How To Submit To DMOZ -Know The Facts First
Submitting To DMOZ – The Open Directory Project
Open Directory Project (DMOZ)
If you are going to submit your site to the DMOZ directory (Open Directory Project), it will require studying the DMOZ rules on how and where to submit your site. When I say study, I mean …STUDY. This is no exaggeration! Sure the DMOZ dragon (Their Logo) looks cute, but don’t be fooled. This little DMOZ dragon will eat you up, spit you out and never look back after rejecting your website.
So if submitting to the Open Directory Project is such a terrible experience, why bother? Who cares? Is it just pride and bragging rights, or are there other reasons? Yes, pride and bragging rights are always motivation, but there are a other (perhaps more important) reasons why submitting to DMOZ is worth your time:
- Search engines, like Google, use it as part of their ranking system that can help grow traffic to your site.
- Organizations take advantage of free access to the directory’s content to populate their websites, providing additional exposure across niche communities.
- A listing in DMOZ will get you listed in the Google Directory.
- And yes, bragging rights.
Is Your Site Listed In DMOZ?
Since it is not my goal to unnecessarily torture you, before you begin this process go to DMOZ to search for your domain. To do this, search from the DMOZ home page for your domain excluding the “www”.
If your site was not found, but you are still interested in getting your site listed in DMOZ, the first thing to understand is DMOZ is a human edited directory. That’s right, a human editor. An editor who I imagine is ringing their hands together as they pick-a-part the submitted website for typos, missing graphics and broken links. These editors are not just glancing at your site, but evaluating the sites content, or lack-there-of. So “take your time” and double check your sites links. Make sure to go through your site, removing under construction pages and symbols. From this warning comes my advice: start by reading the rules on how to submit to DMOZ; and don’t submit unless you have a few hours.
DMOZ Rules To Submit
Free Link Checker
Once the official DMOZ rules have been read, take a moment to reflect on your site and what needs to be done. As you begin to prepare your site for review, do not assume anything. Check you site with a link checker and use a spell checker to review your site’s pages.
W3C Link Checker
Free Browser Checker
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but overflowing text that makes navigating a site difficult will hurt your chances of getting approved. The best way to ensure your website is displaying properly cross browsers is to use a free browser checker. One note on using BrowserShots, select only the primary browsers or it will take a long time to receive your results (screenshots).
Check Website Pages
The Open Directory Project
I’m sure you are beginning to see that submitting to DMOZ is not a 1-2-3 process. However, hopefully any issues regarding your site are addressed and fixed. Once your site is ready, it is time to concentrate on actually submitting your site. As you may have guessed this process is also filled with potential pitfalls, so make sure you are well rested before proceeding.
Bright eyed and bushy tailed, you are ready for phase two -information gathering. Luckily, in the fight to get your site listed I found an online quasi insider who has shared some great tips. Our informant is an editor of DMOZ, whom provides some tips on submitting to DMOZ.
Finally, here are a few other DMOZ resources:
Lastly, if you have a teen or kids specific site, on November 14, 2000, the Open Directory launched the Kids and Teens directory. DMOZ Kids and Teens
If you have a story about submitting your site to DMOZ we would enjoy hearing from you. Or, if you know of any other resources please comment below.
Hi, nice posts there
hold responsible’s exchange for the compelling word
Thank you for sharing this information.
Hi, Congratulations to the site owner for this marvelous work you’ve done. It has lots of useful and interesting data.
Great article
I unfortunataly made it all correct from the first time, and I see my site yet not listed and the category list very few sites. It seems more kind of cartello thing than a real human checking.
I agree, most DMOZ editors deny or accept a site based on their personal agenda and not on the site’s merit. You can do everything right and still not get listed in DMOZ. The suggestions in this article will only help when submitting to a category that is monitored by an editor that upholds the directories intended purpose.
Hey, nice post, really well written. You should blog more about this.
Congratulations to the site. It has lots of useful and interesting data.
This brilliant idea is necessary just by the way
Nice post.. Thanks for sharing this..
I have personally submitted sites that in my opinion where good to excellent and they never got listed. The web is being taken over by groups that believe they are above criticism and that their opinions outweigh the realities of truth.
Chris.
best way to understand dmoz – thanks, i hope my site get approved
Thank you for sharing this information.
Its true that getting listed in Dmoz is a hair pulling exercise. thanks for the blog post, really useful resources that I am sure i will use more often.
All right, you’ve inspired me to try this.
Hope it goes well. Let us know if you get listed.
I’ll give it a whirl I supposed
Still seriously newbee – but not for long- thanks to blogs like this
Just the info I was searching for tks