Is it worth paying for all those Directories?

Yahoo, 299.....

[bullneedsapic]

I have a new site that I'm looking into directories. I guess my first question is do they help? Second it seems like quit a few directories are charging anywhere from $299 to $20 bucks a year. Is it worth paying for the better ones like Yahoo, maybe joeant and others. And third is their a good site to find directories for my niche that is in the healthcare industry.

[Event_King]

You certainly want to target your site as much as possible, 100% target it if you can. The majors will charge many £££££££, and will provide General traffic mostly, so use sites in your industry, as they will cost less and be better. UK sites should target UK sites to advertise in etc etc.

You can either pay for the links/ads or spend much time doing exchanges. Some sites have had considerable success early on but this isn't for everyone and these sites are probably so good anyway, that once a few thousand links are obtained, other sites link automatically as the content is so good.

But basically you need very good content, a great fresh idea that offers a service people badly need, and a viral marketing system. In order for a site to take off, will need a ton of links pointing to it.

I'd say about 5,000ish is okay for starters. Getting the first 300 is quite easy, as directory submissions will do that. Links exchange sites can provide some free exchanges also, but they won't all be targeted.

If you want free links? Then other than the link swap strategy, I dunno. Obviously swapping links is 100% free and that's nice, but you'll find a lot just won't give you the time of day if you're new and not established. Directories give brand awareness, but you actually want ROI - you need cold hard cashflow.