Directories have been good sources of one-way links for a long time. It is a one of the easiest link building method especially for newer sites. But quality is still the name of the game. Some pointers in selecting the directories to submit to:

 

High PR - indication that Google sees some value in the directory.

Well maintained - listed sites are in the proper category

High Traffic - getting traffic could be minimal from directories, but majority are targeted

Kewords ranking high in SERP - Well optimized, shows that the directory is well-marketed and SEO'ed.

 

Which to avoid:

Link farms that pose as directories

Directories that require reciprocal links

Crappy ones with crappy sites listed

 

What are your thoughts? Care to add more pointers?

Yep, never pay to be sumitted to a directory. Ever.

Yep, never pay to be sumitted to a directory. Ever.

That's interesting. Never? Would you mind explaing a bit more about why you shouldn't? I've never paid for a listing but I've never discarded the idea either - would be good to have a bit more insight.

 

Cheers,

Gregir

Because Google penalises paid directories

Because Google penalises paid directories

 

yup yup yup, a waste of money as not only have do they penalising paid directories but also those who use them too, so really you are paying for penalties rather than ranks

Ah, well. Learn something new every day!

Cheers,

Gregor

very informative...thanks for sharing it

Paid directories that manipulate PR and SERP rankings are the ones that are being penalized. Still there are some good and quality paid and free directories that are unscarred The thing is to choose properly where you submit your site to.

 

Another thing - generally, any backlink from any site doesn't hurt you. Time is the only thing wasted building a non-helpful link in terms of SEO

I would also say, if you are going to submit your site to a directory, make sure you do it manually.

 

In other words don't bother with software that is supposed to submit automatically.

 

It may be time consuming but if you submit to the right sites, then it will pay off.

Because Google penalises paid directories

 

Hell of a statement. Links in Yahoo USA and GoGuides.org are getting punished?

 

Here's some advice from Matt Cutts - http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/how-to-report-paid-links/

Q: Hey, as long as we’re talking about directories, can you talk about the role of directories, some of whom charge for a reviewer to evaluate them?

A: I’ll try to give a few rules of thumb to think about when looking at a directory. When considering submitting to a directory, I’d ask questions like:

- Does the directory reject urls? If every url passes a review, the directory gets closer to just a list of links or a free-for-all link site.

- What is the quality of urls in the directory? Suppose a site rejects 25% of submissions, but the urls that are accepted/listed are still quite low-quality or spammy. That doesn’t speak well to the quality of the directory.

- If there is a fee, what’s the purpose of the fee? For a high-quality directory, the fee is primarily for the time/effort for someone to do a genuine evaluation of a url or site.

 

Those are a few factors I’d consider. If you put on your user hat and ask “Does this seem like a high-quality directory to me?” you can usually get a pretty good sense as well, or ask a few friends for their take on a particular directory.

 

Having said that, I have never received any decent traffic from a directory. I only do it for the linkage rather than the traffic, so if you can afford X amount just for a link and the directory is decent then go for it.

what's your experience in SEO fruit & veg?