Web Directory is a common term for SEO professionals, webmasters and online advertising experts. A Web Directory is a type of website allows users to browse through links based on relevant categories as well as users can submit links to the relevant categories through a web form or email. The fundamental logic behind web directory development is publishing website links and short descriptions taxonomically. The term Browsing is chiefly associated Web Directories and Searching is associated with Search Engines so far as World Wide Web is concerned. There hundreds of thousand web directories active on internet. DMOZ, Yahoo Web Directory and BUBL are some of the popular web directories.

DMOZ, also otherwise known as The Open Directory Project (ODP), is one of the largest categorized directories of websites and pages, which is maintained by volunteers. Every website and page that is added to the directory is manually reviewed before it is included to the directory. The listing of a website in DMOZ is absolutely FREE. Let’s learn some of the interesting facts about DMOZ.

The ODP (Open Directory Project) is the largest human-edited web directory on internet. Some of the popular web portals and search engines like AOL Search, Netscape Search, Google, Lycos, Alexa and HotBot use DMOZ’s data.

People behind DMOZ

The Open Directory Project is hosted and administered by Netscape Communication Corporation. ODP is primarily a self-governing community of netizens. "Through a system of self-governance, the ODP volunteer editors manage the directory’s growth and development, and through a system of checks-and-balances, ensure the directory is of superior quality." (Courtesy: DMOZ.org)

DMOZ is an acronym for Directory Mozilla. The association of the term "Mozilla" with Directory is a clear indication of its Open Source aspect like the Open Source browser attempt as Mozilla Firefox. The term Mozilla represents the popularity and growth of Open Source projects.

Yahoo Vs DMOZ

Yahoo! Web Directory is developed and managed by small group of paid professionals. But DMOZ exceptionally does well with small staffs and still manages to retain its quality as well as its huge database.

DMOZ is developed and maintained by a continuously growing community of netizens who are highly skilled and well exposed in their respective fields of interest. Such a vast community of volunteers and the global scope of the Directory has been the success secret behind maintaining quality of the directory. "Given this vast community of subject expertise and the global nature of the directory, there is always someone working on the directory: processing submissions, resolving dead links, culling out the bad and keeping only quality information, and discovering new topics to add." (Courtesy: DMOZ.org)

Unlike Yahoo!, DMOZ editors are core web surfers helping to create a web directory for other Web surfers. Getting your site listed in DMOZ is very difficult and frustrating, too. Everybody (who is more or less associated with SEO/SEM) knows that being listed will probably help website’s Google ranking, but getting listed can take a very long time. But one should not lose faith and keep trying to submit the original website details in reasonably regular intervals to ensure that your site is not out of the queue.