines (and I was even offered to be a webmaster for a hentai site, 40 dollars per person who registers through me >_>;. But anyways ... is there a good one out there I should subscribe to? Is it a waste to do that?

Wait, what? $40 per registration? What type of site is that? That's a tremendous amount of money for a single registration.

[Mirgond]

The fastest way to get your site known (to others and to search engines) is still to get your page linked on other pages. (to be short...)

[geoffreak]

The fastest way to get your site known (to others and to search engines) is still to get your page linked on other pages. (to be short...)

Absolutely correct.

Now, before I get started, I should say that I am a professional web developer (yes, I get paid to do websites full time, not just freelance) and I have been working on websites for almost 7 years.

SEO is always misinterpreted. Although it makes your site easier for search engines to search, it DOES NOT make your site appear higher up on the listing.

Google's results are listed in order of relevancy to the search. This relevancy is determined with a system called PageRank. In short, the more sites that link to your site, the higher your page rank.

Also, don't forget that people can't search for your site if they don't know it exists. I can guarantee that you will get very few hits a week from people who just happen to stumble on your site from a random search.

Advertising is the ONLY way to get more people to your website. Advertising doesn't have to be paid to get results, as free advertising is actually the most effective form of advertisement (word of mouth). Placing a link to your site in forum signatures on sites you frequent is an effective way to advertise your site.

Another key aspect of increasing hits is to have content worth viewing and coming back. If you don't have anything worth viewing on your site, anyone that stumbles across your site won't come back or tell anyone about it.

Finally, your site should be easy to navigate and easy on the eyes. It is a fact that if someone doesn't like the look of the website or cannot navigate it easily, they will immediately leave. Tatsujin, I've glanced at your site previously and it met neither of this criteria. I couldn't figure out what content was on there and the excess of images made it hard to see the actual content.

[Tatsujin]

The fastest way to get your site known (to others and to search engines) is still to get your page linked on other pages. (to be short...)

Absolutely correct.

Now, before I get started, I should say that I am a professional web developer (yes, I get paid to do websites full time, not just freelance) and I have been working on websites for almost 7 years.

SEO is always misinterpreted. Although it makes your site easier for search engines to search, it DOES NOT make your site appear higher up on the listing.

Google's results are listed in order of relevancy to the search. This relevancy is determined with a system called PageRank. In short, the more sites that link to your site, the higher your page rank.

Also, don't forget that people can't search for your site if they don't know it exists. I can guarantee that you will get very few hits a week from people who just happen to stumble on your site from a random search.

Advertising is the ONLY way to get more people to your website. Advertising doesn't have to be paid to get results, as free advertising is actually the most effective form of advertisement (word of mouth). Placing a link to your site in forum signatures on sites you frequent is an effective way to advertise your site.

Another key aspect of increasing hits is to have content worth viewing and coming back. If you don't have anything worth viewing on your site, anyone that stumbles across your site won't come back or tell anyone about it.

Finally, your site should be easy to navigate and easy on the eyes. It is a fact that if someone doesn't like the look of the website or cannot navigate it easily, they will immediately leave. Tatsujin, I've glanced at your site previously and it met neither of this criteria. I couldn't figure out what content was on there and the excess of images made it hard to see the actual content.

I'm re-doing the site right now, I'm not sure when was the last time you've visited it and tell me which pages were hard. I'm actually re-constructing the whole website from inside and making it appear like www.otakixus.com/memories.htm and www.otakixus.com/box.htm since those are pretty easy to surf around with. I'm also taking down all the pointless pages like Characters and Fansubs (too much time to deal with, extra pages, not really needed, etc). Give me like 2-3 weeks and half the site should be easier to deal with. I'm using iframes (i looooove iframes with transparency backgrounds!). I'm also updating Otakixus Blog with Ane. Any tips would so be appreciated. =]

[geoffreak]

After visiting the three links, only the last link actually had legible content. You can keep the background images, but you need to focus more on content. Images should only be the focus on an art website (or another website where people come to see the images).

Here are a few tips for your existing pages:
- Make the image background more transparent/faded. This changes the focus from it over to the content.
- Change the content colors to make them contrast more with the background. The text should pop enough so the first thing your eyes focus on is the content.
- Put the content in the center of the page. Pushing it off to the side as it is in the first two links only says to the viewer that it isn't as important and will be ignored at first glance.

Keep the following in mind:
- A website is NOT meant to show off your skills as a web designer, despite what many people try and make you believe. Websites like these are only meant to be put in portfolios and never used as a public website.
- The secret to a good website is consistency. If every page feels like a different website, it will confuse the viewer and encourage them to move on to another website. The viewer isn't there to play a puzzle game and should be able to easily get around.
- Simplicity makes a better website than complexity. Simple websites are much easier to use because the creators focus less on graphics and more on ease of use and content.
- Everything in moderation. Again with the simplicity, don't go overboard on anything.

[Tatsujin]

After visiting the three links, only the last link actually had legible content. You can keep the background images, but you need to focus more on content. Images should only be the focus on an art website (or another website where people come to see the images).

Here are a few tips for your existing pages:
- Make the image background more transparent/faded. This changes the focus from it over to the content.
- Change the content colors to make them contrast more with the background. The text should pop enough so the first thing your eyes focus on is the content.
- Put the content in the center of the page. Pushing it off to the side as it is in the first two links only says to the viewer that it isn't as important and will be ignored at first glance.

Keep the following in mind:
- A website is NOT meant to show off your skills as a web designer, despite what many people try and make you believe. Websites like these are only meant to be put in portfolios and never used as a public website.
- The secret to a good website is consistency. If every page feels like a different website, it will confuse the viewer and encourage them to move on to another website. The viewer isn't there to play a puzzle game and should be able to easily get around.
- Simplicity makes a better website than complexity. Simple websites are much easier to use because the creators focus less on graphics and more on ease of use and content.
- Everything in moderation. Again with the simplicity, don't go overboard on anything.

All points taking. Never had any person to actually tell me 'how to' and 'what to'. Thanks again.

I really like graphics so I'll be focusing on that. And the content is definitely out of place; tons of things that don't make sense and what not. I've deleted a bunch of pages. I haven't uploaded the content so a lot of things within the website is going to be re-modeled. Most will be carried over to Otakixus Blog.

www.otakixus.com/box.htm <-- probably the best page to meet your specifications. I like it the most.

I've also tried to center things. I use MEW, FireFox is a retarded browser that doesn't wanna listen so I'm just using Layers to make things work. I've done everything I could but when your page appears all the way to the left with the contents that's inside of it and it's being pressed really bad (out of place, etc) then yea. I'm sticking to Layers and iframes for HTML.

[geoffreak]

Stay away from layers and iframes. Instead, do nested divs.

Also, watch what happens to that page when you remove the css absolute positioning of those layers and add the following:

Code: [Select]

margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;

(click to show/hide)

Code: [Select]

<div style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; width: 900px; height: 650px;" id="layer2" class="style16">
<div style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; width: 677px; height: 513px;" id="layer3" class="style17">
<p style="margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class="style19" align="center">
				<iframe name="I1" id="I1" src="box_releases.htm" allowtransparency="true" style="width: 670px; height: 480px;" border="0" target="_blank" frameborder="0">
				Switch to Internet Explorer or FireFox to view I-Frame.
				</iframe></p>
</div>
</div>

All that is needed is to edit the background image and put it at 50% opacity.

Also, you need to be using proper doctypes. Here is the standard doctype setup that I use:

(click to show/hide)

Code: [Select]

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" />
<title>Untitled Document</title>
</head>

<body>
</body>
</html>

Finally, a guide to get the effects you like.

[Tatsujin]

Stay away from layers and iframes. Instead, do nested divs.

Also, watch what happens to that page when you remove the css absolute positioning of those layers and add the following:

Code: [Select]

margin-left: auto;
margin-right: auto;

(click to show/hide)

Code: [Select]

<div style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; width: 900px; height: 650px;" id="layer2" class="style16">
<div style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; width: 677px; height: 513px;" id="layer3" class="style17">
<p style="margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;" class="style19" align="center">
				<iframe name="I1" id="I1" src="box_releases.htm" allowtransparency="true" style="width: 670px; height: 480px;" border="0" target="_blank" frameborder="0">
				Switch to Internet Explorer or FireFox to view I-Frame.
				</iframe></p>
</div>
</div>

All that is needed is to edit the background image and put it at 50% opacity.

Also, you need to be using proper doctypes. Here is the standard doctype setup that I use:

(click to show/hide)

Code: [Select]

<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" />
<title>Untitled Document</title>
</head>

<body>
</body>
</html>

Finally, a guide to get the effects you like.

You have many points, and after few things with Layers and getting enough headache, I decided to switch to Tables and see if things could work with it and make everything centered. With CSS options I freaking nailed it down. =D WOHOOO! The tables work much better and smoother than Layers to center. I also have better control over them!

Most of the stuff in the header needs some clean up, yes. There are some things I don't want to remove. Also, iframes are freaking sweeter than you think. They're essential to me so I'll stick with them. Ever since having transparency through with them things are becoming easier for a graphic designer.

I'm going to demonstrate my skills on www.otakixus.com/box ... it should update within an hour or less and everything should be centered and work in both IE and FireFox.

[vuzedome]

Now onto more pressing matters.

and I was even offered to be a webmaster for a hentai site

Do want to know what site is that. 

[Tatsujin]

Now onto more pressing matters.

and I was even offered to be a webmaster for a hentai site

Do want to know what site is that. 

Cash Meat or something. I have to cancel my account with them. They want me to host my own things without providing an FTP for their end. Not gonna happen.