Is it possible to get on search engines free of cost?

Question

I was wondering because I asked a question about getting more people to my website and I got a long, but very good, reply with a ton of detail. A lot of it though was about getting it on google or other search engines like Yahoo...I don't want to pay because I have a non-profit website. If I currently needed a business site I might be willing to pay. But I don't.

Answer 1

I built a web site for my town and they never showed up on Google results.  I added lots of pages (they had around 10 pages, now it's around 120) and we are the first results.  It's really something to see that happen.

Answer 2

Yes. Some sites charge you to guarantee that you will be listed.

Yahoo! has a free submit-a-site form that you can fill out, however, it clearly states that they have the right not to list for site for any reason they see fit. They mean it, as I had submitted my site unsuccessfully for years.

Here's a list of submit forms:

GOOGLE: http://www.google.com/addurl/

ALTA VISTA: http://www.altavista.com/addurl/default

YAHOO!: http://search.yahoo.com/info/submit.html

You may have to do it a few times, but it's worth it!

Good Luck! :o)