I’m a directory owner get me out of here!
Author: Tim NashAre you a directory owner and are you ready for the day that Google stops telling users PR from the toolbar. Most directories make their money based on the PR value while we in the SEO world scoff at the childish mentality for directory owners it’s a 1 way ticket to profit, higher PR means you can charge more for your links. Other then people submitting links most directories receive little to none genuine traffic this makes having a high PR even more vital as its one of the few matrices that is known to many webmasters out there.
So when you see comments like this from Googlers
Given that many of you aren’t so fond of PR info in the toolbar, I’d love to know what feature you would like to see. Mandatory criteria:
- Would have to provide actionable info for webmasters
- Would need to be useful and interesting for the ~99.9% of users who aren’t webmasters
Source - SEO Round table
Its time to be thinking about how you and your directories will cope in the no PR era.
The options
The way I see it their are 3 options when it comes to looking at the future, do nothing, sell or evolve. The first I don’t really see as an option the other 2 are worth considering.
Selling your site
Now would be the perfect time to sell your site, except of course the next PR update is due soon could this be the last? If you sell now you might not get the same price you would have got if the sites PR has risen, but leave it till after the PR update and you will be competing with an array of sites that have just had a good push and the owners want to offload.
Site selling fluctuates just like any other market knowing when to sell can make the difference between a fair price and a good price.
A quick look at sitepoint and Digital Point forums today showed that a PR 4 Directory would go for around $800 a PR 5 in excess of $2000 while a PR 3 would barely make it past the $150 mark.
Therefore we can see that the difference between a PR 4 and PR 5 is quite significant (but so is the work)
A good rule of thumb is to look at the sites monthly revenue and multiply by 12-16 to get an estimate but not all sites reach their estimates.
Evolving
Still with us, then perhaps selling was not the answer then its time to evolve ultimately to stay in the market you will need to add services and value to your site.
Without PR you will need a new benchmark people will be looking to your directory less as a means to direct money earning but to traffic so what can you do?
- Set up a blog, and advertise featured sites on blog post
- Create link or link adsvertising services
- Go social and embrace web2.0
- Something else?
Setting up a blog
The idea is simple create and maintain a blog attached to your directory, instead of the usual google adsense pull featured listings from your directory. Now this only works if you maintain the blog, but a successful blog will encourage users to submit link (it also works for building up those inbound links)
Become a link broker
You have a vast quantity of links and people looking to be advertised why not get into the link brokerage game, offering to match links within the directory assisting in 3 way link building. This can be done on many levels but the simplest is to allow users to opt in to the link broker scheme and then provide them with a list and a controlled way to contact each other. Of course these schemes can get very complicated but just look at Text Link ads.
Going social the web 2.0
Have a look at mybloglog, blog catalog, digg, reddit what do you notice, they are all directories! At their heart the same ideas of directories are their sure the focus has changed but they are still offering links back to the users site. The difference is they do so under the flag of being a community they provide a sense of belonging even if you don’t want to go as far as installing pling or similar think of the ways you can bring the community feel to your site.
Something completely different
Hey its not all about my ideas their are loads of ways to turn your directory into something more, how about a CSS gallery site? what about site profiles and allowing user feedback?
Tell us what your going to do when the end of the world comes (at least for directories)
ctabuk
2007-08-20 11:42:27
Tim, if this is going to happen and I hope it does -then my job as Mod at WPW is going to be hectic - LOL
Good call buddy
admin
from Webdigity webmaster forums2007-08-20 11:47:50
I think there are plenty of ways to evolve a web directory. There are many examples like the sites Tim mentioned, others like the “traditional” social bookmarks, and sites like the million dollar wiki.
If you can’t think of a way to evolve your directory then it is probably better to sell it now
Death of Toolbar Pagerank - WebProWorld
2007-08-20 11:49:27
[…] of Toolbar Pagerank PaymentBlogger » I’m a directory owner get me out of here! I know this guy - I could have posted the link to SEO Round Table - but it’s in there anyway. So […]
Tim Nash
2007-08-20 11:50:00
@CTABUK - don’t get your hopes up there have been plenty of rumours before
@Nick I guess like all things its evolve or die!
Johnty
from SEO Forensics2007-08-20 12:05:47
Why would Google do it though (yeah I know its a rumour) it doesn’t make sense its the biggest pull to the toolbar?
Mind you I think its about time people started thinking about making more out of their directorie, so got to ask Tim are you selling or evolving?
Tim Nash
2007-08-20 12:11:02
@Johnty without getting into the whole PR debate I think the biggest reason is they have to support it and its become a bit of a albatross round their necks. Also its the biggest metric for paid links, which is of course something they have recently come out as being anti.
Regarding selling or evolving the answer is both, I’m getting rid of those sites I don’t think are suitable to evolve and keeping a couple which I’m mutating oddly enough I was doing this already primary due to a large drop in directory submissions which I put down to social bookmarking being so prominent.
The key for me has been selling pre PR update a) no one else is doing it, b) People by speculatively thinking they are getting themselves a good deal they probably have in the short term
admin
from Webdigity webmaster forums2007-08-20 12:12:30
This rumor is very reasonable. It seems that Google is not using pagerank in their SERPs algorithm anymore, so why should they keep it anyway?
ctabuk
2007-08-20 12:14:35
With the number of replies this blog is getting - I expect a PR2 by the end of the day hehe LOL
Tim Nash
2007-08-20 12:15:17
They never did to start
people just misunderstood it, remember PR is nothing but a score it has no ranking (or had) ability on its own, it just happens that many of the factors that make up that score also were involved and some still are with ranking sites in the SERPs
Johnty
from SEO Forensics2007-08-20 12:21:29
@Tim so how are you evolving yours?
@Admin They might not use it themselves but with so many people rightly or wrongly using it I would not want to be the one annoucing the end of the green bah lol
Tim Nash
2007-08-20 12:24:44
hehe what do you want all the secrets, shall I give you the keys to my car as well
I really like the idea of a CSS gallery which is the way one is going, the other I have been adding features to for a while, started with a newsletter, featured site on the front page, articles, members deals etc. Just trying to make it exclusive particularly as its a paid only directory
tomcatuk
2007-08-20 23:46:10
Google won’t give up their gimmick “just like that”. My money would be on the other engines starting similar rank scoring schemes for pages as opposed to G ditching theirs.
Michele
2007-08-21 23:19:07
I started my first directory over a year ago. I had always seen PR as a gimmick that the vast majority of the Internet doesn’t even know exists. Too often, we professional webmasters forget that we are not the only ones here.
If I had to guess, at least 75% percent of the folks who submitted their sites to mine did it not knowing what this whole PR thing is anyway. They do however see the other listed sites getting targeted visitors and their sites rising in the SERPs and realize that my site offers value for them.
And that leads me to the point, yes, finally. In order for any site to survive long-term, it has to offer something of value to visitors and advertisers. Create a directory that can do that and PR doesn’t matter anymore.
admin
from Webdigity webmaster forums2007-08-21 23:26:00
You are right on that Michelle. After all everything is translated to traffic. In fact I saw a big increase in my directory’s paid submissions when I started to display how much traffic we send to each site (in total we’ve sent more than 1,3 million visitors to the listed sites in the past two years)
Tim Nash
2007-08-21 23:37:12
I guess for you Nick the selling point is your traffic but most directories don’t send that sort of traffic, I think its interesting the people who don’t have to worry are the people who are providing a genuine service so it not just another directory.
@Michele I would love to get some hard stats as to what sort of visitors submit to directories I might make a quick survey on one of the directories I’m selling to see if people know why they are submitting.
Michele
2007-08-22 17:09:14
If you do start collecting stats Tim, you have to consider that the two types of directories, general and niche, will yield results that vary greatly.
I’ve not kept track, but I doubt very many people have visited http://www.craftytips.com without visiting one of the listed sites or submitting their site.
While it is harder to get hordes of traffic and submissions to a niche site, I think they are much more PR proof and sustainable.
My niche is one where many of the site owners know they need links but may not know all that much about SEO and SERPs. They can see where their friends and competition have mentioned my site and how I’ve sent almost 4,300 highly targeted visitors and potential customers to just the top 10 sites. It’s far from 1.3 million, but my target audience is much, much smaller.
Like with any type of site, knowing your audience and what they want is key.
And I would agree that displaying the hits for each listed site is a great marketing strategy. They show prospective customers that they are getting more than a link; they are getting targeted visitors.
Tim Nash
2007-08-23 17:10:03
@tomcatuk sorry for the delay in your comment you were caught in Akismet. Yahoo already has a similar internal mechanism but I never meant this to be a PR debate persay but have you seen many Googlers recently defending PR?
@Michele your right their is a difference between a general and niche directory, I have setup a mini survey so when some one submits for a free link they are offered the chance to win a featured listing. I will blog the results.
Olaf Lederer
from PHP rules!2007-09-20 13:01:46
finally we are back to the beginning:
Create usefull sites for the web!
I’m happy I sold my last general directory and kept only a few niche directories. The best thing is that those niche directories are less work
AnnaBella
from Bloggers for Dollars2007-09-27 22:47:36
A phrase I learned from a Real Estate course I took years ago: “A confused mind always says no.”
I think that’s why I’ve been doing nothing for the last few months… I know I want to evolve but I have no idea which direction to evolve in… maybe it will come to me like a lightning bolt one day.
Colin Boyd
from Social Media Marketing2008-02-28 22:53:26
Very nice insight, I doubt that there are an good directories left, does anyone still use DMOZ to find a site?