There are 2 types of listings you can get in Google. The first is the free option and the second is a paid one.
While the paid one does require that you pay for things like ads, the first one is not only FREE, but you really don’t need to do much to actually have it happen. And it is the first one which I want to focus the majority of this blog post on.
I often see a lot of scam programs online and companies calling up unsuspecting people, soliciting them and saying they’ll create websites for people and “list” them on Google and I constantly tell people to stay away from those companies, no matter what, simply because if people understood how easy it really was to do this, they’d know they were being lied to by these places.
So let me explain the process, that being the free one and the paid one so you understand it, use it properly and never fall for a scam program which tries to lie to you about the process to get your money.
Let’s start with the free one (like my site showing up on Google).
Let’s say you made a website. But you want it to pop up on Google. How exactly do you do it?
Well the short answer is that you really don’t have to do anything because your website has an internal process which signals Google to come to your website and then have it show on it’s search engine.
There’s a reason why whenever I put up new content, be it a new page or blot post that within a day, it’s already picked up by Google. It’s because my website has what we call the “pinging” or as I like to call it the “signaling” option and it turns on whenever I add something new to my site. The LONG, yet specific information on this process is written up here if you want to learn the specifics.
Note: There is an update to this. There is a “speedier” way to get your site listed on Google and that is manually requesting that Google index it. Here is how to get Google to index your website.
But there are different kinds of websites you can make and not all of them have this feature. Here’s the places that do, meaning if you’re going to make a website, do it through one of these places:
Squarespace, Wix, WordPress (my preference), Drupla.
If you make a website on any of these platforms, you can feel calm in knowing that once the page is created, you will be listed on Google for free.
Now if you don’t have a website with one of these platforms and/or you’re unsure about it, you have a few other options. One of them is manually pinging the page on places like Pingomatic.com.
But there are more reliable options than that and my personal favorite if literally notifying Google itself. Here is the tutorial for that.
So to summarize, when it comes to free options, if you have a website with one of the platforms I mentioned above, you are set and need not do anything after creating your site. And if you don’t, you already have a tutorial to make sure that no matter what, your site will be listed, and it will be done for free.
Now it is VERY important that at this stage I mention that your website showing up in Google does not mean that it’s going to be a success. Very often people make the mistake of thinking that just because your site is on that search engine that all the other work is set and done.
This is absolutely NOT true. Your site being on Google absolutely does NOT mean it’ll be getting mass hits, traffic, sales, ect…
Your website absolutely has to have content be created on it in order for it to grow with Google and succeed. This is called content creation and the more you do it, the better it’ll be.
You see, listings on Google aren’t widespread UNLESS you create enough content to make it happen. Let me explain…
Let’s say you initially set up your website and it gets listed on Google automatically. Great. But those listings are limited meaning that your page will only pop up for a few search queries AND it won’t be ranked high for those search terms either, so what that means is that organically (popping up on Google for free), you will get no actual visits from just setting up your page alone.
Now if you start to add content to the site via new pages, posts and so on, then each time you do, Google will grow the amount of times it lists your site and it will pop up for MORE search queries and at the same time, it’s ranking will rise via this process.
So what that means is that you should concentrate on growing your website once you initially make it:
Now the paid option:
Google has a bunch of paid networks in which you can manually pay to list your site HIGH and get visitors. Such places include Adwords and Adwords Express and other services in which if you’re for example a business, you can get a map listing for your site for when people type in your business name or the service you provide and look for locations in their area.
So if you’re for example a pizza place, and people look for a pizza place near them (and yours is in the area, and you properly set everything up), then your business will show up for their search.
The benefit of using these paid options is that for a particular price, you can show up very high up on Google which saves you time from waiting for it to happen via the free options.
But the drawback here is that you have to pay for them and sometimes it can be a lot. Now the benefit of using this approach is that you need not focus on growing your content on the site to get high rankings like I mentioned is necessary in the free part above.
The disadvantage though is that you will have to pay a price for it. But knowing how to properly set up your site, sign up with the services and then set them up so you pay very little, get the right kind of visitors and get paid for it can be extremely beneficial.
Should I focus on the free, paid or both options?
If you’re a personal blogger who doesn’t own a physical business, and doesn’t have a lot of money, focus on the free option. Like I said, your site will get listed for free and if you grow it through content creation, it’ll have more success that way.
If you’re a physical business and want to appear on Google for potential customers, then using the paid options would be very beneficial for you.
Focusing on both options is only beneficial if you own a particular kind of business and have time to create content on your site.
In my particular case, I focus on mainly the free option and grow my site that way. In few circumstances do I focus on the paid options, but since I don’t own a physical business, but an online one, I actually rely on Bing, not Google and use their paid networks instead (it’s cheaper for me).
Anyway, if that part confused you, don’t worry about it.
Only take from this article the following things:
1) Never trust ANY program that tries to say they’ll list your website, but for a price.
2) Getting listed on Google is a completely natural and free process if you own a website and use one of the platforms I talked about.
3) If you don’t have them (one of the platforms), you have the plan B option that I also provided a tutorial for that.
4) It’s when you get into the paid part that you have to actually put in money to make it happen. And there are advantages/disadvantages of using them.
5) Know that whether want to succeed with the free or paid options, that the best way to do is through this program. If you’re serious about setting up a potentially profitable website, that program will help you get to that point.