Reviews - Lively Web Directory

SevenSeek Web Directory is a search engine which doesn’t contain much identity. Even in its “About” section, there’s just a vague two-sentence philosophy, despite being advertised as one of only three headings on the homepage. The “information light” homepage contains a dozen categories to choose from, and each sub-category has an average of only a few listings, making this a very unpopulated search engine. The good news for listed businesses, then, would be if Seven Seek still received as many page views as their competitors who contain more listings.

One confusing item on the homepage is the “v7n network” listed on the bottom. Without explaining what the v7n network consists of, it simply provides seven links. While six of the links are for other search engines, a random blog page is thrown in as the seventh link. Considering the homepage is very sparse, Seven Seek could have taken the time to label this section better.

One of the three homepage headings is a link to web design tutorials. A big web site error that looms out is not being able to get back to the homepage from any of these tutorial pages, despite a link on each page labeled “home”. The tutorials themselves, however, contain great depth on very unique web design topics.

“How” to add one’s web site listing is the final homepage heading, and this section brings about some more confusion. The main category of “recreation and sports”, along with the specified “aviation” category, are shown right above the submission guidelines, as if they are automatically assuming you are submitting a web site devoted to aviation. To go on, the submission guidelines attempt to explain how to choose your appropriate category by using directions such as “start at the top and work your way down to the most relevant” (how are you going to know the most relevant category until you’ve read them all?).

While Seven Seek does uniquely offer the ability to list one’s web PAGE, along with a web site, this is about the only positive difference that separates them from the competition.

Filed under: Directories on May 22nd, 2007 | No Comments »

Kwikgoblin is a human-edited, family-friendly search engine run by the same people who run Aviva Directory. The site’s web directory is based on a popular directory script called “phplinkdirectory”, which provides fast loading and friendly user interface. Kwikgoblin staff are known for staff-approved resources that ensure quality and spam-free web sites.

Just like Aviva Directory, those who want to list can purchase a “feature link”, or the more inexpensive “regular link” option. Kwikgoblin, however, charges less for both options, at $50 and $25 respectively. And, Kwikgoblin also offers a third option, “regular link with reciprocal”, for just $20. Along with less of a fee than Aviva Directory, Kwikgoblin also offers featured links a more prominent position on the site. Instead of being featured on the specified category page (two clicks from the homepage), a feature link is displayed on the main category page (one click from the homepage), which receives many more views.

Also, similar to Aviva Directory are the two free bonus ways for businesses to be listed, “top hits” and “latest links”, which reward listings who are, respectively, frequently viewed and recently submitted.

As far as extra stuff, while Aviva Directory listed links to blogs on every page, Kwikgoblin is blogless and only provides links to directory “competitors” on its homepage.

Filed under: Directories on May 22nd, 2007 | No Comments »

Avivadirectory.com is a family-friendly, paid search engine which currently contains several thousand listings. To keep quality control, the folks at Aviva Directory only allow web site listings which contain original content and don’t make a living off selling affiliate products through annoying links.

There are two listing types for those interested: “featured link” and “regular link”. The more expensive, effective option is to be a “featured link”. Charging $75/year, Aviva Directory displays these businesses at the top of their specified directory category with a heading stating “featured links”. Also, unlike the cheaper “regular link” option, featured link listings can contain text in their title not found in the official web site name. Finally, a featured link receives five additional links on their listing page, as opposed to the regular link receiving just three. Considering it takes two clicks to get to a featured listing (from the homepage to the category page to the specified category page), and that the average specified category contains less than 20 listings, it probably makes more economical sense to go with the “regular link” option.

Two “free” ways a listing gets more exposure are when they are new or popular. Those who just signed up with Aviva Directory get listed in the “Latest” section, which is one of the main five selections on the homepage. Businesses whose web site is receiving a rather frequent amount of hits are advertised in the “Popular” section, also one of just five major headings on the homepage.

Conveniently, on every page of the site there is an updated list of blogs written by those who run Aviva Directory. Blogs usually contain site-related items such as helpful hints on using Aviva Directory or words of advice on how to promote your online business, but sometimes the writers provide unrelated blogs with the intent on entertaining the reader.

Filed under: Directories on May 22nd, 2007 | No Comments »

Apahcinc is a professionally-edited web directory which contains familiar, quality web site listings. Unlike other select search engines, which have a lot of small-time web sites in their database, a huge chunk of Apahcinc’s listings are either web sites you’ve heard of (Wikpedia.org, WNBA.com) or web sites you automatically trust (NY Times Books, Nutrition.gov).

Right when looking at Apahcinc’s homepage, one notices that each main category contains links below it to a sample of corresponding sub-categories. For example, under “sports” are links to “fishing”, “golf”, “water sports”, and “football”, even though by clicking “sports” you’re then led to 11 sub-categories. This means any sports listing under those four links unfairly receives extra promotion (both via homepage and category page).

While not as unfair, businesses listed on Apahcinc also receive extra promotion if they are applicable to multiple categories. Unlike most other search engines, Apahcinc allows businesses to list their web site in all categories they fall under.

Another big, but more positive thing that stands out on Apahcinc’s homepage is the design, which unlike most other search engines of its kind, contains a pleasant layout that doesn’t resemble that of a “junk” web page. The main source of this is the giant, artistic logo of a nighttime village scene spread across the top.

Otherwise, Apahcinc is close in just about every way to search engines such as Aviva Directory and Kwikgoblin. It contains the familiar “top links” and “latest links” sections within the homepage headings, there are about the same number of categories and web site listings, and submission guidelines run the same (be original, no adult sites, featured links may contain extra text while regular links only contain the name of the web site, etc).

Filed under: Directories on May 22nd, 2007 | No Comments »

Website directories can be a valuable source of information for users of the internet and a good source of traffic for webmasters. Many of the best directories charge a minimal fee for your website listing, whereas other directories may be free or require a reciprocal link. Other directories offer various different fee scales and featured listings as well as other paid type listings such as Web Directory List. At Web Directory List you can have full control on your sites position in the directory by adjusting the contribution according to the rank you want to achieve on the site. Moreover, you can get into the top 10 listing of the directory and get listed in the home page of the site, giving a boost to your traffic and rankings.
Web Directory List is a niche directory and it accepts “web directories” only.If you have a bid directory ,a paid directories or anything that is directory related,it’s okay to get listed.
The owner of Web Directory List is Chris,who runs a PR7 directory - Big Web Links Directory.If you haven’t read my review in that directory,go ahead and read it,you’ll then realize it’s worth getting listed!

Filed under: Directories on May 13th, 2007 | No Comments »