Determining The Worth Of Modern Internet Directories
Web directories are used today to gain recognition and traffic from others. From free to paid listings, there is certain criteria that you should consider before submitting your own website. Otherwise you may be wasting time, money, or even hurting your own website’s popularity.
Constant contact between you and a directory owner isn’t necessary, but it’s nice to be able to talk to the owner in case you should ever have a problem with the service. Try emailing or otherwise contacting the website owner and see how long it takes to respond. If it’s more than a few days, you can probably expect future contact to be unreliable at best. Directories with listed phone numbers usually have great contact skills.
Webmasters stick with what they know and like best. Check the traffic rank of a directory to see how it stacks up to others. Metrics can be seen for free with services such as Alexa ranking, where you can get a broad idea of how many visits a website has received over the course of their business life.
You can’t go wrong with hearing what others have to say about an Internet directory in particular. The only bad part of reading reviews online is that you can’t always trust the reviewer. Sometimes reviewers are either paid to write a good review, or are including an affiliate link to make money from those who decide to try the services of the directory. Generally, honest reviewers are well known, although finding them can be tough if you aren’t familiar with them.
Take a look at those who have already either bought listings, or submitted their website for a free listing. Ask yourself if the websites appear to be of quality in par of your own website. If you see listings of websites that appear as spam, you should think twice before applying for a listing. Ideally you should never be associated with a website that is spam, as it would lower your own reputation to other professionals and Internet users.
Being specific is dire when submitting your website to a category in the directory. Your initial reaction may be to submit to a category that is rather general, since there will be more traffic in those categories. This couldn’t be a worse idea, since you are actually going to face more competition and receive less interest from targeted visitors. Instead you should submit your website to a category that is as specific as possible.
Final Thoughts
After you have gained a good amount of experience in the subject of web directories, do the right thing and perhaps make a few accounts of your experience and share it with others. That way those who are in the position you were in will have an easier time getting started with Internet directories.