1.  What is a Directory Submission?

Everyone is familiar with the telephone or yellow pages directories. They contain lists of people or businesses, sorted alphabetically or by category. An internet directory is basically the same, but they are known as web directories or online directories and they list websites by category.

To have your website listed in one of these web directories, you have to first submit it to the directory. If you don’t submit your website to various directories, users will not be able to locate your site unless they come across it by accident or enter the full website URL. Submitting your website details to an online directory is called “directory submission”.

2.  Is there such a thing as submitting too many submissions?

It is entirely up to you to decide how many directories you want to submit your web site to and in what space of time. You can submit them all in one day if you want to. Each directory will take a period of time before they send you an email of approval, some links you will receive within a few days while others may take up to 90 days before you know. Also you have to be aware that not all directories provide links. So, no matter how quickly you submit your details to the directories, the links will come back at different times over a period of time.

3.  If I submit to 500 directories, does that mean I’ll get 500 links?

We only ensure that your site details are submitted correctly and successfully. Whether your link is put up on every directory we submit to; it is dependent on the directory owner. Every directory owner has their own criteria for approving sites and your link may or may not be put up.

This is why google uses these links; not everybody will get the same results; it mainly depends on the quality of your site. as long you have a good site, you’ll get a high approval ratio, lot’s of good links and so achieve high rankings in the SERP’s (search engine result pages).

4.  How will I know whether my sites have actually been submitted?

Most directories send an email acknowledging that your site has been submitted to their directory and since we enter your email address during the submission process, you would be receiving all these emails. Do note that not all directories send emails but quite a few do and some directories even send emails to inform you whether your link has been approved or rejected.

5.  Will my links ever expire or are they permanent?

If your links are approved and put up, they should be on the directory for as long as the directory exists.

6.  Will I see my website ranking increase quickly?

Your ranking will not increase as soon as you receive links from a directory. The search engines will take some time to locate and index the links and the process can be slow. Once you have made some submissions, keep on submitting to new directories and continue building links. If you stop making submissions, your ranking could go down. Link building is not the only method of building relevant links, but it is the most efficient and reliable.

7.  How do directory links help in improving my search engine ranking?

‘Links’ play a major role in determining your ranking position on the various search engines. Obtaining inbound links or back links in quantity and quality can influence your search engine rank immensely. Search engines base a certain factor on directories in judging a website’s popularity and relevance. Depending on the quality of the directory and the number of back links your website has, search engines will be able to determine your relevance and qualify your website accordingly.

8.  Do Directory Submissions increase website traffic?

Yes, directory submissions can help increase traffic to your website. The higher you rank in the search engines due to valuable one-way links from the directories, the more visible your site is. The more visible you are, the more visitors will be aware of and visit your website.

It is crucial to continue building links through directory submissions.  Regular directory links with targeted anchor text will assist you in achieving and sustaining a high ranking.

9.  Are Directories and Link Farms the same?

A link farm and a directory are two completely different things. A link farm is not a directory; it is a website that lists links. These links are not in categories or sorted into any kind of order. Absolutely any website can be listed on a link farm as there is no method of reviewing the website and so there are many low quality websites found here.

In comparison, a web directory lists and places websites into suitable categories and sub categories. To have your website listed in a web directory it is necessary to give certain details including titles, a description and keywords. They then have to have a manual review before being approved. These are quality directories.

10.  What is the point of submitting my site to a directory with a low PR?

The PR, or PageRank, of the directory isn’t too important. No directories PR is ever the same, it changes frequently. Directories with a PR of 0 or 1 might just be new and, given time, could achieve a much higher PR, so they are all worth submitting to. Another reason to submit to a low PR directory now, is that in the future the PR of the directory could increase substantially; they might then become a paid directory. If you miss your chance to submit for free now, you could miss out on a potential valuable link or end up paying to list with them.

11.  Can I influence where my website is located in the directory?

If you have submitted to a free directory, once your website has been approved the site’s link is placed under the category most applicable. It can be quite difficult to locate your site’s link within the directory; it is a case of searching through the whole of that category to locate it. There are some aspects that seem to affect where a listing might be placed in a directory, these include the number of hits the website receives, it’s PageRank, alphabetical order and the date it was accepted in the directory.

Mostly, it’s not just a case of one thing or another that affects the link placement. If more than one website has the same PR, then another criterion has to be followed and so it is not a clear area as to what exactly influences link placement.

12.  How do you ensure that my site is accepted in the directory?

We follow the rules of each directory carefully. For instance, if a particular directory requires for you to submit only an ‘Official Title’, we use only your official title (that’s why we ask you to enter the ‘company name’ when adding a site in our system). We also ensure your site is submitted to the right category.

13.  Some directories look the same. Should I bother submitting to both?

There are some directories that look alike with similar layouts and categories. Directory templates can be found online and the likelihood is they have just used the same one. Each has their own guidelines and editorial staff who review each website so don’t think just because they look the same then it is not worth the bother of submitting to both. The links you receive from them will vary in value and be seen separately by the search engines. They may look the same, but valuable links can still be obtained from both.

14.   Is it true that no-one bothers with Directory Submissions any longer?

There are various reports that go around from time to time regarding the importance and value of directory submissions. The bottom line is that as long as the links you have are from quality directories they are definitely valued by the search engines. It is the low quality directories that give all directories a bad name.

15.  Are All Links Permanent? Are They Do-Follow?

Yes, we guarantee that all links built will be permanent. If we find any links have been removed, for whatever reason, we’ll replace them with no questions asked. All of our links are straight-forward HTML links. We don’t provide links that aren’t search engine friendly – such as link with the no-follow tag or redirects.

16.  What are niche directories?

A niche directory is basically an online link directory on a specific subject. These kinds of directories host links of websites on that specific subject only. E.g. Web hosting directories accept links of web hosting websites only.

17.  What are the benefits of niche directory submission?

Search engines consider niche directories as relevant sites and hence give more value to the links coming from these directories. As the result, page rank and search engine ranking of a website increases. Again, for being subject specific, these directories attract a huge number of targeted visitors, and send them to the indexed websites.

18.  Are all the directories in your database SEO Friendly?

Yes, all the directories in our database are SEO-friendly. And we frequently verify and update our database to ensure their SEO compatibility.

19.  What is Link Baiting?

Link baiting, seems, from the sound of it, to be one of those ‘black hat’ techniques to fool search engines into giving you top rankings.In fact, though, link baiting if done correctly is a perfectly legitimate search engine optimization technique – lauded by the people who work for search engines. Link baiting is simply a sophisticated way of building links to your sites.

20.  What is a Link bait article?

A link bait article is generally blog post or article that is created mainly for the purposes of acquiring links back to your blog or website.

21.  What is viral marketing?

Viral marketing is a marketing trend that helps and gives confidence to people to pass along a marketing message willingly. There are viral promotions coming in the form of video clips, interactive flash games, ebooks, brandable software, images or text messages. The basic form of viral marketing is not considerably sustainable

22.  What Is A Content Management System?

A content management system (CMS) is a system used to manage the content of a website. Typically, a content management system (CMS) consists of two elements: the content management application (CMA) and the content delivery application (CDA). The CMA element allows the content manager or author, who may not know Hypertext Markup Language (HTML), to manage the creation, modification, and removal of content from a Web site without needing the expertise of a webmaster. The CDA element uses and compiles that information to update the website. The features of a content management system (CMS) vary, but most include web-based publishing, format management, revision control, indexing, search, and retrieval.

The Web-based publishing feature allows individuals to use a template or a set of templates approved by the organization, as well as wizards and other tools to create or modify Web content. The format management feature allows documents including legacy electronic documents and scanned paper documents to be formatted into HTML or Portable Document Format (PDF) for the Web site. The revision control feature allows content to be updated to a newer version or restored to a previous version. Revision control also tracks any changes made to files by individuals. An additional feature is indexing, search, and retrieval. A content management system (CMS) indexes all data within an organization. Individuals can then search for data using keywords, which the content management system (CMS) retrieves.

A content management system (CMS) may also provide tools for one-to-one marketing. One-to-one marketing is the ability of a website to tailor its content and advertising to a user’s specific characteristics using information provided by the user or gathered by the site (for example, a particular user’s page sequence pattern). For example, if you visit a search engine and search for “content management systems”, the advertising banners will advertise businesses that provide content management systems instead of businesses that provide telemarketing services.

23.  What do you ask from me after I implement my SEM and SEO strategies?

SEM: Please keep us informed of any new promotions or ad messaging you would like placed in your account. Also, please notify us if you are changing your web site as this may affect landing pages in your PPC account.

SEO: Please keep us informed if there are new pages where you would like to implement an SEO strategy. Our SEO packages allow you to optimize a set number of pages per year; they all do not need to be done immediately.

24.  What is a quality score, what are the benefits of improving it, and what steps do you take for improving the quality score?

Quality score is calculated by the engines to determine what an advertiser will pay when their keyword is clicked. The higher the quality score, the lower CPC you will pay. By organizing your account so keywords, landing pages, and ads are all relative to each other and highly relevant to the searchers query, we can help you achieve higher quality scores for your keywords.

25.  Which engines allow me to utilize Pay-Per-Click advertising?

There are several engines that allow PPC advertising. We focus mostly on Google, Yahoo, and MSN, but if there are other search engines or niche engines that will assist in your PPC strategy, we can also utilize those engines.

26.  Do you recommend using both PPC and SEO?

We recommend what is best based on your business goals. In many cases the optimal solution would be to use both PPC and SEO because one or the other may not satisfy all of your business needs. SEO will always provide you with the highest ROI, but PPC can produce traffic to your site immediately.

27.  How long will it take for my SEO strategies to take effect?

It varies based on the nature of your site and the competition in the online space in which you choose to target. Generally we advise that SEO strategies may not take effect for 6-12 months.

28.  Do you guarantee top ranks in any engine?

We do not guarantee top ranks because it is simply not a promise we can keep. We will adjust strategies accordingly to achieve the best results possible, but the online space has tons of competition and the engine’s ‘secret’ algorithms are constantly changing. So, although we do not promise top ranks, you will find that no legitimate SEO firms will.

29.  What is black hat SEO?
 
Black Hat search engine optimization is customarily defined as techniques that are used to get higher search rankings in an unethical manner. These black hat SEO techniques usually include one or more of the following characteristics:

• breaks search engine rules and regulations
• creates a poor user experience directly because of the black hat SEO techniques utilized on the Web site
• unethically presents content in a different visual or non-visual way to search engine spiders and search engine users.

Several black hat SEO tactics include cloaking, doorway pages, keyword spamming, hidden text and duplicate sites/content, link farms, link spamming, keyword stuffing and article spamming. Black hat SEO techniques can get your site banned from search engines; we do not promote any black hat tactics nor do we use any of them in our search engine optimization practices.

30.  Are you willing to take clients outside of your local area?

Although our SEO/SEM, IT, and web development firm is in South Florida, we accept clients both nationally and internationally.

31.  Do I need a website?

A website is not a luxury in today’s competitive markets. It is simply a must. Without a good website your business will always be a step behind your competition.

32.  What is the difference between a freelancer & a reputable web development company?

A freelancer is a self-employed web designer or developer who works independently and directly with their clients, while a reputable Design & Development firm is an established company that provides complete solutions for clients. The main advantage of using a firm is that the range of services they offer is much greater and their expertise in each of these services is usually a lot higher due to the fact that they have a team of people behind them. Furthermore, in dealing with a firm, you have the peace of mind knowing that your developers will complete their assigned tasks on time and within the budget and will be there tomorrow when you need to take your web projects to the next level. One main problem a lot of clients have faced in the past when dealing with freelancers is the lack of professionalism.

33.  What constitutes a professional web layout?

A professional web layout is not simply a layout that looks good. It also has to use proper color schemes, be functional and achieve its task of generating income or increasing the awareness of your products or services well.

34.  Is hosting and domain registration included in web development?

Domain registration and web hosting is NOT commonly included in the web development process. However a good development firm will be there to consult you on what domains would be better and guide you through the process in order to achieve the maximum return on the investment you have made in purchasing a website.

35.  What is the difference between Dedicated (Private) hosting vs. Shared Hosting?

Dedicated hosting is when your site is the only site on a given physical server. You may either use a third-party hosting company or opt to host your site on a server on site (not-recommended). Shared hosting is when your site is hosted within a shared environment. In this case, multiple websites will be hosted by the provider on a given physical server. The shared solution is much cheaper than the dedicated solution. However the drawback of the shared environment is that you are compromising on performance and security.

36.  What are LAMP Servers?

LAMP is an acronym for the Linux (operating system), Apache (web server), MySQL Database & Perl, PHP, or Python (scripting languages) used in combination to create a server. These software were not written exclusively to be used together, but their combined solution is very popular in today’s servers. The main advantage of a LAMP server is that it uses all open source technologies that are free of charge. At the same time the LAMP is perfectly suitable for use in small businesses all the way up to large enterprise solutions.

37.  What are Microsoft Servers?

Microsoft web server is one that is setup on the Microsoft server 2003 operating system. Microsoft products, being proprietary software, are quite costly, and many clients prefer to implement the LAMP server. For more information on Microsoft Servers please refer to the Microsoft website.

38.  Where can I find the right hosting package for me?

Hosting is an interesting issue that needs some serious thought put into it. The most important advice you can get in terms of hosting will come from your web developer. Once you have a clear idea of the functions of your website and the type of bandwidth requirements you will have, you can decide whether to opt for a shared or dedicated solution. Once this decision is made you must either select a windows or Linux (LAMP) server. This decision has to be done before your site is developed. Your website will be built according to the hosting environment that you have selected. Since Microsoft is proprietary software while LAMP is open source, you will find that LAMP solutions are generally much cheaper than the Microsoft solutions.

39.  What is FLASH and how does it work?

Flash, in a nutshell, is the common term for Adobe Flash formerly known as Macromedia Flash. This refers to both the player (free to download) and the authoring software used to create the high impact multimedia animations that are viewed with this player.

40.  How much will this cost and what guarantees do I get?

The key to building an effective website within budget restrictions is good planning and a great developer. We can assist you from the beginning of your planning process to the completion of your website in order to maintain solutions that strictly adhere to your budget restrictions and to avoid any surprises that could come up in the future. We also provide our clients with a satisfaction guarantee giving you peace of mind. Therefore, if you are prepared to take your business to the next level, and improve your online marketing, contact us today, and we will be happy to be of service.

41.  Do I Need Web Consulting?

You need web consulting to get more return on your investment in your web site. We can help you to:

The web is a new and different medium for communication and requires a different viewpoint and skill-set to use it in the most effective way. We can help you outline short term and long term goals for your website and then set out to achieve them.

Your site could be working harder for you – let us show you how!