There are a good number of people that submit to web directories and have no idea which directories are actually worth paying for an express submission review.  So today I am going to briefly cover this topic.

First, let’s be blunt.  Most people that spend money to be listed in a web directory are doing so because their link will appear on a page with pagerank.  This is evident by the number of people that complained after their $200+ link on Alive Directory was no longer on a page with pagerank.  The Alive Directory had been penalized, and some of the people with links in that directory claimed they got nothing for spending over $200.  But yet their sites were still listed.  The bottom line is this.  Paid directories charge a fee for a listing review, and not for pagerank.  Pagerank does fluctuate, and can be taken away at any time by unethical link building practices.  So let’s look at how you can visually identify the better directories and get a better return on your submission expenses.

One of the easiest ways to build one way links back to your site is with Web Directory submissions.  In this post I am just going to discuss free directory submissions.  Paid directories have their place too, but that’s something I’ll discuss later.

There are basically three methods to submit to free web directories.  Those methods are fully automatic, semi automatic, and manual.

Automatic directory submissions should be avoided at all costs.  Why?  Because spam bots and link spammers try to post at many of the sites that have no CAPTCHA.  There is no benefit to being listed on sites that are potentially “bad neighborhoods” filled with spammy links.

Every blog owner, including myself, has to deal with a certain degree of comment spam.  But used properly, blog comments can add value to a blog while helping you to build quality backlinks and traffic.

There are search engines specifically designed to locate “do follow” blogs that pass pagerank.  Instead of jumping on the same train and following these people, let’s look at some search phrases that can be used to find niche specific blogs that are not saturated.

At Google, try the following search phrases.  Replace KW with your chosen keyword.