Jul
28Getting Quality Inbound links
Tags : To Do Posted in: New Software Releases Search Engine Optimisation
In a comment on an earlier post there was a question about getting inbound links. Well, getting links to a website is one of the most time-consuming and difficult activities when first trying to make a site rank well in SERPs. Although web directories are not as useful in this regard as they were a few years ago, they can still be a good way of getting backlinks. I’ve come across websites that have a PR of 3 and don’t appear to have backlinks from anything other than web directories.
When it comes to submitting your website to a directory, you soon find the process a bit laborious if you do things totally by hand. There’s a lot of copying and pasting and selecting of categories - it takes a long time. The alternative is to pay someone to do the job for you. The problem with this is that you can never be sure they put your sites into the best categories. You might also want to be in control of the sites you submit to. For example if you hire someone to submit to 500 directories and you only get accepted in 10% of them then you need to avoid submitting to the same directories in the future.
SliQTools now offer a free directory submission tool that combines the best of both worlds. The tool greatly speeds the process of submitting to directories. You set up your website details with a number of alternative descriptions and titles (anchor text) then start loading directories one by one. All you need to do is enter any required CAPTCHA to complete the submission process. Sometimes there isn’t even a CAPTCHA to enter. The directory submission software will also help you select categories. You can specify up to 6 possible categories that SliQ Submitter will try and match when loading a directory page. Currently the tool support 450 directories but will support up to 2500 in a release later this month.
by ML
Whats CAPTCHA stand for ?
OK I looked it up
Oh no, my laptop has only a 1024 x 768 screen resolution, can’t see some of the things in your app
Perhaps it would be a good idea to populate the category lists, but make it free text too.
At the moment, I’m thinking I’m going top have to visit lots of sites to discover what categories to use.
I see the first directory requests a reciprocal links and a url to prove it.
From a sales point of view I also considered a links page to look unprofessional.
Maybe it could be out of the way on a links page which is only linked from the site map ?
A lot of directories fish for reciprocal links - it’s up to you whether you want to give them one. Personally I don’t give them a link back. If the directory insists on it skip to the next one - there are a lot of directories that don’t mind.
Many, if not all, directories have the recip. field on the submit form. Just leave it blank. I’d also skip any that require payment.
A mod I might put in a later release is to categorise into recip needed/ paid only/ CAPTCHA needed etc. so people can refine the directrories they load.
The problem with all such tools as SliQ Submitter is that when you are dealing with 1000s of sites the odds that the sites remain static is lower. What I mean is that free directories become paid directories or directories simply go away.
Good point about the category text. Trouble is the possibilities are endless as there is no standard set of categories - though admittedly some are more common than others.
As for the screen size - I need to start testing on smaller screens - I forget some people have lower-spec. kit!
Out of interest, I just saw this thread on DP:
http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=954857
which shows how directories can still help with PR … and PR should help with search results …. which should help with visitors … which should help with sales.
I didn’t think PR3 was that hard.
Sorry - don’t understand the previous comment.
Should read…
I didn’t think PR3 was that hard, to achieve.
I guess will all of my sites the main pages have been software product pages and I’ve submitted pad files, which will produce a lot of links back.
Effectively you’ve done directory submissions but to shareware archives. However these days more and more shareware sites are going nofollow - like yours and mine!
Hmmm, yep I can see that.
But I don’t think many sites will be a clued up as that.
I know its suicide not to keep up with SEO but, I think most shareware sites are just hobbies and this kind of thing will be over looked.
However, I do think having as many good inbound links can only help.
You say later in the month… 2500 sites…
I notice you have more that 450 now.
Is your prog stable?
I don’t mean to sound rude?
Is it finished, apart from tweak?
This I might hang on for a bit of hand holding as I’m a bit confused, I guess this discussion will help you too.
Look at the big boys and they’re all nofollow. The older PADKit ones, i.e. the ones on a shoestring budget, aren’t nofollow on the whole.
What I’m noticing is that screensaver companies submit hundreds of “programs” and seem to end up with PR 6 or 7 as a result. I’ve begun blacklisting some of them.
I was thinking of adding a shareware submission feature into SliQ Submitter.
Yeah..
Oh.. I don’t know whether I told you before, but you need to have your site added to submitter programs already available. I did this years ago. Thats why I’m always edgy about altering my authors page.
I must admit, I’ve done some simple things in the past to stop spammers.
When I get round it it, I’m going to do a group query on the most programs authors have. Then set a limit. However I identify unique authors by email address. So its not a fool proof plan.
When I move the softtester database onto the web, I did this query and deleted / black listed certain domains with lots of programs per author.
I guess another another plan, which is a lot more complicated, is to log the submission day and the IP address and compare other things to determine unique authors.
However as I say, I’m going to action my first plan anyway.
Looking good.
I’m currently using your Submitter program. Much better with the category matchings
One small point, its a windows standard that you select the whole text field when you click on it, I think, its very handy, i do it.
Another feature you COULD consider, is adding FTP functionality, to add back links. That would be very nice
Where did you get the buttons and the fancy toolbar ?
Oh one more point, if you double click the title bar it should maximize, although this could be a problem specific to my dual monitor setup.
Had a few more ideas.
How about after you click submit, you lift the text of the result screen and check to see if the submit has occurred successfully. Then you could invoke your ‘get next site’ code and make the process even quicker. Of course this would mean you’d have to go round all those sites and get the text they use.
Since this isn’t going to be a constant thing, I guess sites as a whole will change from time to time, you should probably have a ‘report error with site’ feature, so you can stay abreast (love that word
) of site changes.
In fact you should probably put the site data in a file on your website. So people can get updates without having to download your program. I sort of do this myself, if I make a breaking change in Ideaspad I update a database version number, which then stops people using old ideaspad with a new database.
Finally, I noticed you increment your filenames, this isn’t a good idea in the long run with your pad file, you want to stick with a generic name. My MDBSecure fille is something MDBS103.exe and has been for sometime
Lets discuss these ?
The features for are all valid and if I decide to take the program further then I may add such features. Time, time, time … RoboSoft and other progs do just these kinds of things but I bet maintaining them is a full-time job. Of course, another angle could be that I could put a page on my site where people can report probs or suggest directories for addition. This will get me more visitors - which is the only purpose of the program at the moment.
For the EXE naming, how about doing a new blog post specifically on that topic? This post has 19 comments now and EXE naming will be off-topic for the post.
OK
One more thing, an up and down button on the categories screen would be good, so you can have preferred selections.
Is there any harm using the same email address for my different sites?
There shouldn’t be any harm in using the same email - it won’t get published.
I have some new ideas
For those sites which there isn’t a catcha and you’ve managed to populate the category why don’t you programmatically click the submit button. I can give you the vb.net code for that I might even be able to translate it for you.
As your now using pretty successfully gaining the success post page, you could have an unattended mode, when you let the program do what it can.
You could track what sites you have detected the success message and add a flag to your directory listbox to say success.
I’m not sure how you track the success post page now, but if you have a site type, e.g. this kit site or that, but if you have it would make it easier to only auto-visit none captcha sites.
What do you think ?
Another idea I had, again if you know the site type, you could add this is a field in your directory listbox and allow people to filter the type of sites they’d like to submit to. If you didn’t go with the unattended idea, you could allow people to select only sites without captcha.
I guess you could easily gain this information if you let your program iterate through all the directories you have looking for site type specific traits.
Thoughts?
I think this would be a logical next step. Clicking the button isn’t a problem, I could do that OK.
As always, time is the key - I need to have time to work on it.
I also want to add more directories. I was planning to review more directories and add these in the next 1 or 2 weeks.
OK another idea.
This is inspired by my SEO book, which says to add a few inbound links to your site every week.
With this in mind…
How about a command line parameter, which invokes a new mode. The program and command line parameter could then be put in the windows scheduler to pop up on say Friday afternoon.
The program mode would then show 3 directories and allow the user, if required to enter catpcha.
I know this should like quite a weird idea and you may no consider a few links each week that important.
But I thought I’d air this idea with you, see what you think.
What you working on next with your submitter?
?
Hope your working on automation
I”d just like to disagree with our thoughts earlier, I’m submitting another site, I’ve been rejected on some site for using the same email address.