How Search Engines Index Websites

Artificial Intelligence (AI): Anatomy of Search Engine Indexing

I wrote this article in 2008 as a high-level overview about search engines and how they index websites. I wrote this for individuals who want to understand on a fundamental level about how search results are presented to the audience. Currently, this information still plays an integral role in our daily lives in a larger capacity, mainly because our lives are digitally integrated on multiple screens and multiple platforms, and compounded by work and personal life. A digital footprint (for most individuals) is left whether we want to leave it or not.

Below is a brief overview about Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) that is used to index websites and present data in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs).

Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI)

Historically, search engines used Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) algorithms to present data in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). Latent Semantic Indexing looks and records patterns of word distribution (specifically, word co-occurrence) across a set of documents. In addition to recording which keywords a document contains, the method examines the document collection as a whole, to see which other documents contain some of those same words. Latent Semantic Indexing considers documents that have many words in common to be semantically close, and ones with few words in common to be semantically distant.

Natural Language Processing (NLP) / Computational Linguistics

A newer technology called Natural Language Processing (NLP) emerged. Natural Language Processing is a sub-field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and it is the approach to automate data classification based on algorithmic complexity, whose purpose is to extract relevant pieces of information from sentences queried, embedded in files, webpage's, and tags on digital devices. The notion of this technology is to present more relevant results back to the user who is performing a query on a search engine.

In other words, the purpose of either algorithm, Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) or Natural Language Processing (NLP) is to produce Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) that are up-to-date and relevant to the user who is performing a web search query.

Once an SEO campaign is implemented, how long will it take to be indexed? Once indexed, how long will it take before a website shows up within organic Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs)?

The answer is unfortunately - as long as it takes. While no individual outside of the search engine research laboratories at Goggle, Yahoo, Bing, and every other search engine knows precisely what determines algorithmic search engine positioning, Teknowerkz meticulously review's dozens of criteria before implementing an SEO campaign. This methodical approach is intended to ensure that your website is ready to receive maximum visibility.