Entrepreneurs and individuals have become even more frustrated with social media than usual, as of late.

Most likely, it is because social media has proven to be overtly time consuming, and generally produces less than lackluster results, (at best, the results of social media campaigns can be difficult to quantify –  if they are quantifiable at all).

Let’s face it, you can’t run a business successfully, or build a good reputation online economically by investing in unproven social strategies.

The simple fact of the matter is -  that you need more than “buzzwords” as your guide when constructing a serious online website promotion or campaign. 

While still popular, social media sites “like Facebook” have taken a real beating in the stock market.

Why?

This is because most investors agree social media is highly overvalued as an advertising asset.

Take for instance, buying ads on Facebook.

We are all familiar with the term “banner blindness” but Facebook ads have elevated banner blindness to an entirely new level.

One reason Facebook ads, ROI is so abysmal is because the Facebook community sees them as an intrusion. Even Mark Zuckerberg understands the Facebook community hates ads, which is why he keeps changing their ad platform, in search of a less intrusive alternative that his community will accept.

Facebook promises and delivers you access to some of the tightest demographics online, but what they don’t say is that they then, can provide you with nothing better than a chance to annoy them!

When people log into Facebook, they do so to have fun, catch up with friends and play games. Thus, having an ad on Facebook is akin to interrupting a private phone call with a commercial advertisement.

In search for something more reliable, quantifiable and easier to implement, entrepreneurs are returning to the old “tried-and-true” directory submission.

Being in a directory not only works, it works better because it is more polite, unobtrusive and helpful.  

Submitting to a directory is indeed very helpful!

For instance, instead of annoying people trying to have fun on Facebook with your Facebook ads, by submitting to a directory, you actually help the people who are searching for solutions, to find you!
If you’re categorized correctly, the people that find you in a directory will be excited and receptive when they click on your link to get to your website. This positivity translates to more sales!

You already know that people are more receptive to search engine results over advertisements, and that being listed in the right directory will also boost your search engine rankings.

Therefore, by quietly submitting your link to a trusted directory, it helps people find you in more ways than one!

Best of all, directory submission will never get you dragged into one of those embarrassing public arguments that social media members seem so keen to follow!

Social media can be a dangerous venue to engage in because you have little control over what the social media community will say about you.

Also, if you or one of your associates makes a social media gaffe, it is more likely that this gaffe will go viral long before any of the positive messages about you or your business does.

It’s just human nature. 

Social media thrives on drama, and there have been many cases of social media gaffes drawing more attention to a business than anything positive they have ever done.

Take for instance the Aflac Inc. Insurance case.

Who can forget the negative attention the comedian Gilbert Gottfried gained the insurance company when he was employed as their “Duck” on Twitter during the 2011 tsunami that obliterated much of Japan’s east coast and caused untold human suffering.

He thought he was being funny when he said on Twitter, “Japan is really advanced. They don’t go to the beach. The beach comes to them” – but the rest of the world thought it was in very bad taste.

Of course, he was fired over the remarks. However the damage was done. Today more people know about those rude comments even though they didn’t know Aflac had a Twitter account!

This is just one example in many, which demonstrates how social media can blow up in your face.

For this and many more reasons directory submission is becoming the #1 solution for business and people concerned about their reputations online.

Fortune 500 hundred companies have been using directory submissions to boost the rankings of websites sympathetic to their position, while burying sites that carry negative information about them, successfully for years!

Now the small businesses and individuals have discovered that it works for them too!

Not only does it work, but also the results are verifiable!

Once you submit, you start to see your website climb up the search engine rankings!

As your website climbs up to the top page of Google, you can easily track its progress and the number of sales that the better position generates!

In addition, it’s safe!

Unlike the volatility of social media, as your website climbs the only possible negative repercussions are to your competitors – because while your site is climbing theirs are being pushed down the search engine pages, out of sight.

Because you are simply making yourself the easiest to find on the web, you will be escaping all of the drama and potential backlash that social media is becoming famous for.

Moreover, because people are searching for websites that meet their specific search criteria, they will be receptive to your message, when they find you!

This is by far, a better way to engage with customers than annoying them when they are trying to relax with their family and friends over a game of “Hidden Chronicles” or “Words with Friends”.

The jury is in: Unless you don’t care about verifiable results, and have unlimited time to devote to social media websites, and are sure that you or one of your associates will never commit a social media gaffe, then directory submissions are your best option.

Directory submissions here are affordable, take little time (about 30 seconds), and produce incredible verifiable results!

Here, directory submissions have been more than a buzzword since 2006!

Let me assure you, that while the past management did a great job building up Domaining.in over the past few years, the best is yet to come!

All of the things that made Domaining.in great, (all the things in the past that you loved about us) will either stay the same, or become remarkably better due to the capitol infusion we have dedicated to this directory service!

Here is why:

Our total focus is on YOUR SATISFACTION, and we now have more of the resources we need to do an even better job than we’ve ever been able to do before!

We recognize that you are special and your goals on this site are very specific, and therefore we intend to do whatever is necessary to help you accomplish them.

PLEASE, if you do not find the answers you’re looking for in this post, then contact us, and we will be glad to answer your specific questions.

To begin, our customer service plan, (as before) is to concentrate on exceeding your expectations, no matter which of the three major categories your needs fall under.

 Whether you are…

1. A Website owner/manager seeking to get more exposure for your great website/s!
2. A visitor looking to find the best the web has to offer!
3. Or a search engine, looking to augment your search algorithms ability to determine which sites to rank highest in your search results, by relying (in part) on our directories significant editorial discretion, as a means of discovering the hidden worth of a given site when reviewed by a real human!

We are here for you!

We at Domaining.in recognize it is because we strive to over-deliver in ALL THREE of these types of customer concerns,  we are better able to deliver excellence in each instance!

IF YOU ARE NEW HERE:

If you are new here, or are unfamiliar with the value of directories, allow me to explain what we do.

Primarily as a directory, we focus on collecting links to the greatest websites on the web, and posting them with accurate descriptions, and in the appropriate category in our network of directory sites.

This of course, makes visiting our directory a fun and enjoyable experience for anyone looking for great human pre-filtered content on the Internet!

Because of our selectiveness, and significant editorial review, search engines value our links more, and thus rank sites we link to, higher in their results.

Thus having a link in our directory means you not only get access to our visitors, but you also get a boost in the search engine rankings.

This is why website owners strive to get included within our directory network!

Two things that are going to change:

1)      One of things the past management didn’t do well, (in my opinion) was not sharing the search engine success stories from people like you, using our services.

While I understand that if you’re a site owner, (or you are responsible for the SEO of a website) you’re more concerned with your personal results, than in someone else’s.

However, one of the small changes we plan in this blog, is to make more of an effort to document some of the many SEO success stories, so you (as our customer) can begin to see more of the results you should expect using our directory network!

2)      Another area that needs addressing, we feel, was that the past owner could have done a better job of explaining the differences between using this directory, and paying for unnatural links.

Between directory inclusion here, and simply paying for links, is an unfathomable and uncross-able chasm that deserves an explanation!

One of the best ways to explain why directory inclusion is better is by showing you a video posted by Google’s head of web-spam, explaining what Google is looking for from web directories.

Note: While watching this video please consider that, (thanks in part to our former owner) we have remained a respected directory since 2006. And, while we may not be as well known, as perhaps say, “Yahoo’s directory”, we have built an exemplary reputation, which we intend to honor, and build upon!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rKUlVquEImc&feature=youtu.be

Discover for yourself, how Domaining.in fits into this bigger picture!

Noting the distinction between directory submissions and unnatural paid links now, you’re probably wondering, “why the fees in this network, (designed to cover the work involved) are so low as compared to other directories similar to our caliber, providing similar services?

One reason is because we recognize that Domaining.in does not have the household brand recognition that Yahoo (and directories like it) enjoy. Thus, we cannot charge the “designer”, brand-name prices, which they command.

However, we know that NO-one needs to charge that much, to offer great services!

You should know that our services do not rely solely on website submission fees; it never has, and never will!

Our business model at Domaining.in is a sound combination of various income generating streams. For YOU, (our customer) this means, that in finding the Domaining.in network, you have found a long term, reliable partner, which you can trust! Moreover, we will be here in the future when you need or want us!

In fact, regardless of the services that you currently enjoy using here, you can expect it to only get better in the days, weeks, and years to come!

We are on track now, and will continually strive to make our services, more affordable and more valuable.

It’s an important job that we do!

We believe that the Internet ought not to be dominated only by website owners with
deep pockets. If that was the case, then the Internet would be nothing but a shallow mirror regurgitating what you could find elsewhere, like on TV.

The same generic drivel doled out everywhere by the “Hollywood, Big Business Elite”.

We recognize that the best web, is a web populated simply by great websites – and great websites can come from the most unusual places and people!

A major reason that we do what we do, is because we love to discover the new and interesting ideas, products, services, pastimes and etc. that people just like you send to us every day!

We simply ask that if you submit a link to our directory network, that you follow our submission guidelines. We don’t like spam anymore than you do!

In addition, we recommend that if you like our directory, or something you find here, then please by all means give us a “shout-out” on your blog or in some social network community like Facebook etc.

The more you spread the word about Domaining.in, the better we can be for you and everybody!

Thanks for reading,

Dan

I just wanted to drop you a line highlighting the fact that submissions to our directories really do have a huge effect towards pushing you UP to Google’s Top Rankings!

Just to demonstrate the fact, I want you to keep your attention on one of our newest domains, (directory submission secrets * com).

I am not going to link directly to it from here because I want to show you the “PURE” results attained from the power of using just 10 links.

These 10 are the links offered in our “FEATURED SPECIAL – (10 FEATURED listings at directories with IP Diversity) Special Offer! - $105 / Year”!

This offer is found in Step 2 of the “Submit Link” process, and is now on special for only $105 down from the usual price of $150!

Watch Our Exciting SEO Experiment As It Unfolds!

On September 19th, 2012, (around 4 weeks ago) we went live with this site, (as a control).

Then around 3 weeks ago, we started linking the site from 10 of our directories, all with PR 1-6.

We set links from 3 directories with PR6, 2 with PR5, 3 with PR4 and 2 more with PR3).

Now, look at the site’s ranking today, (October 27th,2012):

With the main keywords “directory submission secrets” our directory m-e-e-t * org is number one, and our new website is number eight!

I would say that is impressive, and I am also curious as to how long it will take to increase the PR from Zero to (I think) 3-4 which should be visible with the next Google update.

We will keep you informed!

Then just one day later October 29th, 2012:

With the main keywords “directory submission secrets” our directory m-e-e-t * org is again #1 and our website has climbed to #2!

Then another 2 days later on November 1st, 2012:

With the main keywords “directory submission secrets” our new website has jumped to #1, while our directory m-e-e-t * org held onto its #2 spot!

Therefore, after only 4 weeks of testing we are in the Top 2 spots for Google, with our main site and our directory, for these HOT keywords!

The situation on November 6th, 2012 changed:

On this day another directory from our directories network, our strongest directory domaining.in, has overtaken position #1 on Google.

However, our m-e-e-t.org is at the Top #7 spot and our test site “directory-submission-secrets*com” is in position #8.

After 5 weeks, we have 3 websites on the 1st page of Google!

This fact clearly demonstrates the enormous power of our directories network, and the up and downs are just Google’s algorithms trying to find out which website is the most relevant for the keywords. We will expect to see these sites continuing to stay high in the rankings as they change positions over the next few weeks.

On November 17th, after 8 weeks of going live and start linking from our directory network, we have 2 websites at Google Page One, the PR 6 directory is Nr 4 and the website directory-submission-secrets.com is at no 7 of Google’s first page, while domaining.in is taking up the number three spot on page two of Google and the domaining.in’s blog is number four! 

Since 4 days we keep the positions stable: since November 20th we have 2 websites at Google’s Page One, the PR 5 directory m-e-e-t.org at #1 and the website directory-submission-secrets.com is at #2 of Google’s first page, while domaining.in is taking up the number one space on page two of Google!

 For now, we will watch for the next Google update, to see how the PageRank changes.

While we are doing that, let me recommend that you try this yourself.

A featured link in our directories network has incredible link power – as the links are displayed on each page! This means the effect on your page’s search engine rankings, is much better and far faster than regular links, (which are only displayed on the homepage).

If you book now, you will save $45 with our Special Launch Offer, only $105 for 10 featured links!

For more “SECRETS” info just read here: directory-submission-secrets.com

SUBMIT NOW!

Have a great day!

Dan

Domaining LTD

All of these premium directories in our portfolio are located across 7 different C-Class IP’s, with a maximum of 3 directories per IP-Address.

Our strongest directories with the highest authority are of course…

• Domaining.in
  
• 9ug.com
• iWebDirectory.net

However, for a quick SEO push, we can also recommend our newer directories.

These newer directories offer high traffic and/or high PR.

They include…

• Commentsfromleftfield.com
• MedEdCentral.org
• Federalism-e.com
• M-e-e-t.org
• Mikieto.com
• and more! (22 total at the time of this post!)

DESCRIPTION OF ABBREVIATIONS FOR THIS TABLE:

DA = Domain Age PR  = Page Rank IC = Index Count RDD = Referring Domain – Domains BLD = Backlinks Domain EDUD = Educational / Governmental Backlinks Domain EDUP = Educational / Governmental Backlinks Page CF = Citation Flow TF = Trust Flow Alexa = Alexa Popularity Rank DV = Daily Visitors

Quality directories have never been so affordable!

Check out our “All Inclusive Package” with submission to 10 directories (with PR of 3-6) for only $55 per year, at Step 2 of the “Submit Link” process, and for a limited time we will give you an extra link free!

That’s links in 11 directories for one low price!

Or an even better choice for most people is our “Featured Links Offer”, with much more powerful link juice!

Our “Featured Links Offer”, has been proven to boost websites in just 4-6 weeks to the first page of Google.

That’s “Featured Links” in 11 directories for one low price!

This is a first attempt at putting a list together – it’s by no means anywhere near complete but is a start, I will be adding to this list over time and aim to compile a more useful resource (eventually!)

I will be ranking directories on metrics taken from the excellent Open Site Explorer tool at SEOMoz. I only want to list quality free directories that are worth your time and effort when submitting.

I will start with the top ten strongest free directories. As you can see Domaining.in Directory is up there with the best and we are striving to do even better!

However, you need to look for directories moderated by humans, listing only quality websites and avoid SPAM directories.

So far, we’ve only been comparing domaining.in against the other free web directories that we’ve recommended (see post on strong free directories and building a strong directory).

Obviously there are a lot of paid web directories out there too, some of which charge hundreds of dollars a year for a listing.

You would think that given the reputation (and exorbitant listing fees charged) that you would be getting something special for your money, something that we more humble directories could not provide.

In the past we’ve even been tempted to submit some of our own sites to a few of the bigger paid directories, in the hope we’d get some huge SEO benefit from being listed.

We guess that there are other people out there who like us wonder whether it’s worth submitting to the likes of “Yahoo Directory” and “Best of the Web” so we decided to benchmark our “Domaining.in” against a few of these well known high fee directories. (BOTW, Yahoo Directory, Directory Journal & JoeAnt)

We were quite surprised by the results!

Firstly, if we look at SEOMoz’s OpenSiteExplorer tool we can see that actually our “Domaining.in” stacks up remarkably well against the competition!

See screen shot of  “Open Site Explorer Tool” below:

Is it worth spending money submitting to paid directories? Maybe not..

As you can see, Domaining.in tops several of the categories and is on a par with the other big directories for many of the other metrics used.

See description of metrics used) including Page Authority and Page MozTrust

Again, looking at the total number of backlinks according to Majestic SEOs Backlink history tool we see that Domaining.in leads the way!

(I had to remove Yahoo Directory as the tool reports links to Yahoo’s entire domain rather than just the subdomain “dir.yahoo.com” and obviously this biases the results massively).

Domaining.in also leads the way with backlinks!

In Summary: There are several factors that we can’t consider here such as traffic generated by listing in each of the directories (how many people will search the directory and click through to your site), total number of sites listed at each of the directories (how much “link juice” is actually passed to each site listed) etc..

However, we think that we’ve demonstrated that at least it is not cost effective to submit to the big paid web directories and that they don’t really offer anything special for the hundreds of dollars it often costs to get listed there.

Therefore, unless you light your cigars with $100 bills we recommend that you stick to the high-end free directories, and the more budget-conscious high-value paid directories like Domaining.in. –

Oh, and we also recommend our other web directory 9ug.com

I’m pleased to say that both Domaining.in and 9ug Directory made the list!

Domaining.in ranked in the top 15 of all general directories based on domain authority and MozRank!

I think that you have to be a Pro member to view the entire list but I will be adding my list of strong directories once I get some more time.

BTW: I just saw this interesting blog post about the value of submitting to directories and the SEOMoz directory list!

If you are interested in bulk deals I am offering 20% off  on 20+ submissions.

All sites are still subject to our strict quality control requirements.

Sites not meeting these criteria will NOT be listed, and review fees will NOT be refunded.

This offer also extends to 9ug directory and iWebDirectory.

Please contact us for further information.

Out of curiosity, I decided to look at exactly how many backlinks each of the top five of these sites have.

I’ve never really looked at how many sites link to domaining.in before and was pretty shocked by the results (according to MajesticSEO Site Explorer). The first plot below shows the top five directories and as you can see DMOZ is HUGE and has around 1.4 billion backlinks! Again, I can’t vouch for the accuracy of these numbers but DMOZ is certainly the clear leader here.

If we exclude DMOZ and look at the next five strongest free directories we see that domaining.in leads the pack with over 8 million backlinks (surely that can’t be correct?!).

If we compare these numbers with SEOMoz’s Open Site Explorer we see that the link counts are much lower and that there is some disagreement in the rankings. But again, it’s clear that DMOZ rules the free directories in terms of directory strength.

Removing DMOZ we see that Pegasus Directory leads the way in terms of backlinks and page authority.

However domaining.in has the highest MozRank & MozTrust ratings.

Summary: It seems that domaining.in’s reputation is selling itself.

This is particularly satisfying as a lot of hard work has been put into this site over the last few years and it’s great news that people are helping to promote the site.

As I mentioned previously, (see post) I’m pushing to improve and develop the site over the coming months and hope that our users will continue to support us, link to us, and spread the word so that we can grow further.

In the end, by helping to promote domaining.in you have been promoting your own sites listed in the directory!

Thank You All!

We all know this type of behavior is generally frowned upon by Google and can lead to penalties for your site.

Presumably the search engines can spot linking anomalies and therefore buying large numbers of unnatural links, can damage your site’s rankings and reputation.

After reading the article I wanted to test the tool for myself and check domaining.in against some other directory sites (both free and paid directories).

I have to admit that I was excited about testing this type of profiling.

Would competing sites really have similar link profiles?

How easy is it to spot sites that pay for unnatural links?

The answer it seems, is pretty easy!

The first plot shows percentage of links coming from sites with different domain authorities, a full description of domain authority can be found here. In a nutshell, it is shown as a value between 0 and 100, the higher the number the more authority the site has. So Google and Facebook will have a value close to a hundred, whereas a new site with no backlinks will have a domain authority of zero.

As you can see below the link profiles (shapes of the curves) for Domaining.in (blue), Pesgaus Directory (red), Directory Free (yellow) and Best of the Web (purple) are all remarkably similar, suggesting natural backlink acquisition.

However, you can clearly see that the profile of the other (unnamed) directory is very different indeed with all links coming from high domain authority sites (perhaps suggesting that these links are not naturally acquired and the site has been paying for unnatural links). I have decided not to name the directory in question as I don’t want to name and shame. However, I will say that it is one of the paid directories in this post. Therefore, if you want to find out it’s not difficult to do so..

A normalized tabular view of the data is below:

Looking at the correlation between the link profiles of domaining.in with the other directories confirms what the previous graph shows, with the unnamed directory having zero correlation with the other sites:

Anyway, I’m not going to get on my high horse about buying unnatural links but I would suggest trying the tool out on your own site’s link profile.

I would also recommend signing up for an SEOMoz account if you are serious about SEO tools.