Difference
between a Search Engine and an In the world of cyberspace, there are two different types of search tools used…
Knowing the difference between the two, and how to utilize them, will help make your search more enjoyable and more productive. Although the two terms are often used interchangeably, they are definitely not the same animal. The fact of the matter is, the world of Internet Search Engines and Directory Services can get pretty confusing, because the difference between search engines and directory services is narrowing… at least from the perspective of the end user. The Directory Search Engine Hybrid...It used to be that search engines were search engines and directory services were directory services, but not so any more. Today, most search engines and directory services are a hybrid of sorts. Indeed, many of the sites we refer to as "Search Engines "or" Directory Services are in fact both, offering high quality, hand picked results, as well as high powered Internet search engine capabilities... all on one search results page. Search Engine Optimization and the Search Engine Industry...Serviceand When it comes to Search Engine Optimization Services (SEO), this sometimes-murky world of Search Engines and Directory Services can become downright painful. Things in the Search Engine Industry are very dynamic, changing all the time, and near impossible to keep track off. You just never know for sure one day to the next, exactly what Search Engine Technology is powering what search site and who is providing search content to whose search results. Internet Search Engine and Directory Primer...A search engine is the database that delivers search results, a search site is the website that lets you search that database, and in fact some search engines are used by many search sites. For example, Overture bought the AlltheWeb search engine back in April of 20003. More recently Yahoo bought Overture and is now providing search results for AlltheWeb. Consequently, being listed in Yahoo automatically leads to a listing in AlltheWeb... confused yet? Learn more about Why you need Search Engine Optimization to truly suceed online. Search Engine Directory Services...To make things even more confusing, most search sites also present hand picked results from Search Directories such as The Open Directory and LookSmart. This is why some search engines will ask you to submit your site to the directory as well as to the search engine. Most search sites and metasearch sites will also add links to their search results from fee-based pay-per-click (PPC) Search Engines like Overture. Difference between a Search Engine and Directory Service...Well, the difference between a Search Engine and Directory Service is that a search engine, such as Google, reads and examines all the on and off page elements of a web page and determines its relevance when a user performs a search query. A Directory Service on the other hand, allows you only a limited number of words to describe your whole website. Yahoo currently allows you six words in a title and another twenty-five words to describe your entire website. That means it's important to make every word count, and beware that in the case of Yahoo, once submitted, it is almost impossible to change anything. Another difference between a Search Engine and Directory Service is that a search engine uses a program, called a spider, which literally crawls through the pages it finds and analyzes and stores the parameters it finds. Then when the end user queries the search engine (does a search) using a keyword phrase, the search engine applies an algorithm to determine relevancy, searches its databases, and returns a list of those documents in the order it sees fit. Every Search Engine is Different...The exact method by which each Search Engine does this differs, and most will change their algorithm from time to time in an attempt to keep us all honest and search results fair. Understanding the differences in these algorithms, and the effect they have on the positioning or "indexing" of your site, is one of the keys in getting your site ranked higher than your competitors. What this all means is that it's the actual words in the text, page title, Meta tags and more that are most important in "on page search engine positioning or optimization. Add to this things like link structure, back links, relevancy, popularity and PR (page rank)... and you'll see why when it comes to search engine position and directory submission, you might be better off with a Search Engine Optimization and Positioning Firm like SEO Central. Why
choose SEO Central Internet Directory Services don't Crawl...Internet Directories don't search (crawl) the Web, they search only through their own database of preselected websites. Consequently, by using a Directory Service, you may be limiting yourself to a smaller portion of the total Web resources available online. However, because humans have selected the websites, they may very well be of higher quality in terms of content. A Directory Service doesn't use robots, it uses human beings to compile its database of websites and pages. The human "editors" review potential listings, determine what they are about, and list them in an appropriate category, along with what they believe to be an appropriate title. The Open Directory Project (DMOZ) is a good example of a high quality Directory Service. So, now that you clearly understand the difference between a Search Engine and a Directory Service, the next step is to learn "Search Engine and Directory Service Submission Basics". Search
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