10 Mistakes to Avoid When Setting Up a Link Directory

admin    Buy Inbound Links     Avoid, Directory, Link, Mistakes, Setting

10 Mistakes to Avoid When Setting Up a Link Directory

10 Mistakes to Avoid When Setting Up a Link Directory

When adding a link directory to a web site there are important
mistakes to avoid, or else you’ll be storing up big problems for
later on. I know, because I made some of these mistakes and
didn’t have anyone to offer any advice or tell me what I’m about
to tell you.

Don’t create a directory page with all your links on one
page. You should have no more than 30 – 40 links to a page.
The reason is that some sites will not link to you if a page you
put their link on has too many links, because it dilutes the
value of the link to them. To understand why, you need to know
about Google Page Rank and how it’s passed to another site from
your link page. That’s a subject too lengthy for this topic.

Plan your link directory on paper first and decide what
names you are going to give each category in your link
directory. Make the names fit with the theme of your site and
try to avoid adding categories which are nothing to do with what
your site is about.

For example if your site is about Making Candles and Candle
Accessories, don’t have link categories for Computers &
Games, or Search Engine Optimization etc. The reason is that if
you want your site to achieve a good ranking with the search
engines your site should be built tightly around your theme, in
this example Candles.

Only link to web sites that relate to your site theme and
have something to offer your visitors. This refers to item 2. If
you don’t have categories for unrelated topics, you’ll be less
tempted to link to them because you don’t have a category to put
them in.

Choose names for link categories that you want to use now and
in the future, because you can’t easily change them later
on. Once the pages are created by your link manager software, it
will use the category names you give it. So if you have a
category called “Candle Power” it will create an html page
called Candle-Power.html or something similar, using your
category name. Once this page is found and indexed by the search
engines, in time it will gain Page Rank.

If later, you change the category name to “Candle Lights” the
link manager software will create a new page called
Candle-Lights.html and you will lose the page rank you had
gained for the earlier page. If your link partners linked to you
because the page you put them on had a good page rank, renaming
the page will cause this page rank to fall to zero. As a result
your link partners may drop the link they have back to you,
which is not what you ever want to happen.

Avoid having sub-categories or sub sub-categories in your
directory from your main category pages. The reason for this
is again to do with how search engines will rank your directory
pages. If your directory pages are more than two levels or two
clicks away from your main index or home page they will either
not be indexed by some search engines, or if they are indexed
they will achieve a lower ranking. Some web sites will not link
to you if the page you are to put the link on is more than 2
clicks away from your home page because these webmasters know
what I’ve just told you.

Ensure each page of your link directory has a link back to
your home page. Once again the reason for this is to do with
how search engines will rank your directory pages, so make sure
these links are in place.

Don’t be obsessed at linking only to web sites that have a
good ranking with the search engines. Look first at whether
the site has anything to offer your visitors. If it has poor or
unrelated content don’t link to it. If it has good related
content that compliments your own content but has zero or low
page rank, consider linking to it. Later on you may be glad you
provided a link, when it’s page rank improves.

Don’t use link directory software that doesn’t automatically
check links to your web site are still present on the other
sites. Doing link checking manually can be tedious and you have
to remember to do it. Software that you can set a schedule to
check links and automatically send out emails to webmasters when
links are not found will save you a lot of time. Link management
software that will automatically suspend links and delete them
if they are repeatedly not found is an added bonus.

Don’t use standard templates that come with any link
manager, link directory management software. You need to
modify these templates to match the look and design of your own
web site. This requires you know something about editing a web
page using an HTML editor. Also don’t use the standard email
templates, personalize them in some way, even if it’s only to
add your name.

Don’t assume you’re finished once you’ve set up your link
directory and done all the things I’ve said. You must test
and retest every aspect to ensure everything is working
properly, before visitors arrive.

This means making an add a link request, as if you were a
visitor to your own web site. Setting up test links and making
sure these links are being checked by the software so it detects
when links are removed or defective. Making sure it sends out
email notices correctly and check the formatting is correct when
they are received. You should also check you can make backups of
your link directory database and be able to restore it in the
event of a problem.

If you enjoyed this article please consider sharing it!