Posted by on October 16th, 2009 View Comments
Posted in Web Directories |
By now, you’d have heard of the importance of keyword density and metadata in improving search engine rankings, and indeed, these have proven to be useful SEO strategies. However, most SEO experts agree that a link building campaign remains of equal or greater importance than others. The end goal for any link building campaign is to establish link popularity. The more “quality” links that point to your site, the more worthy and relevant it is in the sight of search engines, ergo, the better the rank it earns. The term “quality” must be emphasized since search engines like Google are very particular about this.
If you want to boost search engine rankings, focus on how to acquire quality links using link building techniques. There is no one best method to launch a successful link building campaign. There are several ways, in fact. When you are after link popularity, using different but reliable means of getting links should always be welcome. This is why leveraging the power of web directories to elevate your link popularity and catapult your site to the top of SERP hierarchy deserves serious attention.
What is a web directory? A web directory is oftentimes mistaken for a search engine but a distinction has to be drawn. A web directory acts like a catalog on the World Wide Web that lists sites according to category and subcategory. These directories are considered human edited resources because sites are subjected to a manual review process before their listing gets approved. Any website owner can submit their URL to a web directory – some for free and some for a fee. Since we are talking about getting free links to improve link popularity, we focus on submission to free directories available on the Web.
How does directory submission contribute to link popularity? Judging by the single link and search capability of a web directory, a site owner acquires a vast number of potential link partners begging to be added. With the use of appropriate strategies, web directories can improve link popularity to a great degree. In order to get a clear picture of how free quality directories boost link popularity, it is important to understand how search engines work. Basically, search engines aid users in locating relevant information based on keywords typed in the search.
Search engines then evaluate the relevance of your page based on a number of factors, including:
Several benefits can be reaped by submitting your URL to a free web directory:
Where and how do I submit my URL? The most popular choice is the DMOZ directory, which is a free listing online directory. DMOZ has been operating for many years and catalogs more than four million categorized Web sites. It is maintained by a large number of editors that add new URLs of approved sites to for categorization under relevant topics or areas. However, there are alternative free online directories out there that can help your link building campaign. Identify those directories first. Once you come up with a list of free web directories and before you submit your URL to them, go to each site and review their guidelines for submission to the letter.
Generally, experts put a red flag on directory submission services since it gives you no control over how the submission is handled, if at all. It could also turn you into a potential spammer, which will eventually get you blacklisted, and hurt your site’s link popularity. Google and other search engines are known to penalize associations to so-called “bad neighborhoods,” or sites that abuse SEO techniques and search engine algorithms.
