Have you ever wondered about the importance of web directories on the Internet? You might think that directories on the internet are just like any other directories you can find out there like phone directories. But web directories have another purpose on the Internet that makes them so important and this importance cannot be questioned. Web directories can help boost your website to appear at the top or first page of search results.

The dream of most webmasters is for their website to appear on the first page of relevant search results when a web user searches for something on the internet. Google, a search engine that provides more than 70% (at the time of writing) of relevant search results on the Internet, uses two methods to determine the list of websites that reach the top of search results . Firstly Google uses PageRank technology and secondly hypertext match analysis, we will focus on the first method which is about PageRank or PR, this is where the importance of web directories comes into play.

Now, how does Google determine the PageRank of a certain web page? Try to imagine that all websites on the Internet are voters and cast a vote every time they create a link from your website to another website. There are many reasons why website owners link to other websites, it can be their importance, weight, relevance, notoriety, usefulness, value, etc. But not all links are counted, if the link comes from a bad neighborhood, that link will be worthless. Now, when Google crawls the Internet, it sees those links (votes) and evaluates them if they are legitimate or not. Links that pass the quality inspection conducted by Google will be used to rank the web pages directed by those links and the more quality backlinks a web page acquires, the higher its ranking in Google.

Acquiring good quality backlinks is not easily achieved, especially if your website is new to the web. Web directories can provide us with these quality links needed to achieve good search engine rankings. But keep in mind that web directories are not automated, they are edited by humans. Before your website is accepted and listed, it will be reviewed by the editorial staff of the directories following certain guidelines and other criteria. Not all directories are free, some will require fees for review and listing services, while others will require your link to be reciprocal, but no matter what, there will not always be a guarantee that your website will be listed. This process is the main reason that search engines honor links from web directories. Acquiring a link from web directories will definitely help increase the chances of your website landing on the top page of search results.