Need Answers to a dumb question

[imie]

Out of curiosity, i searched my www.ishopathome.ca site on yahoo to see what comes up and i saw a whole bunch of sites had me on their directory. I didn't put my site there, and my webmaster certainly didn't.

So my question is: is this helping me? are they doing me a favour? i figured, maybe but not so sure.

Thanks,
Imie

[wheel]

I expect you'll find these things neutral.

Your site is listed in Dmoz, a very powerful old directory. Dmoz makes its list of websites available for free download. Directory owners grab this list (which includes your site) and use it to seed or initiate their directory.

What's important is that you have old, high quality links to balance these (and you do). Everyone with high quality links or who is ranking or is listed in Dmoz picks up tons of these low quality links.

If all you had was low quality links that you developed fast, you'd be teetering on the edge of Google branding you as a spammer and them doing horrible things to your rankings. Background noise links (which is what you're talking about) won't do you any harm when mixed in with other stuff.

[george benjamin]

I expect you'll find these things neutral.

Your site is listed in Dmoz, a very powerful old directory. Dmoz makes its list of websites available for free download. Directory owners grab this list (which includes your site) and use it to seed or initiate their directory.


Powerful, old, corrupt and satanic. Devils run that place.

READ:

http://www.shoemoney.com/2007/08/26/dmoz-extortion/



http://www.joostdevalk.nl/the-dmoz-mob-strikes-again/

It's also becoming impossible to get your site listed there by submission, as the top SEO Gurus have said. Parked domains are even listed there, and NO, each section doesnt have the most high quality site.

[wheel]

I thought all that until I made editor :).

I'm pretty sure my niche in Dmoz is corrupt, I've seen stuff happen that I don't have any other explanation for. That being said, you can either play the game or not.

I actually got approved based on an open and honest profile. Told them what I did, listed my sites and so on, and I got approved (on about my third application over the years).

Dmoz is simple. if you can get in great. if you can make editor and list your own sites, great. if you can't wiggle either one, don't worry about it and carry on.

FWIW, I've also seen examples of truly honest hardworking volunteers in some categories.

[george benjamin]

I honestly have been losing a lot of respect towards google lately.


Lets see here:

[1] They just shot down the top paid directories being used to jack up people's Page Rank like Aviva etc.

[2] ON THE GOOGLE WEBMASTER GUIDELINES, GOOGLE TELLS YOU TO SUBMIT YOUR SITE TO YAHOO!, a PAID DIRECTORY.

"Submit your site to relevant directories such as the Open Directory Project and Yahoo!, as well as to other industry-specific expert sites."

[wheel]

Agreed. This is why one has to find top quality links outside of the mainstream. There are directories out there that are fabulous for ranking that aren't on Google's radio. Far better than Dmoz. It's also rumoured that Dmoz is basically worthless anyway - I don't know what to think of that. I do know I'll won't have any of my sites linked in from wikipedia until they smarten up - I removed all links to my sites from their site.

I've read that dmoz just fixed some SE issues and that people are seeing increased rankings as a result. I've had some dmoz listed sites increase rankings a bit lately but I honestly don't know if it's a result of dmoz or not. No way to tell really.

[imie]

Thanks! so i guess i should be happy my site is in many directories.

Imie