rommany Posted April 9, 2005 Posted April 9, 2005 Hello guys, Ive submited my site to about 100 directories for free, but some r charging upto $80.00 to submit to them, 1, why do they charge and the others r free 2,is it worth paying for some ? many thx
Guest Posted April 10, 2005 Posted April 10, 2005 Hello guys,Ive submited my site to about 100 directories for free, but some r charging upto $80.00 to submit to them, 1, why do they charge and the others r free 2,is it worth paying for some ? many thx <{POST_SNAPBACK}> The first question is easy to answer, they charge to make money. I am considering Yahoo`s PR9 directory which isnt cheap so would be interested in the second question too.
Guest Posted April 10, 2005 Posted April 10, 2005 Most free directories do not charge since they are just starting out and want to populate the database with listings. Nobody wants to go to a club if nobody else is there on a Friday night and spiders don't like empty directories either. The content for a store is the product pages but the content for a directory is the listings...until they get content the directory will not pull significant spider traffic and thus is useless to everyone. I like to call free directories that are just starting out "sleepers" since you never know how large they will grow. Most will never accumulate significant strength whereas others will blossom into a powerful directory worthy of paid inclusion. The point is that get in while they are still free and whatever benefit you get will be icing on the cake! Are paid directories worth the price for inclusion? That is an individual call and there is no sure method of making that determination. I hate to use PageRank as a determining factor (although I am guilty) and now use the AdSense sandbox to determine relevancy. I would rather pay $40 for a themed link on a PR2 page than $80 on a non-themed page with a PR5. The benefit of being listed on a themed page is much more valuable than what PR may be passed. Another thing to consider is the features of the directory itself. Are the URLs SEO'd with keywords in the filename? This is important as it helps to establish the page theme! So, is it worth paying for inclusion in a directory? Certain ones will be a great value whereas others you will be paying for the PageRank only. I suggest evaluating the worth of that directory not only in terms of how much PageRank the listing has on the desired category but the features of the directory itself. Another feature that is worth paying attention to is the ability to have more than 1 link per submission. In the past it has been traditional for a directory to give you a single link in exchange for the submission price. However, there are a few that allow you to place more than one link per submission. As an example, you can have the main URL pointing to the domain and 3-4 additional links pointing to separate parts of the site. For an osCommerce site it is best to use at least one of those to point to the all_products page so as to pass additional PageRank and spider traffic to that specific page. This feature alone is worth paying for IMO. Does the directory have SEO URLs? Does the directory give you a dedicated detail page? Does the directory allow more than 1 link per submission? Does the directory have other benefits that set it apart from others? What is the PageRank of the directory? How much human and spider traffic does the directory receive? Bobby
matbennett Posted April 11, 2005 Posted April 11, 2005 Don't also forget to ask yourself the important question: "Will the directory send me traffic directly?". We appear on a few shopping directories that would not warrant submission on the grounds of SEO benefit alone - some even use redirected URLS. As we track the origin of (almost) every sale, I know that some of these directories will send us a handful of sales every week - week in week out. Definitely worth the few $$ a year that they ask. Search engines results are great - but it's all about sales in the end.
theman Posted April 12, 2005 Posted April 12, 2005 We appear on a few shopping directories that would not warrant submission on the grounds of SEO benefit alone - some even use redirected URLS. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> do you mind posting some of these directories?
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