Back linking directly to Google directory

Good idea or bad idea

[Florida88]

Someone told me it was a good idea if you have a good ranking in a directory (http://directory.google.com/Top/Regional/North_America/United_States....) (or yahoo, looksmart, dmoz, etc) that putting a back link on you home page to the page you come up on is a good idea.

I have not heard of this before.

Is it a good idea or bad idea, or makes no difference?

[goodroi]

It is a good idea to link to relevant authority sites regardless of them linking to you.

The person who told you to link was probably thinking about linking to the page in order to help the spiders find this link pointing to you. This is not necessary since if it is a good link the spiders already know it.

[skipfactor]

Good idea when your category needs the PR. I link to one of my DMOZ categories because it's a PR3. :(

[steveb]

You don't have to necessarily do it from your main page, but in general this should be standard operating procedure.

[nakulgoyal]

I have a link from my partners page to ODP Category since last 2 years. I dont know if it's good or BAD, but can't hurt...:)

[yintercept]

Doesn't linking back to a directory that lists you make the directory look like the directory is just some sort of two bit link exchange program?

My understanding was that webcrawlers preferred one way links to two way links.

[steveb]

"My understanding was that webcrawlers preferred one way links to two way links."

That is not a good "understanding" to have.

[Total Paranoia]

If your category is a commercial one, you are indirectly linking to and passing PR to your competitors.