Can I submit my own site to a search engine or directory? Do I have to hire a special service?

The submission process for directories such as Yahoo and Excite is fairly straightforward: There are instructions for submission on the directory site, and you generally need to fill out and submit a comprehensive form. Getting listed in a directory is a manual process that can take a number of months.

Submitting to search engines such as Hotbot and Google is not quite as simple. Search engines have automated robots and spiders that comb the Web looking for new sites. So chances are they'll find you and add you to their database. You can also submit to search engines, but the process is not consistent from engine to engine. You'll need to contact each one individually or consult an up-to-the minute reference to find out the exact submission details.

You're free to submit to search engines yourself, or you may opt to use a service to automate the process. You can also go with a combination approach by submitting yourself to specific search engines and then automating the rest by using Web-positioning software or one of the many Web-site promotion services available online.

If you do it yourself, there are several things you should keep in mind when submitting to search engines:

Don't Spam. Once you submit your main URL, submit other important pages in weekly intervals and in very small batches. Be sure you don't submit more than 10 pages per day. Search engines are notoriously sensitive to spamming.

Test. Once you've submitted your site to a search engine, check back to see how it ranks your listing.

Resubmit. Each time you make substantial changes to a page, resubmit it to the search engines. It's also a good idea to resubmit your entire site every three months or so.

Monitor. Monitor your Web-site listings regularly. Sometimes your listings can disappear, or some kind of error will cause links to become bad. When you find a problem, resubmit the page