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Submitting your Web Site to Free Directories
By Adrian Kennelly
Submitting your website to the various online directories is an
important part of any Link Popularity campaign. Whilst your traffic
from many directories may be minor or irrelevant, relevant incoming
links to your website will help in your overall search engine link
popularity. Other than Yahoo!, which is quite frankly beyond the
reach of many smaller websites, paying for your directory submission
can be a waste of money.
You can get just as good a resultfrom submitting to free directories,
or those that are free with a reciprocal link. If the directory
is exceptionally good, the cost is low, and your directory ranking
will be improved by paying a fee, do so if you wish. Personally,
I wouldn't recommend you pay for what you can get free elsewhere.
To start with on your submission campaign, in my opinion it is
better to submit to those directories that will allow you to easily
modify your listing. That way, you can correct mistakes and get
your campaign down pat before submitting to directories that don't
allow you to logon and modify your submission, thus saving yourself
from wasting or reducing in value your efforts in those directories.
What Directories to Submit To The best are Search Engine Friendly
directories (those that actually have your site URL listed at some
point, rather than outlinks that are simply code).
Some will ask for a reciprocal link, some will not. One list of
non-reciprocal directories is at http://info.vilesilencer.com/main.php?rock=seo-friendly.php.
Opinion at the moment is suggesting that non-reciprocal or one-way
links are better, although any relevant link is useful. Directories
that encode their links are mostly useful for traffic if their Alexa
Ranking is high enough. Directories that do not encode outgoing
links will help your website's Search Engine Ranking.
Deep Linking : It can be worth linking to other pages on
your site other than your main page. Before doing this, make sure
that the directory you are submitting to permits you to both submit
URLs other than your home page (some only allow top level submission),
and for the same site to be submitted to different categories (not
all directories permit what are essentially multiple submissions
of the same website). This will work especially if you have online
tools or directories (such as your links page) on your site that
are useful and relevant to add to other directory categories.
Choose the Relevant Directory Category Most directories will have
many categories you can submit your site to. Decide on the one that
is most relevant, preferably a keyword that you are aiming for high
search engine ranking in, and try to submit to the same or similar
category in every directory, at least for your main page (also see
Deep Linking above). This will increase the ranking of your site
relating to the keyword chosen. Submit to Different Categories If
the directory allows multiple submissions, and your website is relevant
in several categories, submit to all the relevant categories you
can. This will increase the number of incoming links to your website.
Again, carefully check the terms of any directory before trying
this to make sure it is permitted. Write Title Write the title for
your website. Try to include a keyword you are aiming for ranking
in in the title, but make the use of it appropriate, don't just
bang a keyword in for the sake of it; you could get your site submission
rejected. Write Description Describe your website in a way that
will attract visitors. The length of your description will vary
from directory to directory, but most will be under 250 characters.
Some will allow up to 1,000 characters, and in those cases write
the most comprehensive description of your site and its features
that you can.
It is a good idea to write several descriptions of different lengths,
say from under 50 characters for a brief overview, to around 150
characters for a fuller description, up to 250 characters for a
yet more comprehensive listing, and finally a full description as
previously mentioned for over 250 characters. Keep your listing
pertinent to your website, insert keywords where relevant and appropriate,
but do not just submit a keyword listing, as most directories will
reject your submission. Save all your descriptions in a text file,
and just copy & paste into the descriptions boxes when needed
rather than typing the same descriptions out again and again.
Choose Keywords Again, as with the description mentioned above,
the amount of keywords you can use will vary from directory to directory.
Some will not give the option, some will allow you numbers of keywords,
whilst others go by numbers of characters. Make a list of all relevant
keywords for your site, from most important to least, and basically
keep adding keywords until either you get to the bottom of your
list (unlikely unless your list is really short) or you run out
allowed characters/keywords.
Check what keywords your competitors are going for if you need
inspiration. This can often be done by viewing the source of a web
page and checking the META tags. Again, save your keywords to a
text file. Keep Track of Your Progress Keep a careful record of
what directories you have submitted to, and your progress. It is
far too easy to totally lose track of what you are doing, which
does not help your linking campaign at all. The best way is by using
a spreadsheet, such as Excel, to keep track of your campaign.
At a minimum, you need to keep track of the following: Directory
URL, Directory Name, Date Submitted, User Login & Password for
those directories that allow you to alter your details and Response
(accepted/declined). Other categories can include: Directory Alexa
Ranking, Directory Page Rank (this will be for the home page only),
Referral URL (if the directory will improve your ranking for referring
visitors) and any Notes.
If you are using the deep linking and multiple submissions strategies
above, also keep track of what other pages you have submitted to
each directory. Make a seperate entry for each URL submitted.
For example, your spreadsheet columns could go as follows:
Directory Name, Directory URL, URL Submitted, Referral URL, Login,
Password, Alexa Ranking, Page Rank, Date Submitted, Response. I
would advise keeping the list in alphabetical order, rather than
order submitted, as that way you can check more easily whether or
not you have submitted to a particular directory.
Adrian Kennelly is the webmaster of http://www.directorygold.com,
DirectoryGold Web Directory & Portal
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