Search engine optimization (SEO) or preparing your web site to get high rankings on search engines is all the buzz. Because of the attention it's getting, there are a lot of bogus or rather not-very-useful services out there trying to win your buck.

As a busy coach, with limited time and money resources, it can be very tempting to jump on some of the bogus claims of bringing you website traffic.

Here's one of them - "Pay us $30 a year (or whatever) and we will submit your website to thousands of search engines to increase traffic and visibility."

This is a bogus deal. If it were that easy to get a lot of traffic, then everyone would be doing it. Not everyone can have a lot of traffic because there is only so much traffic out there. Not everyone can show up on page one if there are only 10 spots.

Not everyone can have a boutique at the main entrance to the shopping mall.

Some deals will promise "automatic resubmission every X months" to "make sure" your website continues to do well in search engines. This is a dangerous one.

Search engines do not like repeated submissions of the same pages. Just think. Every time you or someone else sends a web page to a search engine, the search engine has to go to that page, read the content, evaluate the page, evaluate the web site, check out the links on that page and store that information in its database.

Multiply this by millions of pages and you can see how much work it is.

Once your web site is in a search engine database, it will remain there. You don't have to resubmit. Search engines will revisit your web site periodically to update their content.

Let the search engines do their work.

$30 Isn't the Worst of It

If your web site pages are repeatedly submitted, violating search engine policies, your site may get banned. Not good.

If you use a bogus service and your website gets listed on other websites that also abuse search engine policies, your rankings can suffer.

It's best to be aware of where your site is getting submitted to.

Here's Google's policy on automated submissions: "Don't use unauthorized computer programs to submit pages..." This was taken from Google's Webmaster Guidelines, which you may wish to read. It's here: http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=35769

Many bogus services are unauthorized. Be sure to check into the service you might consider using. You don't need to submit to thousands of search engines.

Truth is, only a handful of "search sources" really matter.

A search source is a database where search engine results come from.

For example, AOL gets their results from Google, so Google is the source.

You should submit your webpage manually to a handful of core "search sources" that really matter. Google, DMOZ and Yahoo Directory are among the popular ones.

To give you hope, there are legitimate website submission services out there. You will have to do some research for a reputable provider.

Here's what you should focus on to improve your search rankings: There's no quick and easy way to top the search engines... not in any meaningful way at least. So concentrate your efforts on:

* writing good content * choosing good keywords * getting good links to your site * having a cleanly coded web site * having a useful site for your visitors

Be very wary of search engine submission services that boast big results with very little investment. Your $30 bucks is probably better spent on going to the movies and grabbing some popcorn.