Google No Longer Suggests Directory Submission

[mabel01]

The following bullet points have been removed from Google's Webmaster Guideline

It used to suggest:

* “Have other relevant sites link to yours.”
* “Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory Project and Yahoo!, as well as to other industry-specific expert sites.”

http://www.beussery.com/blog/index.p...ry-submission/

[austin005]

It doesn't mean that Google prevent directories submission. Google always says that no need to submit your site to the directories or search engines because spider search new content to cache the page. Still effective directories submission are welcomed with Google.

[Natural Elements]

Directories are continuously smashed by Google since last year, I guess too much abuse has been done. You can see a lot of directories owners desesperate and increase their reviews rate like skyrocket.

[Rankenstein]

Exactly right, too much abuse. People were setting up directories purely for the ability to rank well, and directory owners were cross-linking and so on - naturally Google got round to stamping on it.

[Natural Elements]

Originally Posted by Rankenstein

Exactly right, too much abuse. People were setting up directories purely for the ability to rank well, and directory owners were cross-linking and so on - naturally Google got round to stamping on it.

There are some other abuses:
Doorway pages or creating multi domains for the linkage purpose
Doorway pages made from paid review sites
Doorway pages made from coupons sites, etc...
Scrapers, spammers using your domains

Anyway, I guess Google has some work to do, because directories are often used by little guys, I wish Google will go after the big guys for change.

Make no mistakes, Google want you to sign up one way or another on their Adwords system, that's their ultimate goal $$$$$$$$.

[kbeus21]

Originally Posted by Natural Elements

There are some other abuses:
Doorway pages or creating multi domains for the linkage purpose
Doorway pages made from paid review sites
Doorway pages made from coupons sites, etc...
Scrapers, spammers using your domains

Anyway, I guess Google has some work to do, because directories are often used by little guys, I wish Google will go after the big guys for change.

Make no mistakes, Google want you to sign up one way or another on their Adwords system, that's their ultimate goal $$$$$$$$.

^^This is exactly right, google is beginning to look down on pretty much any networking with other sites and the only way to get links is by paying for them which really sucks. I just wish there would be a rival so google would be less interested in sucking all the money they can out of the internet and more interested in creating a better search engine.

[Newbe]

can't hurt though...

becouse if it ever will, then i will just add my competition to all the directories i know hehe

[zeruel]

So do you guys think that it will be better to avoid doing directory submissions? What other alternatives do you suggests?

[Rexibit]

What the author of this thread is trying to say is, directories are no longer listed on the Google page of how to improve your site for Google to find you.

This supports that statement:

Webmaster Guidelines

Following these guidelines will help Google find, index, and rank your site. Even if you choose not to implement any of these suggestions, we strongly encourage you to pay very close attention to the "Quality Guidelines," which outline some of the illicit practices that may lead to a site being removed entirely from the Google index or otherwise penalized. If a site has been penalized, it may no longer show up in results on Google.com or on any of Google's partner sites.

Google has been taking a stronger stance on devaluing directories over the past year. The removal of it being in the "how to help Google find you" area only supports this further. However, it doesn't mean that it still isn't a good way to build traffic or inbound links.

Don't stop submitting to "quality" directories, that is a good thing. Submit to a few free quality ones, and move on.

[Natural Elements]

Originally Posted by Rexibit

What the author of this thread is trying to say is, directories are no longer listed on the Google page of how to improve your site for Google to find you.

This supports that statement:



Google has been taking a stronger stance on devaluing directories over the past year. The removal of it being in the "how to help Google find you" area only supports this further. However, it doesn't mean that it still isn't a good way to build traffic or inbound links.

Don't stop submitting to "quality" directories, that is a good thing. Submit to a few free quality ones, and move on.

Forget the traffic from directories, this era is finish. only inbound links from high directories are still counting for Google as backlinks, the others are gone my friend.

Google take me off 5000 backlinks from directories, I guess they are off the game now.

[Natural Elements]

Originally Posted by zeruel

So do you guys think that it will be better to avoid doing directory submissions? What other alternatives do you suggests?

Yahoo directory is not longer usefull as my site was #1 on bath category for a while, then they decided to put me at the last page below link farms, or links owned by registrars.

Other high quality directories are still in the game, but for how long?

What I can suggest is submitting to the best high quality directories, the other have no power no more unfortunately.

Alternatives? For e-commerce like me, there are no much choice. Spend more money to promote my site on ppc using SEM, trade products with bloggers for reviews, make more articles, etc...

[LailaScott]

Originally Posted by zeruel

So do you guys think that it will be better to avoid doing directory submissions? What other alternatives do you suggests?

ill give more attention on social bookmarking, networking and media.

[fabamaker]

Originally Posted by LailaScott

ill give more attention on social bookmarking, networking and media.

so do i
twitter is good for this

[AnonymousUser]

Well I think I will still submit imo

[mabel01]

I think there's a lot of things that Google doesn't say you should do that work really well. Just because they omit it from their guidelines doesn't mean it's not effective anymore.

However, it's still our discretion if we will still do directory submission or not.

There are actually some good directories, especially niche and regional directories. Just be selective, and don't just submit your site to a directory that is clearly of low quality. Instead look harder for directories that are well organized and maintained, and also look to those who offers listings related to your niche/market or region.

[broadcast-monitors]

I wouldn't bother with low quality links- I believe that Google quickly stops counting these above a certain point. An example of a low quality link would be from a PR0 directory webpage.

Google seems to lean heavily towards high quality links (e.g. ones that are hard to get) + subdomain importance.

[purplesoda]

Also, it is important that the site is submitted in the right category.

[Avaonline]

Google doesn't give importance to links from directories thats true.

[broadcast-monitors]

Though I'd suspect that certain pages of Yahoo Directory and DMOZ have high "SERP juice" and may be worth submitting to. PR may be a way to tell, though I definitely believe that Google is clamping down on how much information they are giving away. A small % of PR reported is probably intentionally polluted.
Also, the displayed PR is likely delayed compared to actual PR.

2- I agree with purplesoda about relevance.

If the links all point to irrelevant web pages, it might look like the directory page is selling links (or hijacked by spammers) and presumably Google would slap that page's ability to pass on SERP juice.

[GoGlobal]

I agree That below word.
Google doesn't give importance to links from directories thats true.
Because every seo person know Directory submission is very powerful in seo work.