Building a Web Site For Dummies®, 3rd Edition

Adding a Search Function

Unless your site consists of just a single Web page, you need a search engine for it. Sites that don’t offer search functions are at a real disadvantage compared with those that do have them. Put yourself in a visitor’s shoes and ask, “Do I want to spend hours browsing this site in the hope that I may stumble across the information I want? Or do I want to spend a few seconds running a search to get the information I need right away?”

All the search options described in the following sections have their own strengths and weaknesses. Similar programs and services offer varying features. The importance of each feature is a matter for you to decide. I recommend checking out all of them. Because none of them requires much effort to install and use, you may as well road-test every one to see which you like best.

Using Google Site Search

Google Site Search is one of the best of the zillions of valuable tools that Google provides to the Web. You just slap a search box into your Web pages and bam! Your users can search every page in your site — or the whole Web, if you want — using the powerful Google search engine.

Before you can use it, though, you have to get a Google account. No worries — this is a no-obligation situation; you’re just getting one more username.

There are lots of Google tools that require this account first, so even if you don’t end up using ...