Posted on: 25 November, 2001
Author: Ed Burnett
Without a doubt, Yahoo is the single most ... ... on ... Not only is Yahoo the most popular portal on the Web, it is alsoone of the few large Internet ... to actually turn a Without a doubt, Yahoo is the single most important directory on theInternet. Not only is Yahoo the most popular portal on the Web, it is alsoone of the few large Internet companies to actually turn a profit. Since areal Yahoo employee carefully reviews every submission, and each site mustpass their stringent requirements, it is also the hardest one to get listedin.With their new Business Express program and a one-time-fee of $199, you areguaranteed a review of your site within 7 business days. In fact, all sitesof a commercial nature are now required to submit their site through thisservice. However, your non-refundable payment of almost $200 up-front stilldoes not guarantee that your site will be included in the directory. If yoursubmission is rejected, you get to make one appeal for Yahoo to accept yoursite. Once it is rejected the second time, Yahoo will never again acceptfurther submissions of your site. So how does one succeed in getting listedwith Yahoo?1. First, make sure your site is not already included in the Yahoodirectory. Do a search from their main site (or regional portal, ifapplicable) to determine if your companys web site is already listed. Ifyou are, you can request changes to your listing if you feel it is listedinappropriately. Submitting a site that is already in the directory is agood way to get ignored. Also note that Yahoo uses the Google search engineto search the net for sites if it doesnt find any matches in its owndirectory. If your site isnt listed under Yahoo Site Matches but shows upunder Web Page Matches, then youre probably not listed in the directory.This often tricks people into thinking that they are listed in Yahoo whenthey really arent.2. Yahoo has strict requirements on the actual design of your site. Makesure your site is 100% completed, hosted on a reliable server, with nomissing hyperlinks, broken images or under construction pages. They alsolook for unique content and a descriptive page title. Dont use apromotional blurb for your sites title and description. Yahoo does not likehype, period. Rather, your title should have nothing more than your companys name and a brief description of your services or products.3. After you have determined that your site is indeed not listed in theYahoo directory and you have designed your site to comply with theirrequirements, you will need to find an appropriate category to list yoursite. Take your time and explore all of the different categories andsub-categories of the index. This is very important, because if you submitto the wrong category your site will be rejected. At the very bottom of thepage (and sometimes also at the top), there will be a Suggest a Site link.If there is no such link, then you are probably viewing a category that doesnot allow submissions. After clicking this link, you will be brought to theSuggest a Site page, or directly to the Business Express page if you aresubmitting to a Business category.4. Be sure to carefully review all of their suggestions on site submissionsbefore proceeding. You will be prompted for, among other things, your site'sTitle, URL, and Description. Carefully fill these out, double-checking yourinformation for accuracy. Take some time with your description and rememberto include crucial keywords related to your services or products. Give somethought as to how a Yahoo editor might edit it down. Try to word yourdescription so that it is as concise as possible, and therefore hard to makesmaller.After you have filled out all of your information and submitted your payment(if using Business Express), keep your fingers crossed and patiently waitfor their answer. Its true that you risk loosing $199, but Yahoo is simplytoo important to pass up. Following these suggestions will greatly improveyour chances of getting accepted into the Yahoo! directory. Source: Free Articles from ArticlesFactory.com