Latest Attack on Directories

It didn't really come as a surprise that after the idiotic and fraudulent post about multitudes of directories being deindexed after Penguin, that the "SEO Pros" would pull more nonsense out of their bag of tricks and try to make money off of misinformation.

Received this early yesterday. Not sure what, if anything we can do as a group. I've removed the name of the directory. While the directory does have things they need to clean up and have been penalized for some time - they do not deserve the attack being meted out by a scavenger...

While as a marketing person, I think it is a predictable next step in what SEO'ers can offer their clients. Sending such a pitch to a directory owner and including the deindexed directory URL wasn't too bright. It's also a shame that any SEO company would have fallen for an unsubstantiated piece of link bait like the article that started this nonsense. They have several blogs on their site and one of them offers some well-written marketing ideas. Too bad they decided to play in the mud.

 

I agree and saw from the start that the whole thing was to generate business for the SEO community. A rather pathetic way to do business picking my pockets to pad there wallets.

 

That is pathetic. This rumor has been spreading too long.

 

First Panda, now Penguin.

Have directory owner noticed a reduction in traffic?



I think its sites that use spam link building tactics that are being hit.

Thanks Brian

 

Mom and pop business submissions (the heart of any good directory) have not changed but some of the link building services and small SEO service submissions are way down. No great loss since they have such high rejection rates. The very large and reputable SEO services are also down a little but that might be the time of year.

 

I host a large number of websites as I use to sell hosted e-book websites, I really haven’t seen any drastic traffic drop on any of the sites.

One of my Directories main keywords rankings has dropped a couple of places but traffic is up.

We have no control over Google, let them get on with it and just carry on regardless.

Don’t Spam, don’t buy links, don’t copy content, don’t cross link and keep, don’t redirect domains and you have a good chance of avoiding any penalty.

Thanks Brian

 

I tried hard to put out this fire that began with Barry Schwartz (it was de-bunked by his own mates), and which was then re-lit by some green "SEO" at SEOMoz.

The fact that they cannot even begin with an authoritative list of directories shows that they really have no idea about the directory industry at all (any list with thousands of directories isn't authoritative because there simply isn't that many --- it means those lists don't vet content, and just contain spammy directory scripts masquerading as directories).

Sadly Barry then showed his true colours by bringing up that old chestnut about being able to "discount" links in Google Webmaster Tools. Which then brings us to the topic of negative SEO and these SEO clowns marketing "link pruning" or "link profile adjusting" as their new magical post-penguin/panda service.

The trick for most people is going to be whether they can see through the smoke 'n' mirrors tactics of these unscrupulous SEO operators.

 

Lets not do these guys any favors they are certainly not doing us any. We are not legally obligated to remove links regardless of any empty threats they send. This battle has been fought in court several times and the person hosting the link won. I was charging them and most never replied after the bill was emailed but now I'm refusing to dismantle my directory for a cheap SEO service stunt. See this blog post for more information.

 

my directories are doing well, traffic increased, but no new submissions last 3 weeks thanks to google

 

I like that email! Really it is something new, they have developed a new technique to screw people. Thanks YMC for your share. I am sure, sooner or later I will get similar message. So, now I am prepare to move them to spam folder

 

Are you guys familiar with Attracta? Is it a legit SEO service or...?

 

Maybe we should be thanking those SEO's trying to profit on all this FUD being spread around and increasing traffic to our directories. My directory has seen an increase from 6,000 in January to 10,000 visitors for June. But then, thats probably mostly due to all those webmasters that fell for the scam and now crying to get their links removed.

 

I made it this far "Reason: Hello, I am a link building & marketing consultant" then classified it as Spam and could not muster myself to read further.

 

phplinkdirectory.com has 10 million links pointing to it, mostly from directories and we have a good pagerank and alexa rank and rankings. I think they are full of it. Now is the time to get back to doing good reviews of websites that are unique and worthwhile. The directories most likely to suffer are the ones that have no editorial policy.

SEO Moz is all about their affiliate program and selling you into their system. They wanted to point out that 20% of directories have penalties. That means 80% are okay. Face it, there are junky directories, just like their are junk article sites (which SEO Moz pushed big time) including junk like this
http://www.seomoz.org/q/anyone-have-experience-with-best-article-spinner-or-any-article-spinner
They too were not exactly on the ball when it comes to promoting junky seo tactics. A little more research would surely show the SEO Moz was partnered or otherwise benefiting from flat out poor SEO offerings on their site.

With a directory, it is really simple. Have an editorial policy and list good sites, and it will help those sites rank on google. You don't need SEO Moz or special tools.

 

I do not think Google is so smart on this. Hope the mess will be cleaned up.

 

I would have a similar backlinking profile to you, based on our industry circles, and like you I'm not receiving anything from Google to tell me that directories are bad. True, that we avoid the cookie cutters and poor directories, and there are a number of these around.

Rand Fishkin was advocating paid link selling via text brokers for months and months after Google officially said buying paid links is bad. So, anyone who listens to SEOMoz as some sort of authority in regards to directories or link building is doing themseles a major dis-service.

SEOMoz like any business, is pushing their own agenda and will market whatever the new fad is, no matter how short-lived that fad is going to be. People need to be aware of that. All businesses in all industries are trying to sell igloos to eskimos. Why else is there advertising and marketing, and why is that such a huge business for companies. THINK people. Sheesh.

People crap on about "creating unique content". Most websites in most industries, cannot just "create unique content". Their websites are such that once they are built their purpose is established. Creating unique content for them, would be coming up with bullsh!t to write about on a blog, that has absolutely no use to their audience, but they "create" this content because they are told to and that it will help them in the search engines. All it is, is guff, rubbish, nonsense content.

A directory is real. It is a human editing, reviewing and listing websites based on a criteria and knowledge about what makes a good website. THAT will always be useful to the web.

Content that is generated to please search engines? Blogs, Forums and Articles... THAT is the stuff that is junk. That's the stuff places like SEOMoz want you involved in, cos it suits them and their business model. Beware!

And any directory not editing and listing good sites, ISN'T a directory. Most directory owners, especially Digitalpoint ones, need to wake up and smell the coffee. They have bad listings and they need to remove them.

 

I agree with your blog and I think its best tool for seo marketing.

 

We need to do something to focus on the "Real" directories. I'd be happy to pitch in on making some sort of awards for best categories or similar.

 

Dan's list is the closest thing and perhaps the only real solution to some sort of quality designation. Use of banners or graphics are too easily gamed. And most of the other DofD lists think that having the biggest list is more important than supporting only quality directories. Of course that assumes the DofD list owners actually understand how to identify a quality directory.

My only other suggestion would to make the free directory software only function for limited amount of time. Once that anniversary date expires, the site owner would have to either pay to upgrade to a real license or abandon their directory. Tie the download to a URL and it would be very hard for them to 'game' the license. That would eliminate many of the directory flippers and other scam artists from the equation completely but still allow people to kick the tires before making an investment.

 

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