That's the first concern. The second is the variation of the anchor text, as this is what the penalties target... patterns of exact anchor text phrasing. Why do they target these? Quite simply because they are a clear indicator of an intent to manipulate rankings for those phrases. It's stupid... yes... but that's the reasoning behind it. SEO is about manipulating to gain rankings for certain keyphrases. That's why there are keyword tracker tools, and why everyone (even Google's very own WMT) tracks what phrases people are searching in order to find your site, so that you can target those phrases better. Wow, you can even pay Google and they will give you sponsored positions for your keyphrases. So it's all very hypocritical, but the bottom line is, if you have a lot of the same exact phrasing as link anchor text pointing to your site, it's in danger of being penalised because it looks unnatural. For now yup. Tomorrow it might be if you use H1 tags then you are manipulating the SERPs so you're gonna get penalised. Imagine the fun that would cause. Do you reckon MC is just walking on his treadmill laughing his ass off, at the insanity one simple algorithmic change has caused? The way people are talking it is like the world has come to an end. People have gone from building as many links as they can, to removing as many as they can. It's insanity. Authoritative to that degree? Probably only a handful would even get mentioned. The BOTW's, Yahoo Dir, Business.com, BUBL and IPL, et al. - Why? Because they've been around for more than a decade, have been mentioned more times than you can imagine, and all of them have a strong editorial process in place. Not wanting to use PR as a measuring stick, but they are all PR6+ and have been for pretty much the entire time PR has existed. To a lesser extent you are looking at the WOW Directory, Skaffe, JoeAnt type directories. Who don't have the scale of the others, but which are still very comprehensive in their own right. Then you also need to take into account niches. These are far more difficult to list in a general fashion, because you would really need to research your own niche, and decide for yourself based on your expertise and the relevancy of the content how suitable they are for a listing. If you need a good rule of thumb... Whenever you see a directory check out it's age. If it is well indexed, ranks for it's name, has a solid PR, is free of spam in the latest listings and the category you wish to list in, is well designed (not default template) and has a real name mascot/logo. Then it's probably a safe bet. Quite a lot of directories would fit this rule of thumb, and most of them would be good directories to submit a website to. It's the same as with anything of any value or quality. You need to do the research first. Do you just go and buy a car? Or do you actually test it for the very things it claims it can do? If you don't do the research how do you know if you have bought a lemon or not? Anything in life can be a scam. Directories, the bad ones, are easy to spot and avoid. The industry should be thankful for that. It is rather transparent.
I don't think that directory submissions are good today. Admin of them don't approve submissions soon.
Actually there are lots of authority Directories other than Yahoo and Dmoz.Just Google "best authority Directories" and you,ll get them.I think submitting to hundreds of Directories is of no use.But if you can submit to two or three authority Directories or just outsource that, you are sure to get PR 5 to 9 links which is highly valuable to your site/blog.By the way don,t stop at that, try submitting to a few more as well.You never know when and how visitors come.
Actually there are lots of authority Directories other than Yahoo and Dmoz.Just Google "best authority Directories" and you,ll get them.I think submitting to hundreds of Directories is of no use.But if you can submit to two or three authority Directories or just outsource that, you are sure to get PR 5 to 9 links which is highly valuable to your site/blog.By the way don,t stop at that, try submitting to a few more as well.You never know when and how visitors come.
Googling "best authority directories" simply gets you a list of lame blog posts where "SEO" folks provide a list of directories they are peddling and a directory called strangely enough "best authority directory." The closest thing to a true list of "authority directories" is at info.vilesilencer.com.
I highly doubt google would take that position on such an integral markup component. That would effectively set HTML standards back by many years.
i dont think directories plays best in optimization, most of the directories take 6 months for approval...high time...
True, and I was being facetious. If they were willing to backflip on the whole "links can't hurt your site" mantra (and the do no evil mantra hahaha) then whose to say what else they might backflip on
they are still relevant as long the directories are good and have high page ranks. I still use directory submissions.
Using directories for link building should be a very small part of your link building campaign. Do not search for directories for SEO. If the directory features is services for SEO purposes, this is by all accounts not a quality directory. Instead look for directories that have other content on their site aside from the directory and only submit to niche directories based around your own. Also don't submit to directories that post every submission and don't pay for links in these directories, its a waste of money.
In my opinion online directories still have value and are one part of creating a link profile for your site. I would recommend you look closely at the inbound followed links of your key competitors who rank well. I almost always find online directories in the link profiles of my high ranking competitors.