Please help from the ground up

Hey,

I am a web developer and have been building professional sites for years.

I am aware of what helps, doesnt help as far as search engine optimization (ie meta, copy, alt tags on images, proper keywords, title etc...) but what I what Im not aware of is "submitting your site to search engines". I hear this phrase all the time.

Does this cost money? How do I "submit my site" to a google, or a yahoo? Can anyone provide a link to a search engines page that describes how to do this and what it will cost if it does cost anything?

Also, does anyone know of any third party companies that offer "search engine optimization" that will get your site hits? Are there any industry leaders or top recommendations? Links would be appreciated.

Thanks a ton in advance

Grey

Grey, Don't bother submitting to search engines. Its a waste of time. Just get some links from other sites.

Directories are worth submittting to though. Start with DMOZ - its free.

Thanks for the reply, I appreciate it.

But I am actually trying to gather information to present to my client, so whether it is a good idea or not, they kind of need to hear their options. I've been doing alot of search engine optimization researching so I was hoping to get some real life experiences from users.

Do you know where I can go to research how to submit my site?

Thanks again, I appreciate the advice.

grey

Use submit software. It helps and helps you clean up your code as well.

each and every software are crap and should be avoided as much as possible, as you make end up as spammed website which will hurt your efforts
so use manual submission, use google for this or hire some seo.

That is not true. There is very good software out there by well known SEO's.

Do you know of any or recommend any off hand? It seems like I am getting yes/no answers, but no content

any help or guidance is appreciated

Grey

E.g. http://www.submitwolf.net/ Most software teaches you some nice tips on submission etc. Otherwise just check with Google and Yahoo. Most of them have free trial periods.