Submitting to Directories, Good Idea or can it hurt your surps?

Quick question from a new webmaster:

I have read mixed information about submitting to directories, on one side I have read submit to every and all that you can find, a link is a link. On the other hand I read, submitting to directories can get you banned because they may be considered a 'link farm" or "bad neighborhood".

What do you all feel or more precisely, what have you and your sites experienced when submitting to directories, is it worth the effort? Does it help your site substantially?

Any tips on what I should look for in a directory (other than the page rank) in order to ensure that my site does not take a hit.

Thank you in advance,

huntingblades

 

Yop, cuz u have to look for the directory, not link farm. Directory is ordered, link farm not

 

I think this directory system is going in the wrong direction, just like FFA link pages.

 

Directories are a great help for sites, especially news ones. Google may do something in the future to minimize their effect, but it is (will) also minimize the effect of reciprocal links, paid links, footer links...

It is unlikely that anyone will be penalized. I am paying more attention to more focussed niche directories.

If and when Google does something, MSN and Yahoo will probably be years behind.

 

Just make sure you submit to a the most relevant category when submitting to a directory, you'll be fine. Like everyone said stay away from FFA directories which list any and all links on the same page.

 

SEO work should use multiple strategies. To depend solely on directory listings would not be a great idea. I'm 100% sure that getting listed in directories does help with SEO and traffic, but certainly don't put all your eggs in one basket.

 

Well backlinks from directories wih relevant categories help more.
Good Luck

 

It is too bad that directories have just become a tool for webmasters. They were not meant to be just for webmasters.

Find a good directory that has potential to attract visitors. Aside from the backlink you get, you will probably be just as happy getting visits from people that found you in the directory.

 

I still use directories for regular searches sometimes; depends on what you're searching for. You find some useful sites that Search Engines can't offer sometimes.

 

Submitting to directories are good because of the backlinks and local/regular searches.

 

Another factor to consider in order to avoid hurting your SERP is the link you submit. Try to use your keywords in the link text (your site title: the stuff between the A tags), but don't load up the description with your keywords. I laugh when boneheads submit a link with a description like "Prom Dress Emporium, buy prom dress, prom dress, prom dresses at great prices, get your prom dresses here, dress for prom" etc. etc. etc. All they are doing is increasing the keyword density in my directory, which can potentially outrank their own prom dress site. If I allowed that for their link title, it would help them, but any link directory that allowed a title like that is really just a link farm.

 

i've gottten great results with directories. Not awesome but truly worth the insertion.

 

I know this is a bit off my origional topic, but I have been submitting to some directories and I am wondering how much traffic they generally send your way.

Mike

 

I started a paid directory ($3 for 3 links) around Nov 1st, 2005. Here are the top 20 referer numbers from my directory and the date the link was added:

43 11/25/2005 20:13
30 11/25/2005 18:27
28 11/25/2005 20:14
24 11/25/2005 20:14
21 11/25/2005 20:16
18 11/25/2005 20:16
16 11/25/2005 20:16
13 11/25/2005 20:15
13 11/26/2005 16:03
12 11/25/2005 20:13
12 11/25/2005 20:13
11 11/25/2005 20:17
11 11/26/2005 23:58
11 1/25/2006 0:00
10 11/25/2005 20:12
10 11/25/2005 20:14
10 11/26/2005 16:06
10 11/28/2005 16:34
9 11/25/2005 20:12
9 11/25/2005 20:13

The number one most clicked link from directory has gotten 43 visitors from my directory since 11/25/05.

Now for a little guesswork. If they have a traffic to sales conversion ratio of 1%, there is a 43% chance they have made 1 sale by being listed in my directory. Additionally, if they have a 3% click through rate on their ads, they have gotten 1.29 clicks per page. Assuming 5 pages per visit on average, that works out to approximately 6.4 clicks.

But like Mark Twain said, there's three types of lies: Lies, damn lies, and statistics. The number 43 does not say who clicked through the link. It could be the webmaster of that site clicking on their link a lot so that they show up on my "Most clicked links" page, thus essentially getting another link to thier site. It could be a competing webmaster in the same category that most likely will not buy nor click on ads (why help your competition?). It could be a accident.

 

I should add: If we assume my directory numbers are average, being listed in 200 directories could have resulted in 8000+ visitors for this top site.

The short answer is submit to every free directory you can find (keeping in mind what I said previously about carefully considering your link text and description). As for paid directories, read my post from this thread: http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?p=446581#post446581 It goes into some details about the economics of running a directory and can be helpful for determining if a paid link directory is worth it.

 

Thanks for the advice and stats.

Mike

 

it's a good idea, but don't rely on it alone. Do something like 30% of incoming links coming from directories, the rest random places. Keep it natural. Make it appear that most sites link to you because they've see yours somewhere and they believe that it's a good one to share with their visitors as well

but niche directories do IMO work better than general ones if you find the right ones to submit your sites to

Mike

 

This is true only in the case of reciprocal required directories.

To explain further. Free Inclusion (unconditional) and pay for inclusion directories provide one-way links to your site. Since you do not link to them you cannot be banned if they are flagged as a bad neighbourhood. The key to always remember here is You cannot control who links to you - therefore you can't be penalised for links you haven't added.

On the contrary, reciprocal required directories require you to supply a link to them, before they will supply a link to you. If they are flagged as a "bad neighbourhood" - then technically you are linking to a "bad neighbourhood" from your own site (which is a link that you are in control of and therefore you can be penalised).

 

I only submit to a few directories and choose those that seem to actually serve a purpose to the user. That way I don't overdo it to the point where if they are marked as FFA or linkfarm it won't hurt.

 

Except that it will never hurt. Even if they get banned from google for being the most horrible-est FFA link farm ever, your link on their site will not hurt you. It won't help you, but it won't hurt either. It will just be a waste of the time you spent submitting your link to that site.

Like silencer points out, you can't control who links to you, so you won't be penalized for that link. On the other hand, if you reciprocate a link to that site, then you ARE penalized for linking to a bad neighbor.

I highly doubt that there is any such thing as "over doing it". Also, how exactly would a person go about ensuring that they only get about 30% of their links from directories? One can certainly over concentrate on one link method, but over do it? Never. The more links to you the merrier, regardless of their source. How many directories link to Yahoo? Figure 30% of their inbound links are from directories? What if all my links only came from directories, do you figure I'd get banned? I may not rank well for any keywords, but the only thing search engine rankings and pagerank have in common is a few letters in the alphabet.

Look at it another way. If external links could hurt your pagerank, it would be simple for me to take your site and submit it to directories until 99% of its inbound links were from directories. Or, I could add your link to dozens of banned russian porn sites. Then you'd be screwed through no fault of your own. Links to your site are never bad. Google, MSN, and Yahoo don't work that way. They may be worthless, but they won't be penalties. Links aren't good or bad. Links to you are either positive or neutral (+ or 0). Links from you are the only ones that carry the possibility of a penalty to you (if you link to a bad neighbor).

The only way external links will harm your site is in your sites search enigine ranking. If you stuff your link description with keywords in they way I described earlier, you are helping that page rank better for your keywords. This is the only way an external link to your site that you have control of will harm you. If you keep your keywords in your anchor text and on your site, an external link will never hurt you in any way.