“Good” Free Directories

After the success of “Write a Directory Submission that Gets Accepted“, it’s time I post a list of some of my favorite free directories to submit to.

Once you go through this list, and are ready to jump in and submit your site, please make sure you read the aforementioned article first – there are things that will work, and things that definitely won’t – so it’s important that you’re aware ahead of time.

I’ll be consistently updating this list as time goes on, not only adding, but removing directories that no longer prove to be useful or free.

• MavicaNet – Drill down to the category that best suits your site, and wayyyy at the bottom of the page you’ll find a link that says “Add Site” – click it, fill out the form, and you’re done. Pages are carrying Google PageRank and give direct links (not CGI redirects) to the sites listed. This is a multi-lingual directory.
• Verizon SuperPages.com – Your business could very well be listed here already, but if it’s not, you need to get it in there! (also offers paid upgrades in addition to free listing)
• YellowPages.com – Similar to Verizon’s, but this directory is just related to the Yellow Pages. (also offers paid upgrades in addition to free listing)
• Local.Com – Offers free and paid listings, and will categorize your company based on industry and location.
• DMOZ – There’s lots of buzz around the internet as to whether or not it’s even worth your time anymore to submit to dmoz because there’s no guarantees your submission will ever be seen, or that it really holds any water anymore. I tend to believe that it does, and it is very much worth taking the time to read the submission guidelines if you don’t know them and making a submission.
• All The Websites – This directory’s been around for three years and as all the other “good” directories do, passes along PageRank in the form of direct web links (not cgi redirects or cloaked URLs).
• Gimpsy – Offers paid and free options – the free option is (at the time of this writing) under a delay of about six months. The next step up is only $25 US and might be worth it if you’re feeling like you’re in a rush. Otherwise, just do the free submit.

As would be expected, finding good directories to list your site in, be they free or paid, takes time. If you’re not up for hiring an Internet marketing company to do the work for you, my only suggestion would be for you to be patient, dilligent, and make sure you read the submission guidelines thoroughly for each and every website you choose to submit to.

6 Sites To Help Your Business Blogging Skills

Many of my clients ask me about blogging.

“What the heck is blogging?”

“Should my business have a blog?”

“Why are blogs so popular?”

While I try to answer these based on fact and not so much on opinion (because my opinion sometimes sounds fanatical when it comes to the greatness of blogs), I also try to direct them to some sites that have helped me with my blogging adventures, especially once they decide to give it a shot. Here’s a list of some of my favorite (I’ve got them in my RSS reader so I don’t miss a beat) blog help sites. Please note, these are blogs that are ONLY about blogging, not about working at home as a blogger, or working at home in general. This list is meant mainly for businesses with existing web sites that might want to venture into blogging as an additional part of their current site. I’ll make another list soon for individuals, I promise!

These links will open in a new window, so you can come back to this list after bookmarking, because I know you’ll want to!

• ProBlogger – Darren Rowse is simply one of the best bloggers out there in my opinion. He not only teaches you the basics, but also keeps you posted on generating revenue through your blog via ads of all kinds. He has articles on getting and keeping a loyal readership (as he has thousands of his own), and really does a fantastic job of staying on top of the blogging industry. I can’t say enough good things about him, so just go check it out for yourself!
• Performancing – I really do love the tools available on this site. First and foremost is the blog editing tool for Firefox – you can write to any one of your numerous blogs right from your browser window, without having to go to the site, login, and click through to your “write post” page. Their metrics tools are pretty cool as well – it tracks as many sites at a time as you want, and lets you know how many hits you’re getting, exactly where they’re coming from, what people are searching for to find your site (and what page they land on), and even tracks your Google Ad clickthroughs. There’s also a really great forum and the creators are extremely receptive to feedback and support.
• CopyBlogger – Essentially one of the best blogs on how to write in a blog I’ve seen yet. Focuses on skill, technique, and ways to engage your readers simply by fine tuning the way you write your copy.
• Successful Blog – Liz Strauss takes successful blogging a little deeper by writing about not just writing, but thinking about the plan. “It’s more than a blog. It’s ideas.” is absolutely true of Liz’s site, and it makes a great place to expand your thinking once you feel you’ve got the basics down.
• Business Blog Top Sites – Check out what other business blogs are doing in terms of design, frequency of posts, topics, and more.
• Corporate Blogging Info – This site is no longer updated, but there are nearly two years of posts in the archive here that might be useful to aspiring corporate bloggers.

So there you have it. I could probably list a lot more, but this is good to get you started. Once you start clicking around, I’m sure you’ll find more too. Let me know in the comments if you think there are any that really should be listed here, and I might do a “Part II”.

Anubis Marketing and Our Clients

It’s unfortunate that this needs to be said, but due to some recent attacks both here and elsewhere on the internet, I’ve decided to write the following post. This is posted in the interest of my clients, and those interested in the services provided by Anubis Marketing.

• I will ALWAYS seek complete and thorough information before implementing anything on a client’s site. I am devoted to the fact that my clients deserve nothing but the best in terms of my knowledge and skill.
• Be it full-blown software or a snippet of code, and regardless of whether or not it’s open source, free or paid, I reserve the right to ask a question of the creator, especially when all other avenues of seeking complete information have failed.
• I have never, and still do not hold issue with paying for support or outside help with a project. It’s been done before, and will be done again. For the interest of my clients, I will make sure that the person or company that I trust to help is reliable and knowledgable.
• I believe that simple questions with simple answers deserve to be handled with respect and understanding. Never should they result in “flame wars” or personal attacks on one’s intelligence or credibility. They should especially not result in harassing phone calls and suggestions of violence toward someone based on their thoughts or opinions, or their lack of pre-existing knowledge. Not everyone can do everything perfectly – and just as we learn, we have a responsibility to be grateful to our teachers, and a willingness to teach others.

No matter what, my clients deserve nothing but the best – whether I need to pay for it or not. I’m not above it, and will always support those who continue to share their knowledge and experience with the world both financially and verbally.

Thank you,
Lara

Buzz Words: Internet Marketing

Wikipedia says the following about Internet marketing:

Internet marketing is the use of the Internet to advertise and sell goods and services. Internet Marketing includes pay per click advertising, banner ads, e-mail marketing, interactive advertising, search engine marketing (including search engine optimization), blog marketing, and article marketing.

This is essentially how I’ve always viewed Internet marketing in terms of what I do for a living. However it seems that lately there’s been a change in the way that phrase is used. I see lots of “Internet marketers” out there – but for the most part, they are individuals selling e-book courses and using what are called “squeeze pages” to do the majority of their marketing. They use phrases like “list building” and “joint ventures”, and charge you anywhere from $19.95 to several hundred dollars, sometimes over a thousand, to “teach you the secrets of success”.

While I don’t have a huge problem with these types of “businesses”, I’m kind of feeling a little like they’ve ripped a phrase that’s been used for years to define one type of business, and are twisting it around to be something completely different.

Can an individual learn to market their business online, by themself? Sure they can. Will one of those e-book courses teach them? Not necessarily – I think it would depend on the business. If you’re selling an e-book, and that alone is your business, then yes, you could probably learn something. But if you’ve got a bricks and mortar store, or a company that offers services as opposed to tangible goods, then you’re going to need a little more than just learning how to write a good sales pitch or find people to sign up for a joint venture, or how to build a list of subscribers to your email newsletter.

Some of the individual things I do as an Internet marketer for my clients are far beyond the realm of what’s written in these books. Some of those things, I don’t do at all, because they either don’t fit the scope of what the client’s needs are, or I don’t feel that they’re worth the effort, and would rather use the time more wisely. Part of being able to run a successful Internet marketing business is the fact that I’ve got over five years of experience doing this, and I’ve spent that time watching and learning about what works and what doesn’t. Does Mr. Businessowner have that amount of time to spend, in lieu of the money he’s spending on those e-book courses and emails subscriptions? I think not. I do what I do so that the business owner can focus on what he or she knows best, the business.

In the end, I guess those types of courses and sessions have their place – but it bothers me that there’s too much potential for confusion between what they teach, and what companies like Anubis Marketing do. REAL Internet marketing doesn’t involve a website (or worse, a single page) chock full of keyword-rich articles and affiliate links and Google ads to make money. It’s not something that happens overnight, and it’s not for those seeking a “get rich quick” opportunity. It should be an accompaniment to all other classic, standard forms of advertising for a full-fledged business.

What do you think of the phrase “Internet marketing”? Do you agree that it’s being misused at times, or do you feel that it’s a broad enough phrase to cover both kinds of approaches? Let us know in the comments.

Ask Anubis Marketing: Is this for real?

Today’s question hails from {site removed for privacy} Don:

Don asks:

[Company name removed] is offering to sell me keywords for $800 each. They say that my site will pop up on top of all results IF the searcher has downloaded their program. They say over 10 million people have it loaded already. What can you do for me for that much money?

Don, thank you for your question!

If I understand this correctly, they’re offering to sell you ONE keyword for $800, and that the only way your site will show up is if the person searching is using their “special” program, right?

And over 10 million users? Wow, that’s a lot, considering their domain was only registered in May of this year, their Alexa ranking is close to one million (which essentially means that they are the one millionth (1,061,673 to be exact, as of today) most popular site on the internet).

I have a hard time believing this will do you or your site any good at all, for a bunch of reasons. First and foremost that I’ve never even heard of that company, nor have I ever heard of that tactic to get clients. What it sounds like is the old quacky emails people would get offering them “150 links to your site for $99!”. Okay, but what kind of links? Are they relevant to my niche? Are they all hosted on the same server, and owned by the same company? That last one was so typical at one point, where I’d get requests for link exchanges for a client who owned a bed and breakfast on a supposed dental resource site!

Another thing I found, was that according to Google, Yahoo, Alexa, and MSN – there are NO sites linking to them. Not a single one. Wouldn’t you think that if a company’s service were THAT well used, and THAT fantastic, that people would be linking to it?

Here’s the bottom line – if it sounds like anything other than natural, organic listings in the search engines that EVERYONE uses, it’s more than likely some sort of scam that’s not only NOT going to get you what you could get by hiring a real SEO/Marketing company, but it could wind up hurting your site in the long run. The search engines are well known for penalizing sites that use trickery or sneaky tactics for getting listings. Is that what you want for your company? I doubt it.

Depending on your site’s current listings, current rankings, and where you’re willing to make changes, as well as your budget, we can develop a plan to get you NATURAL results that are available to anyone and everyone using the search engines (as they are, without “special software”) to find you, as well as people who are using directories or other authority sites to find you. And it might even wind up being less money!

(Don, I’ll be contacting you privately to discuss what Anubis Marketing can do for you “for that kind of money” since it largely depends upon your site specifically.)