Below is a list of tools and links where you can check valuable information in regards to your website.  You can also use these valuable tools to check out your competition.  If they are ranking high in the search engines, it may not be such a bad idea to follow some of their internet marketing endeavors.  In the links below, we have used WebStar Multimedia as an example.  When you use the tools we’ve suggested, simply replace our URL with yours and drop it into your web browser’s address bar.  

Dmoz Listings

You can arguably say that Dmoz is the best free directory on the net, and probably the most trusted.  To check if your website has been included in the Dmoz directory swap your URL with ours in the following link: http://search.dmoz.org/cgi-bin/search?search=webstarmultimedia.com.

As a Dmoz editor, I can say that the number one thing we look for when editing a website is the quality of the content.  If your content is not original than you will have a hard time getting accepted in this directory.
Yahoo Directory Links

Yahoo Directory is one of the most important paid directories online, along with Business.com.  To check if your company is listed, see the following link: http://search.yahoo.com/search?n=100&dups=1&p=linkdomain:www.webstarmultimedia.com++site:dir.yahoo.com

If your website is not listed, and you’re a non commercial site, than you can submit it for free.  If it is a commercial site, you’re looking at $300US for inclusion.
Yahoo Inbound Links

Yahoo inbound links are a great way to monitor your link building progress.  It’s also a great tool to see how your competitors are building links.  When looking for new ways to build links, I often use the following tool to see who others have built links with: http://siteexplorer.search.yahoo.com/search?p=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.webstarmultimedia.com&bwm=i&bwmf=s&bwmo=&fr2=seo-rd-se.
Who is

Who is tool from Domain Tools provides some potentially useful information about one’s URL and website.  Check out: http://whois.domaintools.com/webstarmultimedia.com to find out about your own URL or someone else’s.

Social Search Engine Optimization, or simply Social SEO has become the new buzzword for search engine marketers.  According to various SEO professionals - directory submissions, link building and other SEO practices are slowly becoming a thing of the past and we must begin moving towards new strategies, if we plan to stay competitive. 

Ideally, you can still carry on traditional SEO strategies, but also incorporate new ones.  If you want to compete in tomorrow’s SEO world, than social SEO might be your best bet.  Social SEO can be defined as a method used to promote your site by creating awareness on social network sites such as Facebook, MySpace, Youtube or bookmarking sites such as Del.icio.us and Digg.  Social media types include forums, blogs, message boards, wikis and pod casts. 

Anyway you can create a ‘buzz’ around your site, you are surely guaranteed to bring in traffic.  If you have good content, people will link to you.  You can even consider Social SEO as a form of link building.

Best way to start your Social SEO campaign is to register on sites such as Facebook, MySpace and create a company or website profile.  Add pictures, write descriptions and put links up to your website.  You can also register at bookmarking sites and ’tag’ your own website.

Just remember, the more profiles you have, the more you ‘tag’, the more traffic you will get…and ultimately, the higher your search engine ranks will be.   

Now that search engines like Google produce accurate search results, more and more users find themselves using a search engine to find what they’re looking for.  So are directories listings completely useless?  The simple answer is: “No…well at least not all of them”. 

What you will find is many ‘General Directories’ out there are loosing their significance.  General directories tend to produce little to no traffic whatsoever.  If you’re submitting your website to a general directory simply for ‘link juice’; don’t be mistaken – major search engines can acknowledge the fact that there is little relevance between your website and the general directory you submit to, and therefore putting very little weight on the link established.  There are a select few general directories that are still worth submitting to.  My top 3 include:

http://www.dmoz.org – Free submission (but probably the hardest directory to get in to), and most likely the most valuable directory link you can create.  If you get into this directory, you are also in Google’s Directory, since Google uses Dmoz results for their own directory.  

http://dir.yahoo.com – This paid submission directory has a recurring annual fee of approximately $300.  Yahoo directory provides a very trusted link and also generates  quite a bit of traffic.

http://botw.org – This paid submission directory has 2 options for payment.  You can either pay a recurring fee of approximately $100, or $250 for a one time fee.  This directory has been around the longest and boasts the fact that they only cater to the ‘best of the web’.  BOTW is a very trusted link according to the search engines.

If you are a business than you might want to look into http://www.business.com. This paid directory is very good for businesses in many industries.  It also has a pricy recurring fee, just like Yahoo!, but has a fair bit of traffic and also provides a trusted link.

The future of directory submissions and link building for search engine optimizers is in niche directories.  By submitting to a directory in your niche market, you are creating links that are much more related to your content and thus more trusted by the search engines.  Ultimately you can expect higher search engine rankings by creating fewer, more trusted links; as apposed to 10 times the amount of less important links.

For example, if you are a Canadian mortgage company you may want to look for mortgage directories or perhaps even real estate directories.  Another good option is to seek Canadian based directories where you can submit your website to.  All these directories would be highly relevant and would be more beneficial than submitting to spammy, general, low traffic directories.

There are a few good lists of directories out there.  One fantastic, but more general directory one is: http://www.avivadirectory.com/strongest-directories/.  

In essence, stick with the top general directories, and search for the niche / relevant directories to submit to.  Directory listings should not be your only means of link building, but should be one of several means of building valuable one-way back links.