SEO-Friendly Directories & Link Building
The 3 major search engines - Google, Yahoo and MSN, generally have different criterias in ranking websites, e.g. meta tags, page content, anchor textlinks, etc. However, all 3 of them place a very high importance on one factor - inbound links.
Inbound links from external sites are seen by search engines as "votes" for your website. And if you think about it, it is way easier to optimize your meta tags or spam your page with keywords than getting inbound links, hence, the emphasis on this factor.
The common route to getting inbound links is by:
- buying them (duh!)
- spamming blogs, social bookmark sites and forums
- organic links through good and useful content
- linkbaiting
- link exchanges
- submitting press releases
- submitting to directories
Buying inbound links are generally discouraged because you have no control over whom you are linked from, link variations and frequency of link additions. Spamming blogs and forums are also less effective these days since search engines are smarter. And for commercial sites, organic links, linkbaiting and link exchanges are almost out of the question.
Hence, submitting to directories are one of the simplest ways to get inbound links (I will talk about press releases in a separate article). I have compiled a list of free/paid directories that I often use, and that is based on my consideration for service, SEO-friendliness and budget.
When submitting to these directories, please consider the following:
- try to vary your title and description
- don't submit to many directories at once to avoid being seen as spamming
- if the page you are submitting to has PageRank
- that one day, search engines may discount links from directories altogether
Here are my favourite directory lists:
- Directories by ILQs
- Directories by PageStrength
- The Strongest Links
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