I am looking for ways to have our church's website be found when someone is searching 
for a church on the Internet. Any help would be appreciated.
Laura Young
for a church on the Internet. Any help would be appreciated.Laura Young
Community
Web-Empowered Church User Community
Total Posts: 5 - Pages (1): [1]
1. Make sure you have complete meta tag info: site name, page name, unique key words for each page, unique page description of each page.
2. Make sure you are using static page links, not php links (www.yoursite.org/about us not www.yoursite.org/?php=102)
3. You will want to make sure you have plenty of text on each page, not just pictures, Flash .swfs, etc. Search engines look for text...in their opinion, the more the merrier (which is not necessarily true for frontend users, though).
4. Eliminate any broken links on your site.
5. Finally, when you've got all that done, register your site with Google and Yahoo. Most major search engines "borrow" sites from these two anyway.
6. Expect it to take awhile for you to show up if someone is searching for "Church." You'll be the low page on the pole unless you get lots of hits, have lots of other sites linking to you, etc.
Bill Tenny-Brittian
2. Make sure you are using static page links, not php links (www.yoursite.org/about us not www.yoursite.org/?php=102)
3. You will want to make sure you have plenty of text on each page, not just pictures, Flash .swfs, etc. Search engines look for text...in their opinion, the more the merrier (which is not necessarily true for frontend users, though).
4. Eliminate any broken links on your site.
5. Finally, when you've got all that done, register your site with Google and Yahoo. Most major search engines "borrow" sites from these two anyway.
6. Expect it to take awhile for you to show up if someone is searching for "Church." You'll be the low page on the pole unless you get lots of hits, have lots of other sites linking to you, etc.
Bill Tenny-Brittian
Thanks for all the information. I will get on this right away.
Laura
Laura
Not sure if this is too late, but some other items to consider:
Local town/city web-sites. This is really useful in smaller communities because you can often get your church site listed on their "Local Services" type pages with little trouble. This is probably one of the most effective means as people moving into an area can easily find you.
Keep your content up to date so people look at the site frequently and newcomers don't find your "Register NOW for Camp 2004!" message on the home page.
Generate some interesting articles that people can write about/link to - that can drive up your relevance.
Don't try to scam the search engines - you can have your site blacklisted for that. Keep it straightforward and they're generally pretty good about relevance.
Watch out for spam comments/links - that can lower your search engine rating.
Local town/city web-sites. This is really useful in smaller communities because you can often get your church site listed on their "Local Services" type pages with little trouble. This is probably one of the most effective means as people moving into an area can easily find you.
Keep your content up to date so people look at the site frequently and newcomers don't find your "Register NOW for Camp 2004!" message on the home page.
Generate some interesting articles that people can write about/link to - that can drive up your relevance.
Don't try to scam the search engines - you can have your site blacklisted for that. Keep it straightforward and they're generally pretty good about relevance.
Watch out for spam comments/links - that can lower your search engine rating.
Author: Andre DaleyPosted: Jun 04 2007 - 03:23 PM
Subject: re: Searching for a church on the Internet
Laura Young wrote:
I am looking for ways to have our church's website be found when someone is searching for a church on the Internet. Any help would be appreciated.
Laura Young
for a church on the Internet. Any help would be appreciated.Laura Young
Laura,
Make use of the google site map extension. it will help google find and index your site in its search engine
http://typo3.org/extensions/repository/view/google_sitemap/0.2.0/
Andre
Total Posts: 5 - Pages (1): [1]