meta tags and search engine?

whats the best way to make a site come up first on a search engine? does it look at your title and meta tags? or what else? thanks!

Most of them now just read thru your site and make their own title and description. So it's important to have actual relevant content on your site. And don't put your text in images or flash, that kind of thing. Plus most of them charge you a ton of money to be listed now.

Getting listed first on a search engine is all about how much you're willing to pay.

I used to work for a search engine and they would determine who gets what position based off of bids. If you bid the highest in your category then you get the first spot.

Usually, only sites that makes big bucks spit out the big bucks to get the top spot. But google is nice enough to put me at number 2 with some file sharing software

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=phex

I don't have any meta tags on, but I think having a domain relevant to your content should help.

thx guys, much appreciated