I have been trying to get my site added to dmoz for a year. Still have been able to get in. Any suggestions? I have a student community website with PR5 and spend 4 hours a day on it. Site has been online since October, 2004. What exactly do Dmoz editors look for?
Please Do Not Feed The Troll It's a shame your site has een waiting for so long. Despite having a great deal of hardworking editors, the web presence of DMOZ amongst the webmaster community (probably because of Google's reliance on DMOZ data, as well as all the other dmoz clones out there (though after recent Google algo updates these aren't that useful for a DMOZ-listed site any more)) is such that submissions are overwhelming. This is especially bad when people, unlike yourself, submit a site when they've just started building it, on the misguided belief that this saves them a spot in the 'queue' - it doesn't work that way - if an editor gets to a category to clean it up and deal with submissions, if he sees an incompete site, the submission gets deleted, not stored for the future when the site may or may not be good enough - but since the webmaster doesn't know his submission was deleted, he might not resubmit once his site is good enough, and then gets really angry when his site doesn't get into DMOZ. What's more, the deletion of a submission of that site shows up on future submissions, and that *might* influence an editor's perception of the site. Some categories are well kept, it would appear the one you've submitted to isn't. 'Submit it and forget it' is the standard advice we can give, and fingers crossed your site will be reviewed soon! Whilst you can't really speed up the the time until someone reviews your site, you can improve your chances of it getting in once they get to reviewing your submission by going over the guidelines and checking all's OK with your site, I guess!
Basically, the general advice would be to submit it and forget it. Then focus on improving your site and make it not only has good content but meets various web standards.
Unique content. I am certain that you have read the submission guidelines, and understand that DMOZ is not a listing service. You should not design your site to satisfy editors at ODP. Your only focus should be your visitors.
I don't think the issue is so much "what do they look for?" but "how long does it take for them to look. The ODP has so many sites awaiting editorial review that review times are extremely unpredictable. It is more likely that your site has not been even reviewed yet than it not meeting standards. Is the student community specific to a university or college, or is it general-interest for students? Which category did you submit it to? Maybe there are some other options.
1- How to make money from their own listings. 2- How to benefit their family and friends by listing their sites. 3- How to get paid from others to list their sites. 4- How to find other sites that are no treat to them to list 5- How to achieve all the baove goals with minimum amount of work.
On the site: unique information and lots of it in comparison with other sites on the same topic. Design, provided it is navigable, is irrelevant. On the suggestion: title formatted according to the guidelines and any specific requirements in the category description. For example the name of the site or the name of the company. In the description, one sentence saying what the site is about, free of repetition and keyword stuffing, one sentence describing the contents of the site, e.g. Contains product information, contacts, photo gallery, and feedback form. Basically a summary of the menu system on the site. Not following titling and description guidelines will not lead to the site being rejected though many editors will give priority to the sites easy to add because their owners have made the effort. On where the suggestion is made: is it the best fit category for the contents of the site. Editors are also on the lookout for signs the site is one prohibited by the Guidelines and will thoroughly investigate any suspicions in that area. Despite what some bitter and twisted trolls might say never offer an editor a bribe; it is the quickest way to a permanent ban of all sites you are associated with.
Actually there should have been another "not" in there. You could actually suggest a site without a title and description at all - or a keyword stuffed title, or anything in those two boxes - and the suggestion will be reviewed at some point in someone's life. However, if you take some time with the title and description - and follow Brizzie's suggestion of how to write it (or read the guidelines) - typically the wait is shorter. This is because it catches the attention of an editor who is skimming the suggestions - it makes it stand out.
I was thinking that too - suddenly I was worried I was doing something wrong by doing trying to make the descriptions guidelines-compliant!
Today I see in front of me a description that looks somewhat like this [xxxxx ing out some inf] Kxxx of Mxxxx presents....Mxxxxxx Jxxxxx. Magician, Juggler, Balloon Twister & all round Funny Guy. [suggested 8/Feb/2005] and another like this Corporate magicians that provide clean comedy magic shows and fast paced illusion shows for the state of Pennsylvania [suggested 12 Nov] If I review the first one, I know before I start that I have to completely rewrite the description, since [like many other submissions] he's in love with capital letters. However, the second one looks very close to being ok with a few changes. So, being that I'm a lazy self serving editor, I review and accept the second one [that's less than a week old], and let the one from nine months ago wait for another day. On top of that, the second submission had the title totally correct, since he must have read the category description - 98% of the titles in this area are incorrect. ---------------------- I also got another one, whose front page said "Site under development 9/1/2005" - that goes straight to the site dump.
It seems that you've at least stopped trying to profit from selling advice on how to get listed in DMOZ. That's a step in the right direction...
Possibly. But frankly I'm amazed that after such a blatant attempt at profiteering macdesign is still an editor.
Stop misrepresenting and lying. It's one thing disagreeing with DMOZ, but it's another making statements about me that are inaccurate. I never have sold information aboiut how to get listed. I did offer a paid service that provided historic information from the RDF dumps that provided reports about the positioning of a site within ODP, showing when a site got listed or moved or removed. That's public information, anyone with any brains can do it, and does not require any inside editor information. It did not provide any details from internal editor logs. I offered a free trial for anyone who was interested, but discontinued it after too may illiterate people failed to read the FAQ, that specifically said that it could provide no information on sites awaiting review.