Top Free Web Directory List

Update 18th Nov, 2013: Throughout 2013 the number of directories on this list has been evolving in an ever diminishing circle. Many directories have converted to paid review models or been abandoned. I no longer believe this list will return to 100 directories and I refuse to pad it with less quality directories just to make up the numbers. So, to that effect, I have removed the misnomer. We've re-calculated rankings for the list which is now at 71 free directories. The free general directories on this list have been certified SEO friendly via our strict selection criteria.
The Alexa Rank and PageRank, which are determined by Alexa and Google respectively will contribute very little to the actual ranking on the list and will be used to break deadlock rankings so that we have definite individual ranks for each directory. Thus you may see PR3 directories sitting above PR6 directories, and you may see 100,000 AlexaRank directories sitting above 50,000 AlexaRank directories. (NB: Toolbar PageRank has been officially broken since Feb, 2013 and Google has given no date at which it will be fixed, if ever).
If you are wondering why the free directories like DMOZ and JoeAnt are excluded from this top free directories list it is because they have established themselves as trusted resources in the industry after a number of years of stability and recognition and for that fact we have placed them on their own exclusive Trusted Directories list.

Sr #		Directory Name	Directory URL			.	Alexa Rank
1		Directory Fire	www.directoryfire.com				19,393
2		A1	www.a1webdirectory.org				10,831
3		So Much	www.somuch.com				7,624
4		SEO Directory World	www.seodirectoryworld.com				63,854
5		Synergy Directory	www.synergy-directory.com				14,814
6		Nexus Directory	www.nexusdirectory.com				16,797
7		Best Free Websites	www.bestfreewebsites.net				23,328
8		Web World Index	www.webworldindex.com				12,335
9		9 Sites	www.9sites.net				18,878
10		MasterMOZ	mastermoz.com				16,346
11		Daduru	www.daduru.com				50,569
12		Direct My Link	www.directmylink.com				15,676
13		Link Pedia	www.linkpedia.net				21,522
14		1 ABC	www.1abc.org				18,010
15		Pro Link Directory	www.prolinkdirectory.com				13,338
16		Tsection	www.tsection.com				14,451
18		Elite Sites Directory	www.elitesitesdirectory.com				20,264
19		Suggest URL	www.suggest-url.net				20,818
20		Scrabble Stop	links.scrabblestop.com				27,916
21		Info Listings	www.info-listings.com				16,464
22		Luton Engineering	www.lutonengineering.com				30,826
23		Business Seek	businessseek.biz				19,449
24		PR3 Plus	www.pr3plus.com				26,076
25		Tech4on	www.tech4on.com				24,356
26		1 Webs Directory	www.1websdirectory.com				17,023
27		W3 Catalog	www.w3catalog.com				17,321
28		Submission 4 U	www.submission4u.com				23,220
29		The Web Directory	www.the-web-directory.co.uk				21,119
30		WWWi	www.wwwi.co.uk				26,599
31		Gain Web	www.gainweb.org				14,778
32		10 Directory	www.10directory.com				22,641
33		EZ Web Tools	directory.ezweb-tools.com				53,633
34		Link Dir	www.linkdir.info				49,265
35		Wikid Web	www.wikidweb.com				44,597
36		SEO Free Links	www.seofreelinks.com				58,738
37		The Net Directory	www.the-net-directory.com				41,536
38		Inteligent D	www.inteligentd.com				53,516
39		PC Graphic Solutions	linkbook.pcgraphicsolutions.com				36,035
40		The SEO Links	www.theseolinks.com				60,597
41		Bubbleplex	www.bubbleplex.com				45,486
42		List Your Website	www.list-your-website.com				60,586
43		URL Moz	www.urlmoz.com				50,736
44		Find Sites	www.findsites.net				45,257
45		Free Web Directory (.biz)	www.freewebdirectory.biz				57,980
46		All Business Directory	www.allbusinessdirectory.biz				35,160
47		Best Directory Sites	www.bestdirectorysites.com				50,075
49		Autopilot Directory	www.autopilotdirectory.com				36,456
51		Sighber Cafe	www.sighbercafe.com				101,858
52		Pedsters Planet	www.pedsters-planet.co.uk				93,892
53		2.0 Websites	2.0websites.com				96,307
54		Elite Answers	www.eliteanswers.com/directory				96,026
55		Web Friendly Dir	www.webfriendlydir.com				103,725
56		Popular List	popularlist.com				108,536
57		A Directory	www.a-directory.net				116,669
58		SecWh	secwh.com				74,622
59		Link Nom	linknom.com				72,845
60		FirmPay	www.firmpay.com/directory				65,537
61		Zindexica	www.zindexica.com				190,462
62		Directory Sphere	www.directorysphere.com				56,046
63		Helpedia	directory.helpedia.com				109,388
64		EZ Article Search	directory.ez-article-search.com				211,927
65		Submit Website Link	www.submitwebsitelink.com				191,115
66		Free Directory (.ca)	www.freedirectory.ca/website_directory				265,914
67		The Aegis Solutions	www.theaegissolutions.com				542,540
68		Ace Web Directory	www.acewebdirectory.com				20,938
69		Deep Links Directory	www.deeplinksdirectory.co				32,123
70		Directory Websites	www.directorywebbsites.com				48,715
71		Online Society	www.onlinesociety.org				16,408

52 Free Web Directories for Building Backlinks

52 Fully Functioning Free Web Directories

Directory Name	Directory URL	PR
Dmoz Jayde Scrub The Web So Much 1 Abc 1 Webs Directory Amray Directory World T Section 9 Sites Business Seek Cipinet Direct My Link Directory Fire Elite Sites Directory Free Website Directory Gain Web Nexus Directory PIseries Pro Link Directory R Directory Suggest Url Synergy Directory Wwwi Link Book Scrabble Stop 10 Directory Best Free Websites Inteligent D Link Pedia Pedsters Planet PR3 Plus Submission4u Tech4on The Net Directory The Web Directory Leading Link Directory Nipao SEO Free Links Suggest Site Wikidweb XY Link Directory Answer Spots A Million Sites Vie Search Dir4UK PRweblink Seouplink Directory Books Digg Directory Royal Link Up Dmoz	dmoz.org jayde.com scrubtheweb.com somuch.com 1abc.org 1websdirectory.com amray.com directoryworld.net tsection.com 9sites.net businessseek.biz cipinet.com directmylink.com directoryfire.com elitesitesdirectory.com freewebsitedirectory.com gainweb.org nexusdirectory.com piseries.com prolinkdirectory.com rdirectory.net suggest-url.net synergy-directory.com wwwi.co.uk linkbook.pcgraphicsolutions.com links.scrabblestop.com 10directory.com bestfreewebsites.net inteligentd.com linkpedia.net pedsters-planet.co.uk pr3plus.com submission4u.com tech4on.com the-net-directory.com the-web-directory.co.uk leadinglinkdirectory.com nipao.org seofreelinks.com suggestsite.net wikidweb.com xysyst.net answerspots.com amillionsites.com viesearch.com dir4uk.com prweblink.com seouplink.com directorybooks.com diggdirectory.com royallinkup.com dmoz.in.net	7 6 6 6 5 5 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 2 1 0 N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A N/A

I hope this list is helpful to your own backlink building efforts

SEO Considerations for New or Improved Websites

Search is still the No. 1 way users find a website, and astronomically so. As such, it’s an important consideration when embarking on a new business venture to think about re-launching an existing site, purchased from a marketplace like Flippa, or to create a new business from scratch.

If you’re simply worried about SEO, the truth is, each scenario has its challenges and benefits. There is no unequivocal rule of thumb that one is better than the other. To determine what’s best for you, examine the list of requirements for each undertaking, and make an informed decision about how to proceed. Below are the most critical considerations for launching a new web business, or revamping an existing site with an overhaul.

SEO Requirements for Brand New Sites
Launching a squeaky clean new website has a serious draw. Imagine the joy of a clean slate, the chance to do everything right out of the gate.
Yet the pressure is immense to get it all done successfully on Day 1. There is so much to consider, it’s easy to drop the ball on any one given focus. To make sure your SEO efforts are aces right from the start, follow these tips:

1)   URL Structure — Be 100 percent sure you’re compliant with your URL structure; this is one part of your site that is a nightmare to change in the future. Obviously, your website name is crucial; be descriptive, avoid special characters, and the more keywords you use the better. Furthermore, avoid creating site sections like blog.website.com — instead, keep your core content within a normal domain structure; blogs should always be at website.com/blog. The same goes for key navigation segments.

2)   Set-Up Your Webmaster Tools — Don’t wait until long after launch to create a webmaster account with Bing and Google. Have this in place straight away, and alert them when you site is live.

 3)   Keywords, Keywords, Keywords — The very moment you’ve decided on a company name, URL, and brand strategy, kick your keyword research into high gear. Then apply these phrases throughout your site in organic and natural places within the text. Yes, images are always important to a website’s aesthetics and appeal; words, however, are still king in SEO, so make sure your copy tells the story of your company with highly targeted keyword phrases.

4)   Double Check Title Tags and Descriptions — These should also be laden with your core keywords, and be fully optimized at launch.

5)   Get Marketing Materials Ready Pre-Launch — Have all your social media profiles good to go, as well as the first couple of marketing campaigns locked and loaded. Start sounding the alarm about your business the moment you feel it’s stable and ready to receive the attention it deserves. Do not wait to handle marketing efforts once you’ve launched the site; you may miss some golden opportunities to start strong.

6)   Test Site Performance Metrics — Be extremely meticulous in the first few weeks about monitoring performance. This includes ensuring your robots.txt sitemap is complete and functional, redirects are performing correctly, all URLs are legitimate (no 404s), you have zero indexing errors, and that all your core pages have appropriate load times.

7)   Benchmark Your Rankings — Once you launch, create an immediate benchmark for your key rankings, and don’t forget to include your company name as well. This will give you a baseline to study SERPs going forward. Set goals early on as well, and methods to create these successes, as a means to be proactive about forward movement.

SEO Considerations for a Website Re-Launch
If you choose to rebrand a site instead, many of the steps above remain the same. There are additional items to include as well — use the list below as your foundation.

1)   Create a Pre Re-Launch Baseline — Just like Step 7 above for new sites, before you make any changes to the existing site, measure all appropriate metrics so your starting foundation is crystal clear. As you determine your new keywords, see how the site ranks for those before you make your changes; this will make it much easier to see how you’re improving things during the re-launch.

2)   Map all Old Pages to the New Ones — Assuming you’re changing the site structure, make sure to move all desired content correctly, or you can do some serious damage. Create a flowchart that maps old URLs to new ones, and follow it religiously. Even if you decide to delete some pages, these should redirect to a page on the new site.

3)   Make 301 Redirects Throughout Your Site — The 301 “permanently moved” redirect is your friend when it comes to moved pages. This is the only reference that will not hurt your SEO rankings.

4)   Update all Marketing Campaigns — You’ll want to update all social media profiles and marketing materials with your new branding images and language, if appropriate. If you’ve developed a new logo, make a list of all places you’ll need to update this, and do so as soon as you re-launch. Don’t confuse consumers with dual branding, or let old marketing campaigns linger.

5)   QA Thoroughly — Once you re-launch your site, it’s crucial that you test all components completely, in all major browsers, devices, and operating systems. Don’t assume your site works as it did before — test things like redirects and core functionality to make sure visitors aren’t encountering any errors.
Whether you choose to start from scratch or to improve upon an existing brand, there are many tasks to cover to ensure great SEO rankings from the start. Remember that if you re-launch a site, it’s completely normal to experience a significant dip in SERPs for the first few weeks; this should improve greatly in a month or so if you’ve covered all your bases.