Where have all the loyal directory owners gone?

I am seeing this forum since days and the Directories section has changed a lot. People started posting in deep buried threads and nothing very useful and good related to directories is coming out here.

Instead people have started announcing their directories in the main section rather than Solicitations and Announcements forum.
I am missing that craze that used to be here. The reason behind this is the forum or the effect of Google's paid link smack on directories has made people lose interest on directories?

I want the same activity as before, so people who were active here earlier, please keep posting here and lets make the directory world stronger again.

 

it is very unlikely that this place will get to its former glory, however those still around can give it a try. good to see you dr. chetan and its good to know that atleast someone wants to put up and effort to make this place active again.
cheers,
uttoransen,

 

As many of us are seeing that scammers are just raiding the entire forum and hitting up everyone, i atleast don't want the directories section to go down.
No one can change anything that is happening in Buy/Sell/Trade but in Directories forum, yes we can put our effort to make it better

 

without Mod 's help, basically we can do nothing. Maybe you can apply to be a Mod.

 

it is not impossible, if we work like the old days, and give -reps to those that post on the wrong section... keep reporting wrong threads, do not post on misplaces threads... then this place can be cleaned up

 

Mods are the ones who are always blamed for most of the things on DP. If they do something good for someone, the other person blames the mod. Staying as a Mod here is not so easy, and so is applying to be a mod

Btw as uttoransen said, lets start reporting threads in directories section which don't deserve to be here. And also -ve rep the members deserving. It can help making the forum cleaner.

 

The old days are gone most people are not bothering with their directories if they have kept them, usually people just come back to have a moan.

In general the whole forum is a lot different now, id say 70% activity comes from asian webmasters.

Nobody knocks out mods anymore for scripts, nothing new is happening, there is a lot of directory networks springing up, real poor quality too, endless .info directories.

Let go of how it was, its gone.

 

I still feel bad to see when a few good directory owners promote their directory well, add pure content and maintain the directory to finally see it penalized in google, but when some crappy owners build huge networks of .info directories interlinking to each other, every directory gets PR in the next update. They then sell the network..
These kind of things have made people wonder whether there is still any importance of directories, or are they just the past.

 

I agree with you generally, but I didn't get that

 

It appeared that in the past that many webmasters here running directories were from the UK, USA, Canada, parts of Europe, i generally dont see that much of people from those countries and regions mentioned above either here nor throughout the forum in general.

It appears mostly asian, ive seen many webmasters complain about poor english used, on top of many other things, plus its possible that many of these new webmasters haven't got a clue whats happend over the last few years so blindly setup sites that they are completely misunderstanding.

There seems to be a niavety, it shows in the posts, things like "what pr does my directory need to start making money"

You will find many webmasters dont want to share forums with posts like that, they see themselves as above it.

For example the missing webmasters are generally not missing from the directory section, they are missing from the forum completely.

In a nutshell they dont like using the forum now, or cant make money from it now, or cant make what worked in the past work now.

 

we can't help the rest of the forums, but we can surely work and improve the directory section. here's a few steps that we can do to improve this section:

1) Invite the old directory owners and ask them to post success stories of their quality directories, tips to improve web directories etc...

2) -rep those that says directories are waste. actually directories are still good, however if the directory do not have any authority then it won't pass any. If a directory is well maintained and promoted, then it is a good source of backlink, for example yahoo directory that has the authority.

3) Spread the word that directories are good, and important for seo.

4) Start submitting your directories in other paid directories, and suggest others to do it too. A paid directory is better than the free ones, its not a paid link but a quality review.

Lets bring back the old days, even if the directories don't get the submissions, atleast we can get the community thing going

 

Number 4 on your list is a lot of what brought things to where they are today. Several very clever people made a great deal of money buying links on new, cheaper directories and getting those new directory owners to buy their much higher-priced links. At the time, no one was talking about "reviews" and everyone was talking about PR. Google didn't like it and started the big smack-down.

I think many directory owners are now a bit gun-shy to discuss much here anymore, or anywhere publicly for that matter, for fear of attracting attention to their site and perhaps getting penalized. The ones with quality sites, who shared information with newbies have simply gotten tired of the lack of interest by DP in maintaining order here and the inane, repetitive posts about directories being evil.

I don't see myself as being above sharing here but I am simply tired of the folks who are too busy to read the stickies and search the forums yet expect others to take the time to answer their questions.

There is a certain bit of irony to all of this. I think in some ways G did the right thing. Unfortunately, it seems like it only brought out more of the get rich quick folks flipping dropped domain directories and has driven the many of the folks who knew what they were doing from the marketplace.

As to posting in the ancient threads, I've seen quite a few discussions on doing that for SEO purposes. Some old threads have achieved some nice PR and they think posting in those threads is a great way to get juicy links. The related posts list at the bottom of most pages is also another way many of these old threads get revived. On at least one occasion I ended up reviving a long-dead thread because I failed to look at the date. (I had assumed if it was being presented as a related thread that it would at least be somewhat current.) As I'm writing this, the most recent related thread I'm seeing is from Oct. 2008.

I guess too, the old threads are the only place where the solid and useful discussions can be found anymore.

 

I know and i agree. it was over done.

but you tell me, was all that really bad? old directory owners always suggested to build quality directories, and when the quality was visible [Pr for example or unique templates or content] the rest of the directory community used to submit their directories in it, then other webmasters followed.

That was the time when quality was preferred, it was not just links, but content too. remember how directory owners used to add sites by themselves, hard work was very much there.

Now, things have changed. you build a quality directory, still you get very few submissions. but if you build a network of 200+ directories then each of those will get a little and you will earn something out of it....

Google tried to clean it up, and made it more untidy but if we have to get the directory industry back to where it was, we have to again do what we did last time. but with a little caution and only submit your sites where you see quality.

 

Well I had a go at doing just that, I was diligently reporting and red-repping for months and so was everyquery. For a while it improved then the moderation stopped, I made a post here complaining and someone piped up and reported it - so guess what my post got removed and the ones I complained about were left.

Without the help of a focused mod to act on the reports this section will not improve.

 

You probably didn't mean it, but that came off as offensive. I really don't see how a person's continent really impacts their ability to create a quality directory.

The problem has nothing to do with the country or continent these directory creators are from, but more to do with the fact that so many people think it's easy money to create a directory and sell a few links on it when it has PR. The naivety you talk about happens with all industries, just take a look at how many myspace graphic sites there are.

Everything thinks there is room for one more, and the people that join in after the craze almost always are of poor quality with things quickly slapped together. I see it as equally with Europeans as I do with Asians and North Americans for that matter.

 

Exactly, i can see it reading as offensive, but its not mean that way.

Theres comments in threads of people complaining about the increase in poor english on the forum.

Still i dont understand why people crave old members to return, people are bound to just move on, as i say, the forum seems a hell of a lot different now, probably every section of dp has changed, it shows in the lack of new posts daily, you often see the first page with quite a few threads that are a few days old.

Web directory customers (paying ones) are not on forums anyway, they will find us which ever way they do, from the search engines, lists or somewhere else.

And web directory owners are better off not all sharing the same mods, tips and all that used to be shared anyway.

And to round off, the reason people dont want to come here talking bout their directories is because people believe thats how they got penalised in the first place.

Some of the directories are abandoned now anyway.

Also in the past web directory owners were probably a bit too trusting of each other, its been one of the few types of businesses online where competing directories still shared so much info with each other.

It was kinda nice and friendly in a way but a bit daft too, business wise.

 

Chetan I'll frankly suggest get on with better work to do like all old guy's have. Things aren't the same and will never be.

 

Since this section has been less active since after 2007 and now ever more post in this sections are left and un-moderated, gives me the impression that a "post is a post" to keep it going, to keep things "active" even though there are a lot of "List of List" and "submit to my..." and "please tell me where to find great PR dirs"

Not much a member to do other than giving that person a red rep, but without moderators they just keep coming back with a new post.

So yes it needs to be moderated and action when needed, but then again if that happens, then this forum would be less active, less activity = less visitors = less revenue = becomes just another worthless directory forum.

With DP letting it happen, people will complain and will create post = ACTIVITY and it shows concerns among members = loyalty. loyalty + loyalty=revenue

When a mod comes and post and says "please keep reporting it to us" But do they not see the misplace posting?

 

Good post there

I tend to think that the lower vloume of posting by the older members stems from a couple reasons.

First
They have better things to do. DP is not the center of the universe for directories. I watch where my conversions come from and I can't honestly attribute much business directly to dp.

Second
Frankly there are more dangers to being active here than benefits to posting. Let one member take offense to something posted - like for example post number 7 and you may have 10 people making something up to report one of your sites to google.

Not to mention a jealous competing directory owner doing the same thing. I suspect this goes on also.

Third
The redundancy of posts. People feel the need to post the same thing over and over rather than use the search function. Just how many times does it need to be asked if Yahoo directory is worth it? Not to mention all the times the same people feel the need to answer those repetitive posts rather than just let them die. Just red rep them and let the post die people. Maybe they will quit asking.

I could go on but why?

There are still some good things about this section in DP also, so don't think I am all negative about it. I take a few minutes a day to see if there is anything worth reading here. I post occassionally when there is something new and worth posting on.

The thing is that DP can drain the time right out of your day sometimes and really decrease ones productivity unless you limit your time here.

 

Basically my feeling about this section of the forum and can say i agree on most points you mentioned

This section has lost much flavor from the days of yesteryear and we have other obligations
and our business doesnt really come from here so.. See Yaz!

thx
M1