The way I look at this is that the question is focused on "big" -- which is a quantity issue. I think I mentioned that we'd gotten some links on a couple of on-topic websites, with the result that they started sending traffic to my client's site immediately. What could be better ... someone goes to a topical site or vortal, searches for what my client has, and goes directly to his site.

I think this is kind of a perception issue here at SEF. We are always looking at more traffic, the more the better. What is not always focused on is truly targeted traffic, which is something a vortal or targeted site can give you just as easily as a major search engine. And people frequent these things, so I wouldn't discount them simply because they're "smaller".

It's similar to the situation where you get a lot of traffic from the majors, but a friend sends you a potential client. You have to take it from there, but this is nothing to turn away simply because your friends send less "traffic" than the majors.

It's a matter of playing all the cards, not just a few or the usual.

Because of the way my present company's product range is so expansive, and almost impossible to document and index accurately and effectively using manual doorway pages and submissions, I'm investing in a portal scheme myself.

Taking the overall company identity, and then branding it into a dedicated site all about that company and it's products, helps to raise not only dedicated, target traffic, it also helps to raise brand awareness in general.

Presently, I'm tasked with managing SEO for approx 6 sites for this company, and I'm actually undertaking all the page creation, posting, and submitting myself, manually. This is very, very long-winded, and IMHO a pretty fruitless task. Trying to educate my employer about the benefits of a vortal is another issue, but the point I'm trying to make is that a well-constructed and maintained vortal doesn't remove traffic from a website, it adds to it, significantly.

Imagine (if you will) that a person is looking for exactly the same product you sell, yet your doorway pages are struggling in 200th position. Now, if you are fortunate enough to have an already-established brand, then creating a vortal is like presenting this person with a virtual online catalogue. It's like passing a child his most favourite toys that he's ever wanted, because not only to you get more visitors, you get more targeted visitors - people who specifically want what you can offer them, kind of like a supply and demand solution.

If you're not such a well-established brand, or you're just starting out, then work on an affilliate program that will promote your vortal to the online communities that you're interested in. It's the usual 'net marketing strategy, but the difference is that using your vortal, visitors will be able to find what they want almost instantly, and the whole lot is sold by YOU.

It's a pretty exciting concept (can't you tell I'm a bit worked up by it?!? ), and once it's in place, it's far easier to add further entries to it than to write a brand new hallway page. You could even add your own search feature to the site, and what a boon that would be, no?

The corporate sponsored juggernaut portals have a huge advantage and nearly shut out the portals. Every ISP chooses one of the big portal's general purpose search engines and puts it on the default main homepage. AOL is the ultimate example. You couldn't change their "main homepage" and the default search that's shoved in your face even if you wanted to.

That's where human nature steps in. 80% of the people will automatically use the search that's shoved in their face. They're too lazy to change their main homepage. And if they do, they're going to change it to another juggernaut mainstream portal -- like switching from the IE default startup page MSN to Yahoo or Google. Vortals will always be consigned to be a bookmark and not a start page -- except by corporate purchasers whose main job is to participate in a specialized digital marketplace. That's fine for corporate purchasers, and Vortals will indeed control billions of dollars in our economy.

But I don't think the mainstream portals are going to sit on their laurels while Vortals eat their lunch! No way. Since all product catalog data is going to be normalized and super-easy to spread around, the juggernaut portals will find ways to blend Vortal results into their oh-so-important default searches.

In my opinion, most search activity will continue to be centered on the super-popularized search sites, with will have increasingly useful and relevant search results no matter how specialized underlying industry. We're seeing the earliest signs of this in the "shopping" portions of general search results.

Feel free to prove me wrong.

quote:

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the juggernaut portals will find ways to blend Vortal results into their oh-so-important default searches

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We are seeing this already, those of us who are vortal owners. I don't think you will ever see a vortal placed as a default search engine - that's not the purpose of vortals. But they will occupy very important places within the larger search engines and portals themselves - coming up first place on search results for a topic or geographical area.

If you stop and think about a big search engine as a funnel - drawing traffic, a vortal acts as a smaller funnel within - sending that specialized traffic out further. The two work very well together.

Your specialized vortals will develop huge followings of their own - due to the community involvement aspects of a successful vortal. In terms of user friendliness, site stickyness, community - a specialized vortal has the big advantage over a major search engine precisely because it is smaller, not intended to compete with the big boys - just do its own particular area comprehensively, and do it well.

The way I see it is nobody has to eat anybody's lunch. If it comes to a kill before I get killed situation, we are going to lose all the ground we've gained in the placement industry in getting the major engines to work with us instead of seeing us as their enemy.

The internet is just beginning, or maybe just re-begining, and there is little doubt in anyone's mind that it is going to be big. Bigger than anything mankind has ever dreamed of before. If we all start trying to eat each other's lunch we are all doomed to another dotcom disaster. There is no way that any one source is going to be the answer to all people. There will be room for anyone who is willing to do the work it takes to provide an honest, quality product or service to become successful. A topic specific portal simply makes that job a little easier.
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In my opinion, most search activity will continue to be centered on the super-popularized search sites, with will have increasingly useful and relevant search results no matter how specialized underlying industry.
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Here is the key to mutual success and why the super-popularized portals will work hand in hand with home made portals.

I totally agree with the increasingly useful and relevant results. Where are those useful results going to come from?

Since we all started noticing the majors placing more relevancy on keywords in the domain name, we all realized, (or at least should have), that any search service would PREFER to give as a results a SITE about a topic as opposed to a PAGE about a topic, or keyword. Following this strategy to it's next natural conclusion, if a SITE about a keyword is good, wouldn't a PORTAL about a keyword be better?

While there is no guarantee that the algorithms of the majors will be the same a year from now as they are today, today, this is working. I have personally seen it for myself. Topic specfic portals are placing better than their website counterparts. Add to this fact the ability to give awards, search boxes, vanity e-mail accounts etc, The link popularity factor also comes into play, not to mention the themed content and the fact that as a portal you have a shot at being recognized as a hub increasing the value of your links to your users.

From almost every aspect of top placement, The awards links coming in, the general topic links coming, the amount of relevant pages that can be indexed, the amount of keyword rich text throughout the site and on and on, a topic specifc portal has a clear advantage. Now if you're a search engine, even the biggest, where do you want to send your vistiors to when they search for shoes? A domain about shoes or a portal about shoes?

My only concern about the future of vortals, and one minor reason I have abstained from posting more about this topic, (which I have a direct interest in), is because there are some people who are reading this forum right now who don't give a rat's hoot about me, or you, or anyone else in the whole world. The one thing that can destroy the vortal potential is the exact same thing that has virtually destroyed the entire search industry as we knew it in '96. Spam.

For those of us who have never intended to build anything of quality, but only to grab what they can as fast as they can, once they realize the potential of a portal, I'm afraid they will once again flood the engines with worthless, re-directed, keyword-stuffed, hidden bull**** crap until the industry has no choice but to once again label all portals owners as spammers.

Assuming that there is actually a possibility that hard work, honesty and quality have enough of a place on the net that we can all keep the spam at bay, (we've all done miserably so far), I see a very bright future for Vortals indeed.

Bob has been a long-term and valued member of this community. Because his company is one of the major players in the Vortal field, I asked him to join this thread. Get the info "right from the e-horse's mouth" so to speak.

Nothing personal Bob.

The Web is the same way, as it gets more complex it requires more specialization, both from professionals and web sites. If you were running a bricks and morter business you would want to be listed in the yellow pages AND a trade directory for your industry wouldn't you? Plus you would probably join the local Chamber of Commerce for networking and a listing in thier directory too. You list where you can be found.

Finally, no large portal can be all things to all people (although they try) as it becomes harder and harder for the little guy on Tripod or Homestead to place at #400 in a search of a major engine, you have just created an opportunity for someone else to fullfill the demand.

Of course you should be in the majors. But if there's a topic-specific portal for your subject, you'd be foolish not to list there as well. Especially if your competition is there.

The majors are, and always will be, very general in their query results by necessity and the sheer volume of their databases.

The vortal concept is an excellent fit and compliments the major SEs rather than detracts from them in my view.

We have spent some time, however, convincing competing companies that the vortal is by far the most effective method to market their products and gain exposure for their goods and services.

It is the same reason MacDonalds, Burger King, Wendy's, Kentucky Fried Chicken, Taco Bell, Taco Time and Jack-in-the-Box build within a few feet of each other in Anytown, USA. They realize that they can reap the benefits of everybody elses advertizing campaign simply by placing themselves in close proximity. People are more likely to try their products there than if they were in stand-alone isolation.

Likewise, vortals offer a very focused, competent array of related selections from which a visitor may choose - thus strengthening the overall market potential for each represented. Personally, I think this concept enhances the Web so long as it is not simply abused as a spam technique.

In practice, the company that develops a niche portal for its own industry often reaps a huge benefit. By providing an UNBIASED source of information on the industry, it becomes recognized as the online authority on the subject. If the sales department is kept away from the portal mailing list, and the company does not actively seek sales through the portal, visitors develop a trusting relationship with the parent company before they ever visit the parent site. Visitors see "WidgetPortal.com is a free service of ABCWidget.com" on every page of the site, every time they visit, but no one is pressuring them to buy something. By the time they click through to ABCWidget.com they have already developed a relationship with the company, and will be much more receptive to the sales pitch on the parent site. It's called branding, and it works, big time.

[This message has been edited by MJR (edited 03-07-2001).]

Not just listings, but content related to their vertical market. Add that to the directory service and and suddenly you have the model for the stickiest sites imaginable.

No site can offer content on every subject. A vertical site can offer everything from tutorials, articles, newsfeeds, forums, ezine, directory and all the rest that the biggies have failed at. In a narrow market, these are big advantages.

And are there any examples we can look at? Are the search results unique or recycled from the big engines with more relevancy?

I'd like to put my own personal spin on the meaning of "vortal" if I may; I'd describe a vortal as a place where you can go to find out about a specific subject, as opposed to a regualr portal which may amount to nothing more than a general directory of interests/subjects.

A vortal's ideal placement is, as Lynne brilliantly detailed above, as a company-sponsored direvtory covering everything about a specific subject. Personally, I work for the single-most recognised dealer of a particular collectible, and it would be an outrageously good service to provide to all those specific users out there. Taking the "no pressure" approach is ideal, an absolutely superb way to generate massive awareness, and have your name always on the tip of their tongue, yet it's their choice as to whether or not they actually click through to your sponsoring site anyway - giving the visitor this kind of power in decision making is simply unrivelled, and puts you in great stead with your target audience.

I simply can't express enough how effective (with the right kind of management approach) a vortal can be. However, be warned - the temptation may be to great for "gold-rushers" to start spam-mailing the users of its vortal. This is the absolute WORST kind of dot-com death: SUICIDE. Not only would this kind of approach destroy your userbase, it would also badly tarnish the name of your brand, most-likely permanently with your initial users.

Abusing visitors trust (not to mention email!) in this way would be but one avenue vortal-death could be washed down. That kind of behaiviour is (in my mind) the single-most biggest threat to company-sponsored vortals, which would lead to the abondonment of vortals in general all over again...

[This message has been edited by SearchEngineer (edited 03-08-2001).]

Mike-Levin.com brings up a good point about "Are the search results unique or recycled from the big engines with more relevancy?", I personally think it is vital to use and have control over your own search database. Recycling a part of some big international database does not do that. There are small web sites out there that are only promoted locally and/or in print so that they will never be submitted to a large directory. You would miss those. Its the difference of walking through the forest or flying over it in a plane. That specialized knowledge is vital.

MJR makes a good point, ideally the search results of the large portals should lead you to a vortal for specialized coverage of a topic.

The search results are unique to make them "most"relevant. There may be a gateway to the Internet via a regional or global SE. There also may be the use of "default" results in addition.

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No one hates the term Vortal more than I. In my opinion it is nothing more than another feeble attempt by the media to impress us all with how hip they are. If there is a definiton , I don't really know it, and I are one.

To me a Vortal is nothing more that a topic specific website with one admin panel meant to give the website owner easier control over a setries of integrated programs or features such as e-mail, classifieds, forums, etc.

In a lot of ways, I think it's a shame that we have to invent new jargon. Educating the public is about the hardest and most expensive venture in any marketing endeavor and now how many people are looking for topical information, (everyone that types in a keyword), but when presented with a Vortal, think, "I don't want a vortal, I just want a website".

But, that's just my opinion and it really doesn't matter because the promise of a vortal, or whatever the world decides to call it, is strong enough that they are coming and I don't see anything to stop them. There are simply too many advantages to them and to me it is just the next natural step in web development tools.

Now, you asked for examples. Here is one of my favorites.

http:graphicdesign.searchking.com

I would love to see any others.