The major indexes like Yahoo!, Open Directory
Project, About.com, Snap, LookSmart, and
Go.com, are great traffic sources. But it can
be difficult and time consuming to get listed.
This report illustrates exactly how to
properly submit your site for quicker results
and better exposure.
Getting listed with "human reviewed"
directories is very important because several
of the major search engines use indexes like
Open Directory Project to supplement their
search results.
Recent statistics from WebSnapShot.com show
the percentage of searches performed on each
of the top 19 search engines and directories.
Yahoo! is still number one at 25.4% and
Google (the Yahoo! default engine) is at 5%
and climbing fast.
An interesting point is that AOL, AltaVista,
NetScape, and Lycos combined make up 40.5% of
total search queries. These four engines are
powered by Open Directory Project and,
combined, control more traffic than Yahoo!
alone.
Submitting to Human Reviewed Directories
When you submit your site to a directory such
as Yahoo!, Open Directory Project, or even
Infoseek Channels, your site is queued for
review by a site editor. That means a human
being actually visits your site and determines
whether or not it should be included in their
index.
Therefore, it's important to realize that
most of the techniques you use to optimize
pages for spider search engines will not work
for directories.
How Editors Evaluate Your Site
Site editors will visit your site to verify
that the category you selected is appropriate
and that the title and description are
accurate and relevant to the content of your
site. In addition, each directory has its own
criteria for evaluating sites.
Here's a few tips to help you evaluate your
web site before you submit:
You should have your own domain name.
You should have secure ordering (if
applicable).
Your site's name should match your domain name.
Display your company's contact information in
plain view.
Include links to your company's privacy
policy, return policy, guarantee, etc.
Make sure there are no bad links, broken
images, or javascript errors.
Submission Recommendations
Each directory has its own rules and guide-
lines for submitting. Read the submission
instructions carefully to avoid being
rejected or banned.
Look at your submission from the editor's
point of view. Did you choose a category that
is relevant to your site? Is your title and
description relevant to your content? Is the
form filled out completely?
If there is a comments box on the application,
point out the strengths of your site. Find
something unique about your site that will
add value to the directory.
Recommendations for Better Placement
Most category search results are displayed in
alphabetical order. So, you will get better
placement if your company name begins with a
letter close to the beginning of the alphabet.
Keyword search results are displayed in order
of relevance to the keyword. So, it's crucial
to include your single most important keyword
in the title and description.
Following Up
Most directories will give you an estimate of
the time it takes to get listed. If you don't
get in by the estimated time, submit again
and follow up with email or a phone call.
Tell them that you appreciate their time and
realze that things fall through the cracks.
Tell them why you think they will benefit by
including your site in their index. Tell them
that you have submitted a second time and look
forward to their response.
Words of Caution
Only submit the main page of your web site.
Additional pages will be rejected.
Never submit your site over and over. That will
only irritate the editor and you may never get
listed.
Don't submit to a regional directory that is
not relevant to your site.
Don't submit your site until it's 100% ready
for review.
All of the above will easily take you hundreds
and hundreds of hours of pure work.
Do you want to drive mega traffic to your site
by ranking high at all the top 100 major
search engines and directories?
Do you want to save hundreds of painful hours
of pure grinding labor?
If you answered yes to the above questions,
read below.
To your success.
About the Author
J. Alarcon
The SubmitPro can help! It's a semi-automated
directory submitter.It's 100 times faster than
submitting by hand & just as effective.Fill out
one form to submit to top 100 directories. At
http://submitpro.net/index.cgi?idfreemoney you
will see all features & can download free sub-
mission software.