I've been getting a little more serious about submiting to directories for backlink purposes. I now switch around my anchor text to target a few different phrases per site. I am wondering if i should also be using a few different descriptions too. Will the search engines care that the 1 or 2 sentances that come after my anchor and link are the same?
Altering your descriptions ensures that the page of the directory doesn't suffer from a duplicate content penalty. That would happen if everyone in your category submitted the exact same descriptions to every directory, and they accepted more or less the same sites. It's rare, but it can happen. It's especially bad when you get a lot of newish directories using the same default script. If you want your link to be indexed, you might as well write a few different descriptions.
O.K. Now i am convinced. Just needed a little confirmation from somebody else to tip me over the edge. Now to come up with some reasonable descriptions different from the original. I find that difficult when all I really care about is the anchor text. But its only a sentence, or two, so it should not be that hard.