If you have a website and are trying to drive traffic to it, getting ranked in Google will likely be the most cost efficient and effective way to promote it. Google often ’sandboxes’ new websites which means that they hold your domain in purgatory to see if you will post quality content before allowing you into their index.

I often get emails from webmasters asking what they can do to get indexed so I thought I would put together my top three suggestions for quickly getting ranked in Google. Using these methods you can rapidly rise out of Google purgatory and into their index, speeding past a lot of your competitors.

1) Get a quality link. It is no secret that Google’s ranking system works on links. The more quality links that you build, the faster you will get indexed. It really is a matter of quality over quantity when you have been sandboxed. All the links in the world from Page Rank 1 and 2 websites won’t get you listed. Focus on trying to land a Page Rank 5 or higher page to link to you. Also look for ones without many external links so you can get more link juice to your site. Most new website owners put all their energy into getting as many links as they can from directories, link exchange programs, and forums. Use that time wisely and invest it into trying to land a quality link from a high Page Rank page. It will go a lot further to getting your site in the main Google index where it belongs.

2) Start a blog. Search engines generally treat blogs differently than other websites. Because blogs change so frequently, the search engines need to be more proactive about indexing them. If a search engine waited six months before listing one of your blog posts chances are users would not find that search engine very useful and would turn somewhere else. You can use the free tools that Feedburner provides to get your blog promoted to the various blog search engines (Google Blog search included). Please note though that if you don’t post to your blog you won’t gain the benefits. Try to write once a day to have fresh content and show the search engines that you belong in their index.

3) Create a sitemap. I’ve talked at length in this blog about sitemaps and how to create them so I won’t go into too much detail here but they can be a valuable tool to help you get in the index. Imagine how many new websites are created every day which are all trying to get ranked. How is Google supposed to keep up with the barrage of new sites? If you are a brand new website you can easily be passed over and get lost in the shuffle. The trick to show Google you exist is to create a sitemap. A sitemap is a listing of all the pages you have on your site and Google provides you with a way through its Webmaster Central to tell them you exist. Another simpler technique is to just submit your site through Google’s Add your URL to Google form. Google provides you with the tools to let them know you exist - why make it hard on them?

Getting indexed is always the biggest challenge for a new website owner. The faster you can implement the above three suggestions, the more likely you will gain a rapid entry into Google’s search results.

Evan Carmichael

Evan Carmichael
YoungEntrepreneur.com Blog Manager

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