How to Register a Domain Name With Google

Webmasters want Internet users to be able to find their sites. Registering the domain name with Google requests that Google include the domain in its searches. This doesn't mean that Google will send your site to the top of its list, but it ensures that Google is at least aware of your site and its web "crawlers" will take your site into consideration when a search is executed.

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Google account
• URL of your website
• URL of your sitemap (optional)

Go to Google

1. Visit the "Submit Your Content" page at Google.com. Click on "Submit a URL" located in the "Here's How to Get Started" box in the upper right corner.

2. Enter the name of your URL. Copy the captcha code.
   
   The "captcha code" refers to the funny-looking characters in the box that you must copy into another box. This ensures that people, not software, submits URLs. Software can't read these captcha codes, so this ensures that a human is submitting the site.

3. Be proud--you have just submitted your site. You have asked Google to let Google users know that your site exists and where to find it.

Give Google More Information

4. Submit your sitemap. Google indexes information on the web by sending out "crawlers" to check the information on every page of your website. A sitemap is a page on your website listing all the pages on your site, and shows which ones connect to which. Search engine crawlers follow HTML page links. If your site contains non-HTML links such as Adobe Flash or JavaScript, submitting the sitemap is especially important to show Google's crawlers how to find your find all your pages.

5. Return to the "Submit Content" page. Click on "Submit a Sitemap," located in the "Here's How to Get Started" box in the upper right corner.

6. Log in to Google, if you have not done so already. To do this you can use your Gmail account.

7. Click "Add" next to the URL for which you want to add your sitemap on the Google Webmaster Tools dashboard.

8. To the right of "My sitemaps()" include the name of your sitemap. Google will take several hours to add the sitemap to its database.

Tips & Warnings

• Google might already be indexing your site. Use the "Site status wizard" to find out. Go to the "Site status wizard" page in Google webmaster tools (see Resources) and type in your URL to learn your current Google status.
• If you add new pages to your website, don't wait for Google to find them. Update your sitemap, then submit both your site and your sitemap to Google again.

Resources

• Google's Submit Content Page
• How to Do Google Search Engine Optimization
• Google's List of Software for Generating Sitemaps
• Google Site Status Wizard