Thread: how effective is directory links?

Does the directory still bring important backlinks ?

It depends, from what I know yes, but depends on the directories list you have.

New directories are created often and usually they contain many categories. My experience was that search engines slowly index the pages of a directory and quite a few pages are not indexed at all. So it easily can be that the backlink to your Web site won't be noticed by Google for months (or even years). There are just a few respected Web directories like DMOZ that are indexed very well. The backlinks from these directories will certainly add a value to your Web site but it's not easy to get your URL included into the directories.

It is a saturated area so it might not be worth registering with a huge number of them. However, there are some free directory listings that are still worth the effort.

They still add some value, but don't expect too much from them. Good ones are DMOZ, yahoo, and several others... but thousands of them wont get you value, as one backlink from one quality and trusted site.

I won't suggest you to spend much time on doing directory submission. Its not sure that directory owner will approve it and though he approved it, it will take a long time to get indexed, meanwhile you can concentrate on other seo activities.

Off course! Importance of link from directory submission can never be denied.

directory listing can still add some good quality backlinks specially on those top directory listings like dmoz and others but its so hard and it takes too long before your site get listed.

You can still increase your ranking with the anchor text used in the title of your submitted link.

confused .. effective.. not effective ... effective .. no effective

Yes it is, it is not giving quick effect but its give good effect.

Submitting website to Dmoz directory will have more weight age,..also directory submission is one of the effective way of creating quality and permanent back links to a website,..Most of the se experts follow directory submission..

It depends on the directory, the PR of the page your link is actually on, and how many links are on the site as a whole. They can be incredibly effective, but can also do little to nothing.

Depends.... paid directories are much more effective than the free ones.
Many, if not, free directories are not worth it.... some of them are even nofollow. Many take months to be indexed and certain categories are never indexed.

I personally don't bother with web directories, they're spammed like hell, and search engines no longer put much weight on them. It used to be worth getting listed on dmoz, but there's so much politics related to dmoz [competitors managing categories] so they never approve your listings.

The only directory that's worth anything is yahoo, other than that none of them are worth anything.

Originally Posted by WebKarim

I personally don't bother with web directories, they're spammed like hell, and search engines no longer put much weight on them.

That is not totally true, there are still many quality paid directories around that can give your site good benefit for SERPs.

Any link is a good link so I think directory is still good. It just how the owner of the directory run it. Say for instant link won't get index because the owner won't sent a site map to google. Basically if a directory owner sent a complete site map to google all link will be index. Best is to get link from a directory with 20 link per page or less because you don't want to be link from a link farm. Also low pr directory won't give you much score and some of them might just go death after couple month but remember sometimes a site could go from pr 0 to pr 5 in 3 months so its all depend on your luck and how the much effort the directory owner put in their site.

It takes time getting the link approved form a high pr dir. Then it is effective

Originally Posted by menj

there are still many quality paid directories around that can give your site good benefit for SERPs.

Agreed $9.95 per submission..

I don't think a good idea..

Yes of course directory submission is one of the best method of creating backlinks....

Directories havent' worked for me... at least not yet.

Its depend in directories if you want to use directories just choose do follow directories it can be help in your site.

Originally Posted by mikehussey

Does the directory still bring important backlinks ?

yes, dir more effective for backlink

If you use quality directory than sure it will effective, thanks for discussion.

Originally Posted by menj

They are very effective and if you submit to quality paid directories (link removed) especially, they will help improve your site's rankings in SERPs.

How come you call your directory "quality", when it has PR1 and Alexa 3 million? You expect us to pay for that?

We tried directory links, not worked as they should have.
Well at-least nothing so far.

Submissions in Yahoo Directory and DMoZ is an essential part of a SEO campaign.Niche directories and deep link directories provide authority backlinks if done carefully under the right category.I think the paid ones will get better result.

Originally Posted by marknel

Submissions in Yahoo Directory...

Is there a free version of this service?

Originally Posted by mikehussey

Does the directory still bring important backlinks ?

They won't bring you too much traffic, but they are useful for backlinks and SERP

I think that the best directories that provide the most value out of directories are DMOZ, Best of the Web, and Yahoo. Other than that I think they are still good for getting a backlink from a different domain (expanding a link portfolio) so I still do it but sometimes the work may not be worth the link value.

It depends on the page rank of the directory