Crap Directories
Some people buy a directory script, create a ton of categories, and then only add links if people buy them. The problem with this is that many categories will not have unique content. Many of these same directories will list any business that wants to pay for a link.
If there is no unique content, or if the content is all sponsored links, the site does not add value, and search engines may not want to index it. When looking at a directory, ask yourself, if you were a search engineer, would you want to count links from that site? Would you want to allow that site to influence your search relevancy algorithms?
You can view how many pages Google knows about from a directory by searching Google for "site:www.directory.com".
Some directories (such as SevenSeek) do not have many listings as compared to the number of pages in their site. This will cause some search engines to either avoid indexing the site or only index a small portion of it. The index saturation of a site in Google can be found by searching for "site:www.directoryURL.com
Signature text for a site is any common text that appears on every page, such as the copyright. Sites that consist of many pages with the same or similar content may trip duplicate content filters. If you run a directory make sure you do not let search engines index the "add URL" pages.
If you are using a content management system for your site, make sure you are not accidentally offering search engines the same (or near same) content at multiple URL variations.
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