Microsoft Office Live Small Business Community

Hello

I have just finished my first website - when I try to seach for it I can't find it anywhere even when I use all my adwords or even when I type the name into things like google

 What have I done wrong?

It would seem that the only way to access it is to type the whole name into the menu bar

 Thanks in advance

Did you submit your website to any search engines? This thread will help you:

http://www.office.microsoft.com/en-us/officelive/FX102018061033.aspx

If you want to expedite this process, you can use OLSitemap.

Royster

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

Well if you would post a link to your site, we can take a look and if necessary offer some advice.

www.totallylg.com  Is the site - its mainly for friends and family so not as professional as most of the ones I've seen on here - so appologies in advance!

Is the OSL sitemap easy to use for a total beginner?

OLSitemap is very easy to use - installation is extremely easy, and detailed instructions and tools are included.

I took a look at your site. You should add META keywords and description to each page on your site as well to assist the search engine in evaluating the relevancy of each page when they index your site. You can add those for each page via Page Properties -> Search Engine Optimization.

In terms of navigation organization, I would suggest putting some of your pages as child pages under parent pages. For example, you have all those different rooms listed - bathroom, bedroom, etc. you can move those under a page called The Chalet or Chalet Layout. You can re-arrange your pages by going to Page Properties->Edit Navigation Position for each page.

Finally, make sure you have submitted to the search engines, esp. Google and Yahoo:

http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl

http://search.msn.com.sg/docs/submit.aspx?FORM=WSDD

https://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/submit

Remember to submit your URL for the above as http://totallylg.com and not as http://www.totallylg.com. To expedite and make the indexing process more efficient, using OLSitemap will definitely help.

Royster

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

Thanks Royster

What is a meta keyword - is that just a word that is relevant to the website?  Sorry for being stupid!  I shall try that OLSitemap

Not at all. It's a good question. A META keyword is a word that is relevant to the website. You can have more than one. The importance of META keywords have been on the declined because of their abuse by spammers, so it is just one of many criteria search engines use to determine the quality and relevance of your web page. Here is a better explanation of what it is all about: http://www.highrankings.com/metakeyword

Royster

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

OK so I need to go into each page and then sort of summarize it into a few words that the search engines can look for?

Should I also pay for adwords?   

Right, but remember to be selective about META keywords.

Adwords can get expensive. It is much better to build your traffic organically via search engines than to use paid links. Adwords may help to boost traffic in the short term and you will have to keep an eye on optimizing the keywords you will use to make sure you are attracting the right audience.

Royster

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

What are the best ways to optimize your keywords - there seem to be so many different ways to describe everything that it seems impossible to keep them to a manageable amount - or else I seem to find I am just repeating the same thing

With that don't forget to change your title to something a little more decriptive than just Home, it under page properties as well.

 SA is right about the title - you will need to make the title a bit more descriptive (title counts for a lot in search engines). Best to keep your META keywords to less than 10, and don't repeat words.

Royster

Get a free .biz domain for your website. Visit SoftPrizm.com

Blog: The SoftPrizm Channel

OLSecure Beta: Secured Web Area Solution for Office Live

Thanks for your help

 I've changed the page title from "home" and will have a think about what to put as metawords for each page

  You might want to change spelling of accomodation to accommodation or include both in your keywords.