I have a site that was submitted to Google three years ago. It doesn't
show up in the search engine. Yet I'm a customer who advertise with
Google (Adwords).
I spent hundreds of dollars on that. I find it extremly odd for not
listing my site.  I've changed it many times. I have submitted many
times. Where to go from here? What to do? can you help? (My site is
www.vendsoft.com. I sell a vending software application)

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Request for Question Clarification by morningstar2000-ga on 14 Nov 2002 11:49 PST

Dear DME - 
   What do you mean it doesn't show up?  Its top of the list under
Vending Software.   Could you please expand your question to include
the keywords you are looking for.   ALso I have been to you site and
the meta tags <KEYWORD> is rather small and defined.  This could be
expanded.  I will continue to look through you site until I hear back
from you .

Thank You, 
Morningstar

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Clarification of Question by dme3-ga on 14 Nov 2002 12:28 PST

Thank you for your rapid response.

What I mean is listing my site in the general listing of the search
engine.
Right now it comes up as part of Sponser listing or feature listing
which I pay for. I had to do it this way because Google will not list
my site in its general Directory listing.  I would like to see my site
listed in the public listing as well as the feature listing.
The main keyword is vending software

Thanks again

Dear DME – 
     I did several things to look into the popularity of your site
within the Google Search engine.  Be reminded I am an Independent
Google Researcher and don’t have access to databases or other
confidential Google Information.. I looked specifically at Link
Analyses data.   This is how many sites have links to your website. 
This in essence is your web.    Its not completely accurate but it’s a
good base line for deciding what to do next.    I also ran your site
against the top three that show up on Google if I search for
Vending Software.       What I found is that your site falls far below
the top three sites on link Popularity.   The top three sites are
running better than 400 + links to their sites where yours is 21.  
Search engines such as GOOGLE use complex algorithms to decide who
gets listed where in their search results.   They use not only link
popularity but keywords listed on your site as well.

The following is from the GOOGLE webmaster section:
 ://www.google.com/webmasters/1.html
“Google partners on the Web include Yahoo! and Netscape. As part of
our agreements with these sites we include the sites in their
directories (Yahoo! and DMOZ) in the Google index. If you are having
difficulty getting listed in the Google index, you may want to
consider submitting your site to either or both of these directories.
You can submit to Yahoo! by visiting
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/suggest/. You can submit your site to
Netscape's Open Directory Project (DMOZ) by visiting www.dmoz.org.
Once your site is included in either of these directories you can
expect to see it appear in the Google index in four to eight weeks.”

 To help in your quest for listing you need to have quality Links. In
making Quality links you need to remember a couple things:
        -  Work with other websites that are complimentary to yours.  
 Ie if your vending software is used with a certain vendor machine (
ie cigarettes ) then see if you they will link you to their site and
you to theirs.
-	If you use a graphic for your link make sure you incorporate your
keywords into the html code.  For more information on Alt tags see:
-	Links with rich keywords are your best bet, but repeat keywords no
more than 3-7 times in any link.

Improving search engine rankings with ALT tags
http://www.searchengines.com/alttags.html

   One warning.  Avoid using FFA (Free For All) sites or link farms.  
These sites will normally exchange email for site links.   Some search
engines see this as Spam and will ban you from their list.  I don’t
see this as a problem currently with your site.

  There are many sites and companies who can help you with your link
analysis.  Some have free trial software.   I really like
Marketleap.com and it is free.

    As I stated in my request for Clarification your site does come up
on the right hand side of the screen.   I did repeated searches for
Vending software and discovered that the side bar does change with
almost every click of the search button.  IT does however list yours
ONTOP about 50% of the time.   As a consumer and web surfer I find
that I don’t look at the right hand side advertisements.   Why?  I am
not sure I think it may have something to do with their muted colors
and small size.   They just aren’t appealing to me.    As you can see
there is actually quite a bit you can do to improve your site listing
with Google or any other search engines.  Under Additional resources I
listed two different web pages for SearchEngines.com.   Both pages
have a graph that shows what all the major search engines are looking
for.  They also have a plethora of other information about how search
engines.   Remember that GOOGLE is only one of many search engines so
get listed on as many as you can and develop quality links will help
you get listed on ALL search engines.    One last note, no matter what
you do today it can take 6-8 weeks to get listed on any search engine.
  So be patient update often, get those links out there, and keep on
top of your link analysis in the future.  Engines upgrade and update
all the time. Each time they go through change your site ranking will
change.  So this is an ongoing and ever present marketing strategy
that you need to take.   Also don’t forget to visit your competitors
and see what keywords/links they are using as well.  This will give
you a better idea of what is working.

Additional resources:
Link Popularity Check - Marketleap Visibility Index - Measure your
link popularity
http://www.marketleap.com/publinkpop/

SearchEngines.com - search engine rankings and search engine
optimization tips
http://www.searchengines.com/searchEnginesRankings.html
http://www.searchengines.com/search_engine_statistics.html

Google Information for Webmasters
://www.google.com/webmasters/4.html


Search Strategy:
Link Popularity Analysis
How do I get my site listed 
Keyword searches
Search Engine listing

Good luck in getting your site a better rating. 

Morningstar

Great service. Great Knowledge. I just wish he can do the work me.