Would you keep Paid Directory Submissions a part of your SEO Strategy?
-
We've been debating this. We've had some budget allocated to quality paid directory listings. We read that SEOMOZ analyzed some 2685 directories, 20% of which were banned from Google.
So our question is, should we keep paid directory submissions with keyword rich anchor texts as a part of your SEO strategy or should we drop it.
Thanks!
-
Depends. Typically not, but depending on what you are doing you may have to rely on some of these to meet mkt objectives.
Here is an example, for industrial b2b, ThomasNet, Globalspec & MacRae's are paid directories that are typically used because of the amount of prospects using them. So in a way it is a paid link to your website that Google frowns upon even though a firm may not be using it for that purpose.
In a grand scheme of things, Google is a paid directory via adwords.
-
I suppose it all depends on what you mean by 'directory'. If you just mean paid inclusion - i.e. there's no value in being on that site, or even no listing on that site if you don't pay, then No, because essentially it's a paid link (which is generally bad).
If that directory is offering you some other paid service on top of a good free listing on a quality directory, then you have to assess that website in terms of its return for you. Do a few minutes research to determine if being listed on that site is likely to be good for your business, except for another 'keyword rich anchor text'...
You need to assess each site on its own merits, but we don't use paid directories - in our eyes you'd be better investing that time and money in producing some great content and then getting that out over social media. There are usually much better investments for your business finances than a paid directory - especially if there's the risk that a website you've paid to be listed on falls out of the Google index and therefore is giving you precisely nil value.
Remember link building should be a natural thing, so get a variety of websites, a variety of link texts and as is preached here at SEOmoz, get good quality editorial links where you can too.
Hope this helps a little.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Making a custom web directory
I am wondering if it is beneficial to launch a social bookmarking website based on Semantic Scuttle [http://semanticscuttle.sourceforge.net/demo] in order to gain inbound links. For the sake of example, say my industry is ebooks. I would of course add links to all of my products to the site. In addition, I would want to add links to competitors products to the site to make the site actually useful and not look like spam. On the face of it, is this a good idea? Secondly, I of course wouldn't want to be helping out competitors, so would any of these actions be advisable? add nofollow links to all links except those pointing to my site. ads or featured listings pointing to my links. I make it so only voted on links are dofollow. Thus, competitors could actually get links from my site. Naturally, I would vote on all my submissions. The idea of the site would actually be to provide a meaningful service. Once it's done I would want to get people linking to it. Any advice? Thanks! Edit: I added scenario #3 which I think is probably the best option, if this is even a good idea. I would also make some static content to really make this a good resource!
Link Building | | Jbeaty0 -
Paid Link Backs?
I know I have read that Google doesn't give much value to paid link backs. My company has worked with a charitable organization (marine research and conservation) in the past and we were considering a corporate donation to them. My question is, would there be value in this from an SEO standpoint? There are many many other company links listed on this page. The area we would be listed would be towards the top of the page. Also, they have a really good DA, 71. I don't believe I have many if any .org / charitable organizations in my link profile. Thanks!
Link Building | | CalicoKitty20001 -
SEO advice for Link roundup
I publish a link roundup on my company blog on weekdays.
Link Building | | maribha
Example: http://www.shack.co.in/blog/argolinkroundups/daily-trail-game-jams-future-of-mapping-and-chomsky-on-education/ I do this using a Wordpress plugin created by Project Argo for NPR news websites. Right now, these link roundup pages have a very low authority score. Could you suggest a checklist of things to keep in mind while doing SEO for link roundups? Thanks, Abhiram0 -
Seo & Real Estate Site?
I am a Realtor. I am also a web developer. I want to make a site about real estate and web development. Primarily how I use my unique skills with web to sell homes. A real estate website caps it's Page Rank very low. There are not a lot of good backlinks to get when compared to the web development industry. There are millions of blogs I participate in about web development/seo. There are a lot of blogs I participate in about real estate too; however, the real estate websites all have low page ranks. This is obviously because the seo/web development industries know how to build page rank, which makes it easier to accumulate it. It's difficult finding good outlets to get link power from in real estate. How confused would google be? Is there an acceptable strategy to making this a reality? Please point out all of the variables I am not seeing. Pros and Cons. I'm not an SEO pro. I would be going for the keyword Pensacola Real Estate. I would accumulate backlinks from the real estate industry and the web design industry. Help 🙂
Link Building | | JML11790 -
Best SEO when you have a lot of clients
So I'm in a bit of an interesting situation. I want to do great SEO for all my clients, but I currently manage 18, each demanding 10 - 20 hours per month. Is anyone out there able to manage a ton of clients and keep them all happy? What are the most effective strategies you use? I'm currently focusing almost exclusively on copywriting for all of them, simply because I don't feel like I have time to effectively test different strategies. Anyone have any advice?
Link Building | | nxmassa0 -
Another Yahoo directory question
Hi all Is there any way of seeing if the Yahoo directory is likely to be beneficial for my site? I can see that about 9 of my competitors are in there, and the category that they are listed in has been indexed by google. What other factors could help me choose whether to submit my site? Thanks,
Link Building | | JoeBrewer
Joe0 -
Blackhat SEO firm had more success than whitehat me
I’ve been link building for a small online store. Before I took over their SEO, they hired a company who got them lots of spammy links over a 12 month contract. The spammy links didn't seem to improve or hurt rankings on their main keywords but general search traffic has almost doubled. Now I’m doing whitehat SEO for them and getting links through emailing bloggers and giving them reasons to link to us. Over 2 months (amongst over things) I’ve obtained links from around 35 websites, mostly PR 3 – 4 with a few up to PR 7. On my own website, a couple of links like this would produce a noticeable effect in the rankings, but I can’t seem to budge the ranks for this website. I’m concerned that they might just want to go back to their old SEO firm for more spam links. Am I doing the right thing? Am I getting links quick enough and how can I argue the case for whitehat if they’re getting more noticeable results from blackhat?
Link Building | | davidtube0 -
Using Social Bookmarking for SEO: How
Hi guys, how do you guys really use social bookmarking for seo? in terms of lets say really trying to optimize the domain in general for authority, etc, do you submit blog post to diff social bookmarks, etc? Whats the best strategy you've used?
Link Building | | PaulDylan0