Webmaster Pro Guide

Archive for the ‘directories’ Category

I have decided to publish my long awaited
top 20 web directories list based on various criteria like

* Age
* Page Rank (PR)
* Site Quality & Design
* SEO friendly pages
* Google Backlinks
* Google Indexed Pages

The following web directories are rated as top 20 directories without any bias or any self-promotion. The list contain the best directories on the net . with respectable reputation and ll are seo freindly ..

1. Yahoo Directory (Paid) - http://www.dir.yahoo.com

2. DMOZ Open Directory Project (free) - http://www.dmoz.org

3. Business.com (Paid) - http://www.business.com

4. BOTW Best of the Web (Paid) - http://www.botw.org

5. Uncover The Net (Paid) - http://www.uncoverthenet.com

6. JoeAnt (Free/Paid) - http://www.joeant.com

7. Link Centre (paid) - http://www.linkcentre.com

8. Alive Directory (paid) - http://www.alivedirectory.com

9. Aviva Directory (paid) - http://www.avivadirectory.com

10. Webdiro (Free / paid) - http://www.webdiro.com

11. Wow Directory (paid) - http://www.wowdirectory.com

12. SevenSeek  (paid) -http://www.sevenseek.com

13. Starting Point (paid) - http://www.stpt.com

14. Skaffe (paid) - http://www.skaffe.com

15. GoGuides (paid) - http://www.goguides.org

16. Ezilon.com (paid) - http://www.ezilon.com

17. Incrawler (paid) - http://www.incrawler.com

18. LinksJuice (paid) - http://www.linksjuice.com

19. 2Yi.net - http://www.2yi.net

20. Haabaa - http://www.haabaa.com

I hope that this list will help you in your directories submissions .

Article directories have been a great source of back-links and visibility. Am writing this article as am running an article directory myself for the last few years, and I do feel that this section of the web needs lots of improvement. The following tips will not only help the article directories but also it will help the article submitters. 1) Technorati Indexed: Get your directories indexed and claimed at Technorati, that way people submitting their articles will get Technorati votes and authority. 2) Do you accept those articles with links inside the article, this might be a risk, as Google might find this as a paid post and give your article directory a penalty. Even if it’s not your fault as the article if free so no paid links stuff but you still don’t want to get penalty due to poor and in-efficient google’s algo. 3) Is your site properly cashed? Check your last 50, 100 or 200 article, and see if they are even indexed by Google or not. When was the last time Google bot gave your site a visit. This problem is mainly because article directories don’t add unique content, so search engines don’t find anything useful in these sites and stop visiting frequently. So I suggest article directory owners to buy unique and high-quality articles from time to time, so that your sites get properly indexed. 4) Do you accept every article that is submitted? So far I have seen that many submitters use article-spinning software and submit those articles to directories, this is the reason why I say that at least read a few lines from the article before approving it. 5) Research on the keywords for the articles submitted. Then re-write or at least edit the title of the article with a good, low competitive keyword. That way you will have some occasional traffic coming from every article. 6) Get your article directory some quality back links; try social bookmarking if you want free back links. That way your site will gain authority and your over all traffic will increase, as you will be beating your competitors on competitive keywords. 7) Keep adding content yourself, not a bad idea. Just do some research for low competitive and high searched topics and add some small articles by yourself, this way your site will have unique content and your writing ability will develop which will help you in the long run. Promotion is the key. If you have a good site with good content, but it is not promoted then it won’t get traffic. Do social bookmarking, directory submissions; press release submission and distribution, forum signatures; blog posts etc. do it slowly and continuously. If you have a budget for promotions then things will become lot easier, else you will have to do the hard work.

A phpLinkDirectory modification that that allows update the page rank of all links in your link database. You can select as many or as few links you would like to update. You can also reset the tracking to update the links at any later date.

• Updates links with actual current page rank.
• Choose a variable number of links to update at once.
• Reset option to allow updating with latest page rank.
• Update feature available in admin section only.
• Compatible with phpLD V2.00 and phpLD V3.06 (slightly different install process for each).
• And its free too!

Download PR Update MOD (more…)

Directory Submissions are really becoming very popular these days. Packages like submission to 1000 or even 2000 free directories (I don’t know that If so many free directories also exist!) are really hot these days and best thing is that even an Excel Report is provided as a proof of by these submission service providers. Now the topic that we will be discussing today is that how are we going to make the best use of these services in terms of SEO and Link Building.

Here are some of the tips that we need to follow while submitting to Web Directories.

1. Randomize the use of Anchor Text’s : This is absolutely important to randomize the anchor text’s when you submit to directories as If you get 1000 incoming links (in the ideal case, I am sorry but sometimes we have to use that) all pointing to your domain with the same anchor text, then this will definitely make Google raise a Red flag against you. Randomizing anchor text’s and description really become a key for a successful directory submission effort.

2. Writing Quality description about your site : I have seen that many sites that are being submitted to directories for review are without any quality descriptions and by this I really don’t mean that you need to type in a sales letter in directory description box or just hype your product. Use realistic descriptions that will encourage the users to click on your link.

3. Stop submitting to Spam directories : I really don’t see any advantage of submitting to tons of spam directories (directories build on dropped domains, no backlinks & directories made just made to make a quick buck). Submission to these directories will not help in terms of SEO, But will surely make your life more difficult as being associated with SPAM. Submit to a fewer quality paid & free directories which will surely help you a lot with link building.

So the next time you opt for a directory submission service for your site(s), Ask your service provider a sample of the directory list that he will be using for submission & then make an decision based on the above mentioned points.

Submission to quality directory will definitely boost your SEO efforts and also offer a strong back link to your site. Let us try to explore the various selection factors to determine a quality directory. Quality directories can be both free and paid directories. The selection factors displayed apply same to both free and paid directories. I really don’t want to differentiate quality directories on the basis of PR after the recent Google pagerank update.

1. Search Engine Indexation: Before you submit to any site make sure that the directory is well indexed by Google/Yahoo and when the directory was last cached. If the directory was not cached by Google for a long time then there is definitely some problem with the directory. Quality directories are indexed completely and cached on a regular basis by Google.

2. Popularity of the Directory: This is the most important factor as you will be waiting for months to be getting listed in DMOZ or paying some dollars in to get listed in a quality paid directory but what is important is not only the link juice that the directory can offer to your site, but also the traffic that it can send to your site. A highly promoted and established directory can really offer you both traffic and at the same time give you the link juice for your SEO efforts.

3. Unique Category structure: Make sure that the category structure is unique and not from any of the SQL dumps for various available directory scripts. Also the categories should have a deep drilldown so that information is well organized, so that relevant information can be located quickly.

4. Link Attribute : A directory that uses a “rel=nofollow” attribute or places your link with JavaScript re-directs will not be of any SEO advantage and is not counted as a back link by Google. Quality directories will always offer a direct back link to your site.

5. Unique Design (Optional): Content always plays a very important role, but the way the content is presented also makes a difference. Unique directory design shows directory owners commitment and seriousness for his directory.

6. Links in the Category: Check the quality of the links that are present in the category that you are looking to submit your site. If the directory has spam links (low quality links), then there is really no point in submitting to such directory & as it will really not pass any link value. Quality directories do reject lot of links.

This question of How to make a Directory has been posted again and again on various directory forums. So I planned to write a small blog post to getting started on your own directory. Now let us get familiar with the term “directory“. The prime motive of any directory to organize various resources, so that they can be easily found instead of searching on various search engines.

So below are the steps listed to eventually becoming a directory webmaster.

1. Hosting : With so many hosting companies around like HostGator, BlueHost and many others you can easily sign up for a shared hosting account to set up your directory. Once your directory starts getting some huge traffic and becomes popular then you can move your directory on a dedicated server.

2. Selection of Directory Script : This is really most crucial step and with many directory scripts around like PhpLD, Esyndicat, SiteSift and PhpLynx or (PhpLinkBid for bidding directories) you will not be having a tough time deciding the script as per your needs. Again all these scripts also come in with a free version and also paid version. It is quite obvious that there is a better support and more features with the paid version of the script. So It will be really your decision, how you would like to scale your directory. There is always a upgrade from the free version of the script to the paid version.

Tip : I will highly recommend you to start on with PhpLD, not because I am affiliated with them in any way. But It is the most popular directory script and has largest number of mods, templates and a very big support forum.

3. Niche Selection for your directory : Now after that you have decided on the directory script. It is important to decide up on the fact that whether you want to start a general directory, bidding directory or a niche directory. So accordingly you can modify the category structure as per your needs.

4. Installation of the Directory Script : Most of the directory scripts are easy to install, But if you are not good with the installation or find installation difficult. You can get the script installed by paying some one on the Services forums or various directory forums. Please do not use a category dumps available with the scripts to create categories, instead use unique category structures and that will help you rank better on search engines.

5. Templates and Mods for your directory : Directory scripts generally come up with some default templates and you can use them or you can use many of the free templates available online and the same goes with mods for the directories.
Directory mods really enhance the directory functionality.

6. Promotion of your Directory : Congrats and welcome to the world of directories. There is actually no rule as to how you can promote your directory. You will have get quality backlinks for your directories, do lot of link building, social
Please post in your comments, If you feel that I have missed something in the above post.