Is A Custom Search Engine Worth Your Time?

Writing by Nick Stamoulis

Do you have your own customized search engine? Should you?

A customized search engine can do three things for your website:

1. It can allow your site visitors to find what they are looking for on your website more easily
2. It can be used as a marketing tool since you can opt to have your custom search engine be listed in the public search engines index
3. It can assist your site visitors in finding the information they are looking elsewhere if your website doesn’t have they are looking for

A custom search engine can benefit your site visitors in a number of ways. If you have a large website, or if you have several websites with similar themes, then you can help your site visitors find what they are looking for with a search box on your website. Your custom search engine can also be used as a branding tool that will display your company logo and/or header at the top of all of your search results on the search results page as people use it to conduct searches. You can also monetize your search engine through Google AdSense.

There are two types of custom search engines. The first one is free and Google ads are required. But you can earn commissions on those ads. The second type of search engine costs you a little bit of an investment and does not include ads, but you can use it to monetize your website by charging other website owners a fee to be included.

Should you start a custom search engine. The decision is yours, but I see tremendous benefits for webmaster who have the time to manage a search engine. It does take time, but it can also be another source of revenue besides your Search Engine Optimization efforts.