Webmasters often ask if paid directory submissions worth the money? Of course the answer depends on the directory and the money.
There are two things you can get from a directory: link popularity and traffic. I don't know of any directories that really deliver much traffic. Listings in Dmoz, and the Yahoo directory don't even get me much traffic. Still if you're buying a permanent listing, getting a few visits a year for 20 years isn't so bad. There's little doubt that this is targeted traffic.
Then you want backlinks or link popularity. This depends on the directory and the category where your listing will be placed. The structure of the directory categories will determine if your site will get a top-level listing (one or two clicks away from the homepage) or a deep listing (3 or more clicks removed from the homepage). Then it depends on the number of links on that page. Many paid inclusion directories are selling everypage links, but these are a serious link popularity drain.
So the two main problems with web directories are where your listing will be placed and how much link popularity gets passed on to your site. My solution is to submit to 300 free non-reciprocal directories (with new sites I do 100 submissions a week for three weeks) and choose several paid directories that will place my new site in a top-level category or on a page that has only a few links.
A recent case study revealed that these 300 free directory submissions, combined with one listing in a top-level category of jtrotta.com web directory and one homepage link from a related site produced, in just over a month, over 130 backlinks (according to Yahoo) and led to my site being fully indexed by Google. Search engine traffic has been good, due to high rankings in Google and MSN search results. All this would cost the average webmaster 30.00 for the 300 directory submissions, 69.90 for the top-level jtrotta.com listing, and 45.00/month for the homepage link. The best part is that it required so little of my time.
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