If you have a question about the search engine indexing of your website the answer may be listed below. To see how search engines are indexing your web pages enter the following command in any search engine:
They should list the home page first in the index and then all your other pages and they should all have a title and description. Make note of the number of pages and compare it to what you actually have. If it's not accurate you may have a search engine indexing problem.
Why does it take weeks for Google to find my new pages?
The PR (Page Rank) of your pages affects how often Google comes back to check your pages. You either need more of your pages pointing at that page or more external links for that page to bring up the PR. If your page is too large this can slow down indexing of your content by search engines.
Why is my page not indexed?
A scraper that copied your new page can cause it to not be indexed--the solution is to get more links. If you are using base href tags in your code make sure they are correct or this can cause indexing problems. MAke sure you don't have rel="nofollow" in the head of your pages.
Why is my website listed with just URL only?
This usually means the search engines know the page is there but cannot index the content for some reason. Or they just haven't had time to do the later and it will be indexed soon. Make sure the first option isn't a problem however. If your home page is listed with title and description but not your other pages then the seearch engine probably can't follow the links on your website in which case read the following:
Why are search engines just listing the links in the footer of my website?
Your menu at top of the page may be preventing search engines from following and indexing the content and, if that is so, they are likely not following the links either. This often happens if the menu is designed in 100% Javascript (no HTML) which not all search engines can read. Also if you have Session IDs to track visitors on any of your menu links this can cause a problem with indexing on those pages. Designing your website within Frames can cause the same problems.
Will it help the indexing of my website if I have a sitemap?
You only need a sitemap if the search engines are not able to follow the links on your website, such as in the example above where the navigation is not indexable.
Why doesn't my home page appear #1 in the indexing of my website?
Make sure all your inside web pages point back to your home page with a link that can be followed by a search engine, i.e., not a 100% Javascript menu (Javascript menus that also incorporate HTML should work ok). A link to your home page counts as a vote for your home page (the same is true of any other page on your website). The more "votes" it gets, and the higher the PR (Page Rank) of that web page, the higher it will rank amongst the indexing of your own pages. However, only link to your home page with "/", or the domain if you are using full URLs, as this can cause duplicate content issues.
If you have a question about search engine indexing of your website that isn't listed in the above FAQ
feel free to send me a question by email and I may post the answer.
