Fruity Directory

I’ve been a bit quiet on the directory front lately so its good to get in and review one. Fruity Directory embraces it’s offbeat theme by focussing on the health industry and sticking to it’s niche. It has a bright and cheerful skin which I thought would annoy me no end (I’m no fan of white text on a dark background) but somehow it gets away with it. It’s only on pages like Honey is Healthy that it fails because the Island Ad is too big and it’s hard to read around. While ads are necessary and the blending is lovely – it’s actually offputting for real visitors I’d recommend borders and a smaller size.

The categories are clear and broad and have plenty of sub categories. Take health and fitness as an example. It’s broken down into a further 18 categories.

I’m a fan of small, concise categories though, and I’d like to see the subcategories further rationalised. I believe it gives the sites a stronger “on page” theme and its easier for humans to find what they need. Consider Nutrition with it’s 61 links (at time of writing). Some of the sites are country specific, some provide generic information and others are scientific. At 61 links I’d recommend sorting them out.

One of the bug bears of directory ownership is making sure the directory doesn’t get spammed and a good example is this new listing for Hemroids. The submitter was able to give the keywords that the site wants to be listed for but they’re spammy:

<meta name=”keywords” content=”hemroids,hemroid,hemroids treatment,hemroids treatments,internal hemroids,external hemroids,bleeding hemroids,hemroids symptoms,hemroids guide,hemroids information,hemroids cure” />

<meta name=”description” content=”Hemroids.info gives complete information over hemroids and also a source to get information on all types of hemroids like internal hemroids, external hemroids, bleeding hemroids, treatments and causes of hemroids and much more.” />

This is the cue for the directory owner to either edit or reject the link – depending on any number of personal factors.

That said, there are a good number of authority sites in the directory to lend it credibility. Either the owner has imported from another credible directory (such as DMOZ) or he has taken the time to research his niche and find the right sites.

I’m not expert in phpLD (the technology behind this directory) but I’m concerned that a site query on Google throws up the same summary for every page. Check out http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=site%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.fruitydirectory.com%2F. Ideally all the categories should have their own description and meta tags so that the search engines have more information.

While the current description says “Fruity Directory is an amazing recipe directory where health enthusiasts can find great healthy recipes.” it’s primarily a directory with a few articles thrown in – a stepping stone to the great healthy recipes but not the recipes themselves.

The Google Page Rank is an impressive 5, and passes the vast majority of fake page rank checkers but a handful report that the google-sorry-page trick is being used to report an overly favourable PR. The link building has been done, lets hope the tricks can be dropped and the directory can stand proud with it’s own, real PR.

Submission is free and easy – no captcha at this stage and no fees for submission. So, all and all, it’s a great directory if you have sites in the niche.