Have you had trouble getting your site listed on the major search engines? It's a Herculean task. You go through the usual channels, and you submit your site, sometimes to each search engine one at a time. But how effective is that?

I did not have any luck with that method, but I recently did a search on Yahoo for my site, and it finally came up months after I had submitted it. But a closer look showed that none of the URL's listed were mine! Yahoo hadn't listed my site because I submitted it; Yahoo listed it because it was listed on other sites! While the other major search engines were a bit more generous, the same was true of them: most of the links for my site weren't mine. So, I concluded the only way to get my new URL listed was to list it with other sites, namely directories. I started with the six sites that came up in Yahoo and submitted my new URL to them. I figured if it worked once... Then I checked other search engines to see where they picked up my URL. I have read that sometimes URL's are picked up from posting in forums, but many won't let you "advertise." The one site that had two listings was for my directory listing at Zing.com. Create free photo albums at Zing; if you have a business, you can put your products up, list your business and include a short description in the Zing directory. Make sure you put your URL into your virtual photo album and in your directory listing; if the search engine link goes to the Zing page, and your URL is listed, they can still reach you.

Another crucial directory to add your site to is the Open Directory Project (Dmoz.org/add.html). Many search engines, large and small, gather their listings from the Open Directory. My Open Directory listing came up repeatedly on the search engines. Plus, the more search engines you are listed on, the more search engines will pick up your listings. For example, getting listed in directories helps you get listed on major search engines; smaller search engines mine the larger search engines, by performing metasearches, for their listings.

But listing yourself on smaller directories is beneficial too, because the major search engines mine those. For example, in my case, a link I submitted to DogPages.net, was picked up by most, if not all, of the major search engines. To find directories to list your site, punch into the search engines keywords related to your site and see which URLs or sites come up. Check particularly into directories who will let you list your URL for free. It's time consuming yes, but it works. Many directories let you submit your link, either as free for alls or reciprocal links.

Another place to start from is www.directoryguide.com, which is what it says, a guide to directories; you can also check keywords at Yahoo, and look under the "directories" category. Some directories, like www.christmasgiftstores.comand www.heryellowpages.com let you post a link at a nominal cost. My own such links came up frequently in my searches so it was worth a small fee.

I signed a guestbook once on a local "hometown" site and that, too, came up repeatedly in my search. And for every contest I've ever sponsored, there were links to those pages on the search engines! Some sites that accept contest sponsors are KeystoneConnect and All-About-Babies.

And lastly, I once did a search for something else and there were multiple listings for one particular article that had been "reprinted" on numerous web sites, so another good way to get listed is to submit an article like this one! It takes time, but costs nothing. The rewards could mean the difference in sales. Good luck!

Here are a few more free directories where you can submit your site, just to get you started:

www.madeinusa.org
www.magnoliaink.com
www.herplanet.com
www.digital-women.com
www.sheknows.com
www.womensnewsbureau.com
www.couponmadness.com
/www.happyhippie.com
www.pleides-net.com

Top Sites at Moms Network Exchange:
www.momsnetwork.com/topsites

Women's Resource Center and Moms Network Exchange both let you create free virtual business/personality cards—mine were repeatedly picked up by the search engines:
www.resourcewomen.com/bizcard/create.html AND
www.momsnetwork.com

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