Last Update: Tuesday, January 18, 2005.
In this article, I show you how the Yahoo!
Directory ranks its listings, so you can use this knowledge to get higher
rankings.
First you must understand that Yahoo! is a web
directory, NOT a search engine.
So what is the difference?
Well, search engines, such as Google, index web pages by sending a spider or
crawler out to the web to find, crawl and index web pages.
When a spider finds a web page, it will typically
index the contents of the page's TITLE tag, the body text and sometimes the
A search engine will use the contents of the TITLE
tag as the link title in the search results. The description for a link may
consist of the contents of the
On the other hand a web directory, such as the
Yahoo! Directory, does not use spiders to find, crawl and index web pages.
Instead it relies on web site owners to submit their web sites for indexing.
Here's the important part... so listen carefully!
;o)
The Yahoo! Directory will ONLY use the information
submitted via its How to Suggest
Your Site submission form to create the directory listing title and
description. Did you catch that?
The 4 ranking factors are:
The submission is then reviewed by a human
reviewer to ensure the information submitted is appropriate. Quite often a site
reviewer will edit the submitted information to fit its own editorial
guidelines.
Yahoo! NEVER sends out spiders to gather information
from your web site. So no amount of optimization to your web pages will have
any effect on your Yahoo! Directory listing's rankings.
What this means is that the fate of your site's
ranking in the Yahoo! Directory is dependent on the information you submit in
its site submission form.
In addition, once your site has been accepted into
the Yahoo! Directory, you are stuck with the listing title, description and
ranking.
Unless there is an error in the listing title or
description, or your site has changed completely, Yahoo! will NOT entertain any
changes to the listing. This is straight from the horses
mouth.
If your listing has an error on it, you can make a
change request using Yahoo!'s How to Suggest a Change to Your Yahoo!
Listing form.
Don't forget that Yahoo! charges an annually
recurring fee of $299, for as long as you want your listing in their directory.
For adult web sites, the fee is a whopping $600!
This is why it is essential that you get it right
when you submit your site to the Yahoo! Directory. Because once you've made
your submission, you have to live with your Yahoo! Directory listing for years
to come.
With the Yahoo! Directory being the most popular
directory on the Web, the results could play a major part on the success of
your web site.
I hope that has cleared up the confusion that
optimizing your web site can improve your Yahoo! directory listing rankings. It
won't!
You may like to read my search engine
optimization book, entitled "Search Engine Optimization
Strategies."
Remember, you only have one shot at getting your
Yahoo! submission right!
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About The Author: Michael Wong is a respected