Hello, I need to build link popularity for my business website, but my quick question is: Free directories on the web; page ranks vary between 0 - 5; are they really worth spending time? If I add my website to 500 directories, will that be any good for Google - Yahoo ranking? Or do I need to look for quality directories and spend money instead of time? (Like Yahoo, business.com etc)
the ones with good pr would be worth submitting to probably pr 3 and above the rest would be a bit os a waste.
Yes they are worth spending time on, i can never express this enough, so many keep saying dont waste time with free directories, to put it bluntly they only tell you that because they own paid directories or dont have the time or patience to submit to the free directories. I can guarantee you that they are ueful, regardless or pr, no pr, they will definately help you get better ranking, just depends what your trying to rank for. Spend as much money as you like, i have 4 paid directories yet i always promote how good free directories are all the time, id rather do that than bulls**t people just to make a couple of sales in mine. Use all the free resources you can first, or ignore me completely and spend like a lottery winner your choice.
You might find this article, which I just read, useful: http://www.searchengineguide.com/david-wallace/do-directory-submissions-still-hold-any.php.
500 Free web directories will help a small amount. You may only get approve in 300 of them, and google may only index your backlink in 200 of them, so 200 low quality links will help a little but not a huge amount.
Whether a directory is free or paid should not be your sole criteria for whether that directory is worth submitting to. There are exceptional free ones just like there are totally useless paid ones. Combining payment and PR as your main criteria will only lead you to wasting a great deal of time and money chasing something that Google has made perfectly clear is far from guaranteed and can apparently be changed with a few keystrokes. Welcome to the forums but please in the future search the forums to see if your question has already been answered. This question has been beaten to death.
It's still worth submitting your blog. It's also the best way to earn backlinks as you can use your own desired anchor text which is great if you are optimizing your blog for search engines. Try checking this list of 50 free directories with good google page ranks and the best part of it --- NO RECIPROCAL LINKS REQUIRED. 50 FREE DIRECTORIES - With good Google page rank and no reciprocal link required. Happy blogging.
Yes, free directories are of limited use. And submiting to them is a bit of a double-edged sword when looking for the ones of highest quality because the really good ones take forever (or many months) to approve your sites and 99.9% of the ones that will approve you quickly are not even worth your time in filling out the submission form. I would not spend time submitting to more than 50 or so free directories.
Dont look a gift horse in the mouth. Beggers cant be choosers. You get what you pay for. Believe half of what you read and half of what you hear. Anymore? Really you should be mixing up a cocktail of promotional methods anyway, rather than expecting (not saying you are) directories to bring everything neccessary, use other methods. Most of your links coming from directories looks weird, not natural, tending to be more serps pushers, but not always direct results with other things.
I second that, people who tell you to submit to as many as possible are clearly either not keeping up to date with developements regarding the worth these free directories offer. Choose a small amount of half decent quality directories not half a million crap ones that are likely to get you thrown in the sin bin.
Submitting your website to several good paid directories would have a bigger impact on your site than submitting to 500 free ones. Of course every backlink helps somehow.
Need to be more specific on the "good paid directories" though, depends what you need. Some will use "were listed in dmoz", "yahoo" etc as a promotional point, it dont mean much though. Find out if your listing wherever makes a difference for your clients/visitors, it may make something about your directory or site cool, for vanity reasons but who/what is your site appealing to? Hyper it depends what the bigger impact would be, can you suggest? dont say good traffic forget pr juice passed, lol, a backlink? one backlink.
being listed on the 1st, 2nd category page on a paid directory is definitely better that on a 10-15th page of a free directory. Yeah, even if your paid directory gets visited by few ppl in a month, your site would have better chances to be viewed and visited, and yeah you will have a relevant backlink as well
Everyone has their own different opinion on this. Personally I believe that free good quality directories (regardless of page rank) are worth submitting to.
Agreed, but being on the first page of a free directory that actually gets visits from real people not just fellow directory owners is better than being on first page of a paid directory that doesn't.
I will just add that many of today's free directories are tomorrow's paid directories. Something to think about. Free directories still have influence. The problem with many people when they promote is they expect one method to rocket them to the top. They just endlessly submit to directories, or only spend time creating social link bait, and they wonder why they struggle. Everything should be done in moderation. Try a little of each promotional method, and you will get better results than relying on 1 alone. Directories are just one of many promotional strategies, and they are an important one. It is how you go about it that makes all the difference.
Usually those who visit a free directory, are there only to submit. Less than 1% are browsing categories for something they are looking for.