Building a directory, sending out notices about inclusion

- is this a good practice or considered as spam?

[radix]

I'm working on a site, one part of which is going to be a directory of links related to the subject. Relevant websites are being added to the directory as I explore the net in this niche. Inclusion in the dir is free.

To let the featured sites know about their inclusion, I'd like to send out email notices to the contact named on their contact pages. I'm not sure if I should mention that links back to my site are welcome, provided they like the site.

Is it acceptable practice to send out an email about the inclusion? And what about asking for a backlink?

TIA for your thoughts in that matter!

[Rosalind]

Is it acceptable practice to send out an email about the inclusion? And what about asking for a backlink?

It's spam if you added the link details yourself. If someone submitted them through a form and left an email address for you to use then it's good practice to inform them about the link going up.

[ken_b]

Not directly related to a directory, but somewhat on topic.

I have an events calendar that publishers user submitted event info after I review it. I'd suggest sending a "info received" email before letting the posting go live.

Sometimes those "info received" emails bounce. Which is a good reason NOT to post the info online, at least in my opinion.

[piatkow]

If you are sending individual emails and are not asking for anything in return for keeping or maintaining the listings then I would say not spam.

[onlineleben]

build the directory, but don't send inclusion messages.
At least not for those that you found and entered yourself.
Later you might get requests for inclusion and those you can confirm (even with the polite request for a backlink to help their users :) ).

Works for me

[radix]

Hey, thank you all! It's pretty confirmed now that sending out inclusion messages is not a good idea when someone wants to play by the rules. Thus linked sites will recognize their linked status if they check the referrers in their stats :)