
Bill Robinson
Founder and CEO
Relentless Marketing
|

|
About Relentless Marketing
Relentlessly Committed to You
About Search Engines
How do Search Engines Work? Search Engines for the general web (like all those listed below) do not really search the World Wide Web directly. Each one searches a database of the full text of web pages selected from the billions of web pages out there residing on servers. When you search the web using a search engine, you are always searching a somewhat stale copy of the real web page. When you click on links provided in a search engine's search results, you retrieve from the server the current version of the page.
Some of the major search engines are Google, Altavista, MSN, Excite, Hotbot, Infoseek, Lycos, and Webcrawler. Note that Yahoo is a directory, not a search engine. The term Search Engine is also often used to describe both directories and search engines.
Search engine databases are selected and built by computer robot programs called spiders. Spider is that part of a search engine which surfs the web, storing the URLs and indexing the keywords and text of each page it finds. For example, Google's spider, also referred to as a "crawler", is named Googlebot. Although it is said they "crawl" the web in their hunt for pages to include, in truth they stay in one place. They find the pages for potential inclusion by following the links in the pages they already have in their database (i.e. already "know about"). They cannot think or type a URL or use judgment to "decide" to go look something up on the Internet.
If a web page is never linked to in any other page, search engine spiders cannot find it. The only way a brand new page - one that no other page has ever linked to - can get into a search engine is for its URL to be sent by some human to the search engine companies as a request that the new page be included. All search engine companies offer ways to do this.
After spiders find pages, they pass them on to another computer program for "indexing." This program identifies the text, links, and other content of the page and stores it in the search engine database's files so that the database can be searched by keyword and whatever more advanced approaches are offered, and the page will be found if your search matches its content.
Some types of pages and links are excluded from most search engines by policy. Others are excluded because search engine spiders cannot access them. Pages that are excluded are referred to as the "Invisible Web", i.e. what you don't see in search engine results. The Invisible Web is estimated to be two to three or more times bigger than the visible web. (Source: University of Berkeley)
back to top
According to Wordtracker (2005 info), three search engines get roughly 70% of all traffic, with the following distribution among them:
-
Google gets 47.0500% of all search engine traffic (approx. 268 million a day).
-
MSN gets 9.0000% of all search engine traffic (approx. 51 million a day).
-
Yahoo engine gets 12.7700% of all search engine traffic (approx. 73 million a day). Yahoo gets 12.7700% of all search engine traffic (approx. 73 million a day).
The table below shows only the engines included in the Wordtracker system; who they power, and who powers them. Pay per bid engines other than Overture have not been included.
Search Engines Relations
| Included Engine
|
Main Results From
|
Powers
|
| AllTheWeb |
Yahoo! Search Marketing, Yahoo |
None |
| Altavista |
Yahoo! Search Marketing, Yahoo, Open Directory |
None |
| Google |
Open Directory |
Lycos, AOL, Ask, Hotbot, Dogpile, Netscape, Alexa |
| HotBot |
Ask, Open Directory, Google |
None |
| Lycos |
Looksmart |
None |
| LookSmart |
Inktomi |
Lycos |
| MSN |
Yahoo! Search Marketing |
Dogpile |
| Open Directory |
None |
Lycos, Altavista, Google, Netscape, Alexa, AOL, Hotbot |
| Ask |
Google |
Lycos, Dogpile, Hotbot |
| Yahoo |
Yahoo! Search Marketing |
Altavista, Alltheweb, Dogpile |
| Yahoo! Search Marketing |
None |
Altavista, Alltheweb, Yahoo, MSN, Dogpile
|
Useful Resources
The following resources describes the relationships between the search engines, directories, and pay-per-clicks, so you can understand why we chose some engines for the competition eearch but not others:
After beginning his business career at RCA Corporation in New York City , Mr. Robinson established himself as one of the youngest managers in the company and soaked up all he could about the corporate business world. When General Electric Company (GE) acquired RCA in 1986 for more than $6,000,000,000 (in what was then then largest non-oil company merger in history), he continued as a GE executive for two further years while becoming one of the youngest attendees of GE's "Experienced Manager Training Program."
A six-year stint working for best-selling author Michael E. Gerber then followed Mr. Robinson's relocation to California. Gerber is the author of the Entrepreneurial cult-classic The E-Myth: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What To Do About It which has sold over one million copies in more than 18 languages for Harper Collins. Mr. Robinson was instrumental in taking The E-Myth's sales from approximately 150,000 to its current levels by engaging the media about Gerber, his books and electrifying message. Major media hits included: FORTUNE, Inc. Magazine, Success Magazine, Entrepreneur Magazine, Nation's Business, United Press International (UPI), The Boston Globe, Dallas Morning News, CNN, CNBC, numerous broadcast network TV and Radio affiliates and a series on PBS entitled Small Business in America which featured Gerber exclusively. Mr. Robinson also focused intensely on Strategic Alliances with organizations such as McDonald's, General Motors, MailBoxes Etc., Dunkin Donuts, the International Franchise Association (IFA) and many more.
It was during his sixth year working for Gerber that Mr. Robinson was irreversibly bitten by the entrepreneurial bug and started Relentless Marketing.
Journalism and Media Appearances
In order to understand the inner working of the media industry and get an exposure Mr. Robinson has written columns, articles and cover stories for Forbes.com; Marketing Magazine (UK); FORTUNE Small Business; Cisco System's iQ Magazine; Business 2.0; The Financial Times; United Airline's Hemispheres Magazine; and Upside Magazine, among others. Robinson's “On Location” columns for Upside won three prestigious ASBPE awards. He also appears frequently on CNN, PBS, Bloomberg, had a regular segment on SKY News and speaks, moderates and chairs technology, marketing and business conferences worldwide.
During the two years Mr. Robinson wrote “On Location” column for Upside Magazine and in writing his column on next-generation devices, he has traveled to over 76 cities in 44 countries covering technology, biotech, venture capital/investment, incubators, economic development, the Internet, hardware, software, wireless technologies, Bluetooth, the media and convergence devices of the future for his writings and SKY News segments.
In traveling the world as a journalist, Mr. Robinson has established an extensive network of top executives and visionary thinkers. These invaluable connections proved to be very effective in Relentless Marketing core marketing services, and many remained good friends.
Mr. Robinson's articles can be found on the website, in the Articles section.
|