Say you want to build links to your site www.example.com From your experience which is more effective- post article (with link back to www.example.com) in free blog (like blogspot, wordpress) or post article (with link back to www.example.com) in article directory?
Ezine articles has way more authority/suitability than any new blog whether its your own or hosted with blogger/wordpress. I am not sure about other article directories because I never really researched them.
Article directory is a better idea because of the bigger authority. In the long run you can develop a blog too and make it rank quite well.
There are only about ten article directories worth having your article in. I consider greater value in blogs.