Our Own CSS Galleries:

1. Tasty Placement CSS Gallery. This is our CSS gallery, reviewed by our staff.
2. CSS-Hell.com (this was fun for a while, but we eventually gave up on it).

Our Favorite CSS Galleries, the Cream of the Crop:

1. Urban Trash. This gallery is truly one of the best, and often our first stop when we seek to tighten up our design skills.
2. CSS Elite. Another of the truly high-end CSS galleries. Many fine sites are featured here.
3. CSSDrive. CSS Drive is one of the elite class of directories, and CSS Drive has many other design-related features as well.

Exceptional, Noteworthy CSS Galleries:

1. CSS Heroes
2. Most Inspired
3. CeeSeS
4. Creative Pakistan
5. CSS 2.0
6. CSS Based
7. CSS Beauty
8. CSS Slip
9. CSS Collection
10. Web Digity
11. Alvit CSS Showcase
12. Best Web Galley
13. Brdcast
14. CSS Demo
15. CSS Website
16. CSS Based
17. CSS Clip
18. CSS Cool
19. CSS Exchange
20. CSS Galaxy
21. CSS Gallery
22. CSS Heaven
23. CSS Import
24. CSS Impress
25. CSS Liquid
26. CSS Mania
27. CSS Smooth Operator
28. CSS Tux
29. The CSS Gallery Lists (helpful compilation site).

New CSS Galleries Added by Our Readers:

1. http://supersit.es
2. cssdesigns.us
3. CSS Arena

We run a few internet directories in connection with our web design programs. And these internet directories receive hundreds of submissions a month from all over the world. We see hundreds of listings that are barely legible, or in violation of the most basic rules of link building. And so, every few days, we reject 90% of the inbound links that are submitted to our directories. These are links that should normally be approved, but we are forced to reject them not because of the quality of the sites, but because of the quality of the link submission title and description.

We’ll take a look at some obvious errors that cause real harm to real companies; and, we’ll learn what you can do to prevent it.

Sample: Poorly Written Title Tags (Grammar and Keyword Stuffing)

Here is a submission from a US-based real estate company that came into several of our directories. The unfortunate clients of this backlinking campaign are now left with potentially thousands of lost linking opportunities, and the few hundred links that did get approved were approved by low-value, non-human edited sites, and represent the company poorly. Keep in mind that we get hundreds of these low-quality submissions a week:

Title: Vineyard for sale| Buy a vineyard| vineyard estate for sale| york vineyard for s

Problems:

• The foregoing title is too long for the default PHP Link Directory submission window, so in thousands of directories it will be cut off–that’s even if it is approved in the directory, which is not likely.
• It’s obviously keyword-stuffed, so no decent directory will approve this submission for that reason  (we didn’t).
• The first letters of each word (including city names) aren’t capitalized, so some directories won’t approve.
• This backlinking campaign has obviously been outsourced to folks with poor English skills.

Sample: Description in Broken English

Description: We offers vineyard for sale, Martha’s vineyard for sale, buy vineyard, 
Marthas vineyard for sale, vineyard for sale California, vineyard
land for sale, for sale on vineyard, Oregon vineyard for sale,
vineyard property for sale, buy a vineyard, vineyard estate for sale.

Problems:

• The grammar is horrible (“we offers”).
• The description is keyword stuffed. Anyone who has ever worked in a serious, effective linking campaign knows that keyword stuffing yields a low number of approvals–because directory owners don’t like keywords stuffed titles or descriptions.

If you “follow the trail” of this unfortunate client around the web, you’ll find dozens of links written in broken English. And, one prominent link is this completely nonsensical article, which is little more than a collection of keywords separated by commas: Vineyard for sale| Buy a vineyard| vineyard estate for sale| york vineyard for sale [article was eventually taken down].

Ouch.

Here are some other examples of poorly written descriptions that we rejected:

Adventdesigns is a professional web design company which offer the services are web design, 3d animation, graphicdesign, multimedia and SEO services at affordable cost.

It is very nice blog having lots of information and review about website you usually don’t known about (this submission comes in by the dozens, each month, for a “family” of blog review sites).

How to Investigate the Quality of Your Inbound Links

You can investigate your inbound links to see how they appear on the web. Here’s how to do it:

1. First, you can sign up to Google Alerts. Google Alerts is a service that sends you email alerts when your company’s name (or any other phrase you choose) appears on the web. We use it to learn about new incoming links pointing to this site. Just google the phrase “Google Alerts” to sign up.

2. Or, you can use Yahoo Site Explorer to find all (or nearly all) of the links that point to your website.

• Google the phrase “Yahoo Site Explorer” to get to the Site Explorer.
• In the top window, type in the name of your website, and click the “Explorer URL” box.
• You see a list of all the links on the web (well, the first 1000 or so) that point back to your site. From there you can visit the pages and see how the descriptions are written.

Good luck!

Typically, local business posting will outrank just about any other page on the internet because of the tremendous pagerank power that a site like Yahoo Local or Hotfrog enjoys. And, Google Local’s reach and power is absolutely unparalled-Google puts local results *above* the natural results for thousands of business related search categories in local markets. And then, of course, is the pagerank value that your own site enjoys from the high-powered backlinks that large business directories enjoy.

We recently posted on our review of the 6 Best Free Local Business Directories for Backlinks, Customers & Hits.

In this article, we’ll point to some sure-fire tips and tricks to get every ounce of mileage from a local business directory posting.

Always Assign As Many Categories As Possible

This is paramount. Google local allows you up to 5 categories (and recently began allowing free-form categories). With most local business directories each business category under which you register will create an individual entry on an individual category page. Thus, your entry might appear in 5 different places in a directory. Each page is a backlink for traffic and for pagerank value, and your listing will quite simply be seen more often. 

Get Reviews

Reviews from happy customers can help boost your rankings within the local directory. Google local is the greatest example. While their ranking system for local entries is a secret, it obviously favors entries that have received reviews. I’ll bet you’ve done a favor for a client at one time, right? Ask them for a review. Send them a clear and concise email with instructions and a link to write the review. Beside the ranking power within the directories, reviews will increase the conversion power of the local entry; readers are more likely to follow up on your ad if they see a positive review from a member of the community. 

Also, positive reviews can offset a present or future negative review. If a negative review does happen, a positive review can soften the blow. 

Upload Pictures

The larger local business directories are quite advanced, and most include the ability to upload pictures. Always upload the maximum number of pictures. A full and complete listing is always more likely to rank higher within the directory. And again, viewers are far more likely to act on a complete listing rather than a sparse one. 

Complete All Optional Fields

When creating a local business entry, you may have noticed many optional fields such as business hours, payment types accepted, and languages spoken. These fields are optional and most folks just skip them. 

You should always fill out every optional field possible. In some directories, the extra fields have the effect of enlarging the directory entry, while omitting it would just display nothing. So, your listing might be 5 or 6 inches tall on a results page, while your competitor-who skipped the optional fields-will have a simple 2 or 3 line entry. 

Also, some directories allow (or will allow in the future) users to use the optional fields as search criteria (i.e., the ability to search for companies that accept Google Checkout, etc). Naturally, you’ll want to come up in any such search result.  

Two Locations? Make Two Entries

If you have multiple business locations, make separate entries for each location. Then, each location will show up in searches separately (many folks search by zip code). And, each entry will represent a backlink. I have clients with Yahoo Local directory pages with a pagerank of 2 that link back directly to their website; That is a very valueable backlink. 

Write a Compelling Business Description With Keywords

This goes without saying, but 75% of folks don’t bother. A compelling business description will convert viewers and draw them to your site. And, if you description is focused on your primary keywords, then your local business entry will likely rank for those keywords. 

Good luck!

When people ask me, “is a paid YellowPages.com ad worth it?”, I always answer, “Is YellowPages.com bigger than Google? Because a Google local listing is free.” That’s not a truly fair answer, because YP.com does earn some traffic, and does offer free listings. Nevertheless, there are a range of free local business directories that can bring backlinks, customers, and web traffic. Here’s a list of our favorites, and we use the following services for our SEO clients. 

This list reveals the top free business directories.

1. Google Local. The undisputed king of all local business directories. If you aren’t in here, your competition will be, and you are missing valuable customers that are searching for you every day. Suprisingly, some local businesses still don’t have a Google Local listing. We wrote about the importance of this feature in The Power of Google Local to Improve Search Results.

2. Yahoo Local. Yahoo Local is a large local directory that enjoys high page rank. Thus, a business listing here can rank quite well in search results. Go here (http://listings.local.yahoo.com/csubmit/index.php) to add a listing. Listings are manually reviewed and take more than a month to appear in the directory.

3. Hotfrog.com. Hotfrog bills itself as “Your USA Business Directory.” The listings rank well, and the site is attractive, falling well within the confines of Web 2.0 style.  Hotfrog is easy to use, and the listings appear almost immediately. 

4. Yelp.com. Yelp is popular (a fair number of visitors) and its pages rank well in the search engines. So, a listing here might earn you some supplemental results in a Google search. It’s review-based, and there are a lot of “interactive” features you’ll want to skip if you just want to list your business. Valuable and free. One limitation: Yelp does not give dofollow (a link that passes valuable pagerank to the target site) backlinks. 

5. YellowPages.com. YellowPages.com makes our list, with reservations. It’s hard to even find the free listing link on the site, you’ll need to squint at the very bottom of the left navigation. While a limited free listing is available, you’ll be forced to dodge pitches for paid service along the way. If your business is a dot-com (as in TastyPlacement.com) you’ll have to ditch the suffix-website addresses are not allowed as business names. So, we are in the YP.com directory as “TastyPlacement.” Other problems: a complicated signup is required (no doubt to feed leads to the YP sales staff, and yes, they will call you), and the listing is only valid for 12 months.

6. Kudzu.com. Kudzu, like YellowPages.com, is high-maintenance.  Nevertheless, it is a large, highly-rated nationwide business directory that allows free listings. You will need to sign up, and again, expect to be pitched on a paid business listing. One feature we do like is that the individual listing is comprehensive and robust.