Google devaluing DMOZ and Yahoo directories?

RedEvo · #11 (**permalink**) 07-10-2008, 08:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by meader83

Do you think this could devalue some of the work you SEO guys offer? I notice OWG offers a directory submission service

No, it will make it harder for people to just decide they are SEO's and re-enforce the position of companies like OWG et al. A lot of so called SEO's are simply clueless link spammers and directory submitters.

Bring it on

d

meader83 · #12 (**permalink**) 07-10-2008, 08:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by RedEvo

No, it will make it harder for people to just decide they are SEO's and re-enforce the position of companies like OWG et al. A lot of so called SEO's are simply clueless link spammers and directory submitters.

Bring it on

d

haha. Fighting talk.

The SEO war begins!

Us DIY seo guys will watch from the sidelines

RedEvo · #13 (**permalink**) 07-10-2008, 08:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by meader83

haha. Fighting talk.

The SEO war begins!

Us DIY seo guys will watch from the sidelines

Not at all. I encourage the DIY approach and offer tons of advice for free in our blog - as does OWG and others. Our fees are out of the reach of a lot of businesses meaning they have to DIY and that's all good in my book.

The more people that do SEO properly the better the web gets.

d

24x7 Exchange · #14 (**permalink**) 07-10-2008, 11:29

Yes, there has been a lot of talk about this over the last week. Personally, I think its high time Google put us all out of our misery and answered the question about the value of submission to directories. It can't get much clearer than dropping the recommendation of Yahoo and DMOZ. And if the big two have been dropped, what favour could the others possibly carry?

I think that for a long time now Google has been strategically positioning itself into a completely different method of site valuation. Even backlinks have taken a hit as the webmaster guidelines no longer suggest getting backlinks from high quality expert sites. They now just say to make sure that all the sites that should know about your web pages know that your site is online. So backlinks - yes. But major emphasis - no.

Google have successfully convinced webmasters to install Webmaster Tools and Analytics. With the Sitemap.xml and Analytics telling them all about your site's ins and outs and explicit graphical details of such audacious privacies as your bounce rate, Google now have the power to determine directly how relevant visitors found your site to the term they searched for. So who needs backlinks to determine your sites relevance? No longer Google. WE are directly giving them the information they need to determine where to rank our site in SERPs. See Visio's excellent article about Bounce Factor and Rankings and also that of Internet Business, Why You Need To Understand Bounce Rates.

Also consider the phenomenal rise of social bookmarking. Google searches these networks where internet users can stumble upon and leave unmoderated critique of your site as well as comment on how much they digg your articles or press releases. All of these sites offer the users the ability to tag your site with keywords relevant to them (not what you want to be relevant for) when sharing information about it. So no loner do Google and other search engines need to try and determine how users would appreciate their correlation of your site and a particular keyword term, the users are now directly doing it for them.

Internet Search is moving to a whole new dimension and if you think it's purely about backlinks and on page SEO, you had better start illuminating your mind and getting hip to the new technorati.

Mike Seddon · #15 (**permalink**) 07-10-2008, 19:44

Very interesting point of view and nice linked articles about bounce rates.

Google continues to evolve at a pace.

meader83 · #16 (**permalink**) 08-10-2008, 08:35

Very interesting articles on bounce rates.

I suppose bounce rate is something that a website should always try to improve regardless of rankings.

Is there a benchmark figure for bounce rates which you should aim for or is it dependent on the industry you are targetting? My site tends to vary from between 35% & 45%

24x7 Exchange · #17 (**permalink**) 08-10-2008, 09:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by meader83

Is there a benchmark figure for bounce rates which you should aim for or is it dependent on the industry you are targetting?

There is a benchmarking option within Google Analytics. You can set it to the industry and size of company you wish to be benchmarked against.

Another thing to think about is the fact that your site may inadvertently rank for keywords you're not chasing and these will ultimately increase your site's bounce rate. My site suffers from this on a key word that seems to be searched for by people in Iran (I have no idea why). I imagine that the data from Analytics would then cause my site to slowly decrease in importance for those keywords, and perhaps specifically for that region, while not affecting the ranking of keywords for which my site is relevant and receives fewer bounces for. Of course, all of this is untested but I am keen to start doing some research into this when I can find some time, which of course means never

Kevin · #18 (**permalink**) 08-10-2008, 14:28

talking about jumping to conclusions did anyone even bother to read Google's response to this

deviltronics · #19 (**permalink**) 10-10-2008, 18:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kevin

talking about jumping to conclusions did anyone even bother to read Google's response to this

So what was the response for this from Google? I have found another directory (paid) that I would like to add my site on, but if this is no longer the way forward I'd rather save my money.

I added myself to the Yahoo Directory about 6 months ago after Ray suggested it and I am pretty sure it gave a huge boost to my rankings.

Come on SEO Pro's, put us out of our misery.

Fazza · #20 (**permalink**) 11-10-2008, 20:51

Could be way off the mark but if Google did decide to de value the likes of DMOZ then I wouldnt be to bothered. As the likes of probably so many other visitors to this forum I still havnt been added due to the fact that DMOZ is human edited.

The category I want to be listed for only has three other websites so to me that shouts out loud that there isnt a moderator for that category. Thats the major problem with totally human edited directories as if you have indepth knowledge of the industry what gives you the right to decide whether or not its worth listing.

Get rid of DMOZ thats what I say.