Directory Owners: Important Thread on WMW

WMW is pretty much the leading SEO forum, and there is a thread right now at the top of their homepage asking if directories still work. Might be a good time to provide success stories. Here is the link:
Links from General Directories - Are They Worth It?

 

Doesn't really seem "Important" just the same old dead horse being beaten to death. Maybe a good advertizing platform if you are trying to sell directory scripts but for an owner just another "do directories work" thread.

 

Obviously, directories work for some from the submitter to the owner. Granted, it becomes a "dead horse" when you are trying to repeat the same old model over an over again. Fortunately, we are seeing a lot more variations on the model these days.

 

The "dead horse" is the thread starters "do directories work?" How many times can you start the same thread. Sticky?

 

Ive replied in threads like that, over and over again, it got boring trying to bolster the directory biz, most people stopped trying to talk positively about them long before i stopped.

The threads dont get read by the people that we would like to read them, ie: businesses with actual marketing budgets.

Its been regurgitated so much, no need for those curious to even ask about pr, the submissions that i receive are clearly not seeking pr.

Success stories of directories working or sites succeeding because they submitted to directories?

How about we instead bring attention to the endless .info's of them, the bizarrely named high pr ones, the useless junk that overshadows most normal directories, the fake pr on some, the ones built to be sold shortly after....

 

That is important too. The main thing I would add is there is useless junk built every day, and that is not limited to directories. There are 1001 flavors of useless junk.

It is up to the consumer to make worthwhile decisions. Take a trip to Wal-mart or the Dollar store. There is plenty of useless junk there too. There are made for adsense blogs, content shuffler sites, and every form of junk you can imagine. This is not something limited to directories.

Then there is the case where you find good, well maintained directories, and they are not so useless. Their listing receive a better ranking or more traffic. They do exist! But it is the consumer's job to find it. And hopefully it would be our job to support those who do a good job.

 

Probably 99% of directories being built are unless junk. They are built to make money then the owners figure out it is not that easy then they abandon them and they fill with spam links or they are built with dropped domain filled with scraped DMOZ links then sold to a fool who thinks he will make money who will also abandon them and let them fill with spam links.

This is all good for those who sell the scripts they make the money off of the script. If only a few web designers that made quality directories were around the people selling the scripts would lose most all of their customer base. Don't believe me look around at all of the junk directories and compare the numbers to good stable ones.

The only thing making and posting "how directories do work" in these "important" threads does is sell more scripts and propagate more junk directories, great for those selling scripts but a waste of time for directory owners.

 

Lately every time I set out to do some directory submission, I give up in frustration. Several hours later I may have found one or two directories worth submitting to, the rest are complete junk.

While in the past I was not a fan of the no more free versions of directory software concept, I'm seriously rethinking that one. Very few of these newly released directories are utilizing the professional/paid versions of the scripts. I do get the try it before you buy it construct - it certainly makes sense to let people see if the software is workable for their site concept. Perhaps the free versions should be redesigned to restrict the number of listings to say 20 (enough to test pagination) and the number of cats to a mere handful? That way folks could get familiar with the software but not be able to launch yet another useless directory. Seems like it would lead to more sales rather than less - so everyone wins.

It becomes easier and easier for the "SEO pros" to attack the usefulness of directories when so few are actually useful. It would take me all of about 10 seconds to find examples of bad new directories (heck, just visit the S&A section) and probably hours to find a good new one.

 

The SEO pros I know don't even submit to free directories other than dmoz. They get higher quality directory links from good paid directories.

 

Even if they change the pagination it would be pretty easy to debug the code and increase it to some other value..

 

For all new websites built, how many of them do you suppose make the top 1000 sites in the World. It would be a very small ratio indeed. Lots of people try things that fail, or make only a small amount. This is pretty standard for the internet, which I assume you are quite familiar with.

Would it be right to say that only 1% of directories make significant profits?
There could be some truth to that. On the other hand, there are many that make a lower level of profits, but they still profit, and in today's economy if people are at least making something, kudos to them.

Now when you talk about selling scripts, if you are referring to phpLD, a very significant part of our business is repeat customers. I don't think our repeat customers are losing money, or else the wouldn't keep buying our script would they?

I have to agree that following the same old model that everyone else follows is a poor strategy. On the other hand, we see some absolutely brilliant folks. It's all in how you look at it.

 

I wasn't talking about any scripts in specific just the tone of the thread title seemed like it was designed to drum up business and hype for the directory industry.
To me it seems like most of the money comes from a speculative market, people throw up a directory on a dropped domain and sell it to a sucker who thinks they will make money and people buy a directory script make 200 categories and think they will be selling links for $30 next week.
It is like when someone in 1849 found a huge gold nugget in California the papers all raved about it and thousands went to get rich buying mules, shovels and other supplies 99% came back broke but the 1% selling the shovels and supplies made some good money. That’s the way I see the directory business.

Yeah a few ek out a small amount from directories a couple might have even struck it big but sitting around raving about the few success stories only hypes up the market and makes the ones rich selling the supplies to the rest, it is just fake.

 

i cant remember the exact info now of that old saying but something about mining or something like that? And the one making money is the guy selling shovels? Ive probably got it wrong but its something like that.

 

This is pretty universal in marketing.
Does deodorant guarantee you won't smell bad?
Will you look as good as the model in the bathing suit?

When marketing goes especially wrong is when people make dubious claims such as "we guarantee you a #1 rank on google". But another comparison:

Which is worth more? A paid listing on an established directory or a google adwords buy?
Of course, "it depends", but I have been part of lots of adwords campaigns where the buyer was losing a ton of money trying to get traffic, and the ROI was negative.

There are 10 ways to lose money for every one way to gain it. It's up to the buyer to find the best way. It's also up to the seller to produce something that has a great enough chance that people might gain from its use that people would continue to invest in the product.

 

Well even most antiperspirants dont do what they claim, none keep completely dry for 24 - 48hrs

Last time i tried on a womens bathing suit i thought i looked quite nice in it, lol

I and anyone can pretty much guarantee a first place ranking for a keyword phrase, of course something totally useless like "yellow magic keyboards from space" or something weird and useless like that but yeah i know what you mean.

I wouldn't compare anything to ppc, adwords gets used in many different ways, i agree it can suck money very quickly, but in the right hands it can be very useful, some use adwords even to test a market before building.

There are some very naive questions that get posted here though, its sometimes hard to tell if they are taking the mickey or that they really think that the internet is full of easy money opportunities.

 

http://gymcraze.comMight not be the prettiest directory in the world, but it's functional and it does it's job. It's powerful and it's easy to input unique descriptions and it offers a review section. I don't really have any input on your guys' problem with directories. I do know that if you build them right and don't scrape everything, it can be decent. I even have one built now on a brand new niche that is killing it. I don't look at it as a making money thing....but more of a way to help people find what they are looking for.

 

Been receiving infractions for last 2 years for speaking my mind out against SEMI/FULLY automated softwares for directory submissions! (Did nothing but BAN the domain and delete them permanently-- no Q of review as they didn't pay me to review )

Hopefully, the ones giving me infractions, now realize my points why I was so vocal against those type of things long time back!!

 

It definitely wasn't me and I have never used automated software. More often we have helped devised methods to prevent automatic submissions for phpLD users.

 

Lol David -- I was not pointing @ you -- was just trying to make a point to all those SPAMMERS using those softwares which never help anybody (read the WMW thread).

But surely - you can make your script much more strict against SPAMs. Out of all my directories - I use PhpLD in 9 out of 10 (I paid for all). But --just to try -- I used the first FREE version of PhpLynx on one of my directory 4 years back!! It is till now the least SPAMMED directory that I own!! Soooooooooo

 

Horrible memories just came flooding back, please dont let it start again.