Why and How to get listed in Dmoz Directory?

Today I am going to talk about one of the most common problems that people and businesses faced a few years back, which was to get listed in the DMoz Open project directory. The reason I thought to write about this topic again is because yesterday I received an inquiry from one of the potential clients who was asking me what I am going to charge to get his business included in DMoz directory.

I did a bit of research and thought to write a complete post of whether or not it is important to get a link from Dmoz and how to actually get your website included in Dmoz.

Dmoz Link is it of any worth?

This is the real question! In August 2012 Barry of Search Engine Roundtable discussed a thread on his blog that talks about why Dmoz link is worth less and how people are not witnessing any SERP improvement even after their website got listed in Dmoz directory.

In my opinion Dmoz link in 2014 still has worth and businesses should invest their time in including their website in to it. There are two major reasons why they should do that.

People Still Trust Dmoz

Let’s suppose for a moment that Google and other search engines are not giving much importance to a link coming from Dmoz directory but REAL users, even in 2013 trust Dmoz and if your website is listed in that directory, they tend to trust you and will possibly convert in to leads which will have a direct impact on your business sales.

Quality Directories still have value

Ask any expert link builder and he will tell you that directories may not have that impact as they had a few years ago, but directories still are the best place to start. If you have a list of quality directories, you should invest your time adding your website link to the ones which could be a better directory then Dmoz itself.

How to get Listed in Dmoz-Ways?

A normal (not really high quality directory) take 3 to 6 months of time to get your website included in their directory; so is the case with DMoz, where every link is manually checked, it is fair to take a year or more before your website actually gets listed .

Dmoz is tough but there are ways that you can try to get your website listed in Dmoz. Here are the 3 ways that you can use in order to include your business website in Dmoz.

Submitting a request

The most common way! The idea is to make changes in your website, according to the standards set by Dmoz, submit the form given on the website, choose the most relevant category and then wait for their manual editor to review your website and add it accordingly.

The idea sounds simple but this needs a year or more of a wait until your website gets approved by Dmoz editor. If you have that much of patience then you should go for it, but normally, businesses do not have this much of patience and they try to find other ways to get quicker results.

Outreach to the Dmoz editor

This is a bit of a difficult idea but still works for those who are good at outreaching and building connections. The idea is to find the Dmoz editor, outreach and build connections with him, and request them to manually review your website and accept for the most relevant category accordingly.

The problem is that there is no search engine from where you can find the Dmoz editors for your relevant category. Usually, they don’t even openly declare that they are the Editors at Dmoz so it is difficult to find one, but if you can, you should and make your website go live in Dmoz.

Become a Dmoz editor

This is one of the powerful options in all that might need more efforts then usual, but the results are just phenomenal. The idea is to send an application to the Dmoz group to become an editor and then add your website accordingly.

You might have to write a powerful application (may be more than one), in order to convince the Dmoz group to make you the editor, but once your application is accepted, the inclusion to the Dmoz is guaranteed.

No matter what way you choose to get your website included in Dmoz, it is good to try and invest your time to get listed because there are other factors then just ranking that are playing their part which can help you get better leads for your business.

That’s it! Enjoy and Please share this blog post with your friends etc.