What do you look for in a directory?

Hello Everyone!

I have a number of questions for you all that I think will create a great thread for a number of discussions... First, let me give you some basic background information...

We started a web directory in 2008 called Project WORD. The concept of the directory was based around linking keywords to your business that would then go on to build our search facility. For example, you would choose the word "Website Design" and link this to your business, you would then come up in the search results when people searched for that phrase in our directory.

Upon launching we received a huge amount of press, including national coverage. The directory grew from strength to strength.

We have recently launched a new version of our directory and we are heavily promoting it at the moment but we feel the original driving force for people signing up to directories may have changed over the years.

What we want to know is "What do you look for in a directory?"

Our directory has Free and Paid options and doesn't contain any adverts. Our goal is to collect current, up to date, quality data about businesses that want to make an effort to rank high in our directory. To help us do this we would really appreciate

a) your thoughts on our new release?

and

b) what do you look for in a directory when signing up?

Do you sign up purely for SEO? What makes you choose a particular directory if SEO is your driving force? Do you sign up to paid directories, if so, what made you choose to pay? Are you likely to share a good directory with your friends using the tools it makes available? Do you consider design and functionality?

We have lots of questions for you about what your driving force is, we genuinely want to know so we can develop a high quality directory that is more and more useful to our customer base and we feel it would be a great discussion point here on Digital Point.

Link is at www.projectword.co.uk

I look forward to hearing from you

Kind Regards

Jamie
Project WORD Business Directory

 

The website is probably hosted on a dedicated/high processor server because of that It opens up less than a second which is search engine and user friendly.

When i decide to list in a directory I consider the following:
- directory is a seo friendly and very fast browsing
- top level sub-category got minimum pr1
- good editorial control
- accept quality websites (both free and paid)

 

I pretty much agree with what Pradip200 listed. I would even put the last two first with my list. I think only having quality sites within the directory is important.

 

This should be a thread on Solicitation/Announcement section of DP

 

I guess, when I want to use a directory, my first question would be is it a busy directory? Will it give me traffic? I would probably ask the same questions about any other site or service. If it benefits me - I will use it, if not, I don't care how great it looks or how easy it is to navigate - I will probably skip it.

 

Thank you for your comments. It is interesting about the high quality content, I know it is a big factor which is why we have a manual review process. We just need to build more and more high quality businesses on the directory.

I think the PR is 2 or 3 on category pages so that is good.

All URL's and profile have been optimised and also the code has been optimised so I think search engine friendly is covered but always improving it.

Busy directory to bring benefits, it is busy but I think any website can always be busier so we are working on that too.

Thanks a lot for your comments, it will be a great help, very interesting points.

 

nice thing to see in a directory.....but i mostly see in a directory that is user friendly and have all categories and sub categories and also it give approve links...

 

There are two target audiences for web directories: webmasters and users. While I will concede that not nearly as many people use web directories for their originally intended purpose as once was the case, I believe that if a web directory is put together with the intention of serving its users, the end result will be that it will better serve the webmasters whose sites are listed there as well, because I believe that what Google and the other search engines are looking for in a web directory is it serve a purpose other than providing paid backlinks to webmasters.

Whether or not a web directory proves to be well-trafficked, I think that it should be well designed and reasonably attractive, its category structure should be intuitive, listed sites should be in appropriate categories and subcategories, and they should be described in such a way that a user would have a good idea what to expect from the site before clicking on it.

I also believe that the use of sentence fragments and skimpy descriptions, devoid of keywords, which has become an industry standard, does a disservice to directory users, the webmasters whose sites are listed there, and to the directory itself, since well-written, grammatically-correct, unique, and informative descriptions not only inform the users but they serve as content that will be spidered by the search engines as well.

The same is true of category descriptions. I left a directory that I was working for, in part because I was criticized for using category and site descriptions that were too long, although they were obviously within the allowable character limits set by the directory. Ironically, I was being paid by edit, so these longer, more informative, descriptions were essentially on my time, not theirs. For awhile, I conformed to the skimpy, uninformative descriptions they wanted but I didn't enjoy working that way.

Directories have added article directory features as a means of gathering the content required by the search engines, yet in time (actually, already), you will find that these articles will have been submitted to dozens or hundreds of other directories and will be viewed as duplicate content by the search engines.

Why not use category and site descriptions as content?

 

Thanks for all of the information. You sound like your switched on in terms of the directory world!

Who did you work for? Would you consider assisting with promotion and improvements on our directory? We are not mega rich at the moment but we could sort some kind of pay structure out if you are looking for some part time work?

 

I am currently working for one directory (other than my own). Both that one, and another that I worked for for several years, have asked their staff not to tell anyone that they work there, probably afraid that someone might take money to admin-list sites through the backdoor, which might be a reasonable concern.

As a volunteer, I was a meta editor for the ODP for more than a decade, coming in during the time that it was changing from Gnu-Hoo to New-Hoo, then on for years after Netscape accumulated it, and AOL bought Netscape. I was also a Go Guide before Go.com shut its directory down, and a Zealot for the Zeal directory. I am currently a volunteer for another directory but haven't really had time to do much with it.

I appreciate the offer, and will keep it in mind, but I'm stretched pretty thin right now. Some of it may be short-termed so, if you think of it, get back to me in a month or two.