Submission: An Extension of the Human Touch

Back in the day when electricity was science fiction, the electronic communication paths we rely on today had not even been dreamt of, and so if you wanted to have an appointment with a person of means, it was standard practice to drop by in person and submit your “calling card” for approval. What a great way to chew up a day. But, in some respects, it is no different today – if you want your website to be noticed by the search engines, you must submit your website for inclusion, but it is how you submit the request that makes the all the difference. 

To be considered for inclusion in a search result, your website must be indexed by a search engine. And to be submitted, there are two paths: automatic submission, and manual submission. I’m not one for blanket statements, but it is safe to say that by-in-large search engines do not prefer automatic submissions. There are arguably a handful, or maybe even a half-dozen, big search engine players, and between them, they are bombarded with millions upon millions of automatic submissions every day. To try and dissuade the fans of automatic submissions, measures have been put into place that border on manual submission tactics, like requiring passwords and mandatory fields.

Indeed, the hatred of automatic submission software by search engines is so severe, that many search engines have banned their acceptance altogether because of the software’s inability to properly place the content into relevant categories. And if that were not enough, search engines, always weary of spam, will not tolerate any type of automated submission efforts that have even a passing resemblance to spam and the resulting action will be your material being banned from entry. Instead of using automatic submission software, you can try a submission service, but all in all, the benefits of using a paid submission services (a.k.a., an automated service) are minute simply because given that they are a business hellbent on profits, they will automate where possible. But if the submission service route is the way you want to go, you should be aware that the best submission services will provide you with enough education to allow you to operate the software and run with it on an ongoing basis.

So, that all being said, I guess that leaves you with submitting your site manually. It’s a no brainer – manual submission allows you to tailor where your material will be listed. A standard practice for automatic submissions is to list your site with unfamiliar search engines and call it listed, or even worse, automatic submissions can often associate your site with objectionable sites. Compare the hit and miss variety of automatic submission with the tailored results achieved by submitting your own site – you are in the driver’s seat when it comes to picking your site’s category, and as a result, your targeted audience won’t have to look for you under “Other”. 

The submission process is an extension of the due diligence that you and your SEO firm went through to create your optimized website. You didn’t let a robot optimize your site, so why would you leave it to 3CP0 to submit it? At the end of the day, the site should be submitted according to the intended audience who determine through their phraseology the descriptions and keywords that define your site.

For a detailed account of the ins and outs of submission, check out this article from MSNBC.