You are correct! The minute you install BANS, it is able to be typed into the browser and located.

Chances of a search engine spider finding it and indexing it however, are very slim until you provide an inbound link somewhere on the web.

In most cases… this entire process will be done within just a few hours of activating the domain and installing BANS onto a server. Alot of folks don’t want to “open” their site to the public until it is a ready state for visitors though and don’t start to promote the site until everything is completed.

Once I have my categories populated, I will post a link from another site to begin the search indexing portion of the process. GBot and Slurp etc, will only grab a few pages a day when they come… why not get them started early.

Mark

You stated, “Under normal circumstances, once you have the categories created, even before you have optimized them, you can open the store for the search engines to start indexing.”

I’m confused by this statement. It seems to me the moment the BANS software is installed the store is technically open as it can be found if you know the link. How do you keep your store closed (inaccessible), so to speak, until you are ready to go live with it?