Yahoo Directory takes friendly fire

Posted by Josh on Wednesday, March 28th, 2007.

According to recent posts at the Search Engine Roundtable Forums, Yahoo! has removed category links from search engines results. In doing so, we feel that Yahoo! has significantly devalued the directory and reduced the justification for the Yahoo! Directory Submit fees.

It is our opinion that the primary value of Yahoo! Directory listings has been for quite a long time simply to get high-value links from Yahoo! properties. Most users long ago gave up the limitations of directories for the sheer breadth and increasing accuracy of search engines. The fact that the directory is no longer on Yahoo’s own home page backs this up.

However, directories are still very useful for finding resources that are easily categorized or are hard to search for effectively. The inclusion of categories in search results also made it much easier to find similar websites to those that were able to attain high rankings without having to wade through long lists of marginal results. This was particularly helpful for keywords with multiple uses or that have a wide variety of different types of sites in the results. The fact that the directory could be used in these ways makes it attractive to many companies in ways beyond SEO.

While paying for expedited review / inclusion in the directory has been justified mostly for the SEO benefits, the removal of yet another reason for coughing up $299 creates more reluctance for us to recommend it to clients.

The removal of categories demonstrates a devaluation within the Yahoo! organization, and it may portend further erosion of the directory’s significance. This is sad in a way as it was the kernel of Yahoo’s beginnings and for many was the first signpost many people used to start navigating the young world wide web (remember that phrase?).