If
you are a webmaster, then you've probably submitted your website
to several directories, you may even run one yourself. There are
thousands and thousands of directories out there on the net and
they all have their advantages and disadvantages. Good webmasters
need to be able to evaluate these differences to assess what directories
will be worth the time, effort and money to submit to.
Traffic
While
all webmasters would like more traffic, and often have the goal
of obtaining more visitors from directory submissions, the truth
of the matter is that most directories don't bring in very many
visitors. Even DMOZ, one of the largest and most popular directories
on the web, brings in few surfers for many sites listed there.
And other directories that spend several thousand dollars each
month on advertising may only bring a few visitors.
Now
don't get me wrong, sites in popular directories listed in a good
spot near the top of popular categories many indeed see a nice
amount of visitors, but this is the exception rather than the
rule. But even one visitor a month is better than none.
SEO
The
top search engines build rankings to a lesser degree based from
on-page factors, like how many times your keyword appears on your
page, or if the keyword is used with bolding, italics, H1 or H2
tags, etc. To a larger degree, search engines rank pages based
on what the rest of the web has to say about them. This means
that links to your website count as positive votes, and the anchor
text in these links helps categorize the content of your page.
If the rest of the web says a webpage is about a "miserable failure",
search engines will take that strongly into consideration, regardless
of what the webpage in question says it is about.
The
main point being that directories provide webmasters with a way
to vote for their own website by getting a new link. With respect
to categorization, the downside with most directories is that
instead of linking to your site with your keyphrase as the anchor
text, they link to your site through the title which only provides
some categorization depending on the title. Worse, directories
sometime use the URL as the anchor text which provides no categorization
benefit at all. But the absolute worst way that a directory can
link out to your site is through a tracking-script URL which allows
the directory software to count hits to your site, but provides
no SEO benefit at all. The ideal case would be a directory that
used a direct link with your selected keyphrase as the anchor
text, but this is very rare.
One
final SEO factor to consider, is the difference between floating
text links and links that are naturally embedded within content.
Search engines understand that natural in-content links may provide
more accurate anchor text, and that floating links are often used
with links purchased for SEO benefit. If you can get your anchor
text link from within surrounding content text, that is the ideal
case.
Saturation
Another
factor to look at is the saturation of a directory. This simply
means how full is the directory, or targeted subcategory, with
other websites. If you take Google PageRank into consideration
the idea of a link as a vote, as discussed above, becomes more
complex. Really each page has a certain varying amount of voting
power (PageRank), and this voting power is divided between all
the links on the page. In practice, this means that if a link
to your site is the only one on the page, it will get the most
benefit as it gets the full voting power possible from the page.
This is rarely the case, as there are usually multiple directory
entries which all share the PageRank. If the directory has grown
to 100s of links per category it has reached the saturation point
and the benefit of being listed is diminished. So, the best time
to get into a good new directory is at the beginning!
Free
vs. Paid
Some
directories are free, some require a reciprocal link and some
require a onetime payment or a recurring payment. Yahoo's directory,
for example, requires a recurring annual payment of $299. DMOZ
is free, but many sites wait for years to be listed. One of the
advantages of paid directories, is that the fact that they are
not free, slows down the submissions, which in turn slows down
the saturation of the directory. This factor can make a purchased
directory entry a very worthwhile investment, these directories
are often of higher quality as well, which makes them a better
resource for users, which can make them a better source of traffic
than junky free directories.
One
thing to note here, is that you definately want to avoid FFA link
pages. Free-for-all link pages are typically uncategorized lists
of links that often require no administrative review for submission,
this results in a spammy, uncategorized, saturated list of links
that you really don't want to be associated with. So, in summary,
take avantage of the quality free directories, but don't write
off the paid directories if you are seeking to gain high quality
backlinks.
Introducing
SEOMA
Now
that you are aware of some considerations for selecting directories
to submit to, I'd like to introduce you to a new directory you
may be interested in. SEOMA was designed from the ground-up to
maximize the SEO benefit for listed sites. While most directories
ask for just your URL, Title and Description, SEOMA also requests
your desired anchor text. This anchor text is used exclusively
to link out to your site, maximizing the benefit of the new backlink.
And another optimized feature of SEOMA, is that if your anchor
text appears within your description, it will automatically be
hyperlinked on the custom detail page which is provided in addition
to the standard directory listing. Your link will be the only
outbound link on this page. So, you get a custom anchor text link
from an on-topic category page, plus another custom anchor text
link from a dedicated detail page for at least two outbound links
per site.
Visit
SEOMA
Mark
is the creator of many popular websites including Money
Talk and SEOMA.
Article
Source: http://EzineArticles.com/
