Now just when the directory model was becoming a bore and the market was dying out of ideas, the next refreshing think to hit the directory market was "Link Bid type of directories"
In this article I would share with you the details on how these type of directories work and a few personal thoughts.
The two primary factors that add an appeal to a bid directory are :
1. Ability to control ones link placement for maximum PR juice and traffic exposure.
2. Strong permanent backlinks for a very reasonable price
The first point primary covers how a bid directory functions.
Let take an example and explain this. Let have a look at http://www.bigweblinks.com/
The structure of a bid directory is very much like a conventional web directory. You have relevant categories for your link suggestion and once you have decided on an appropriate category for your weblink, you can use a submit form to request inclusion for a premium. Now, the interesting part comes in. The specialty of bid directories is that one can feature their links on the homepage for maximum exposure and PR juice by bidding the highest amount for ones weblink. Say I bid 50$ in flavor of my weblink, now if there are no bids greater than 50$, automatically my link is promoted to the homepage.
Usually a bid directory would feature the top 5 or the top 10 bids in the homepage.Some of you must be grumbling that you would not have a budget to bid for the top spots.Thats the beauty of bid directories, the benefit rolls out in two phases with even people with a smaller budget being able to participate in the fun and get quality backlinks for their websites.How? It may be necessary to be among the top ten or the top five bidders to make a homepage feature but you can still bid for a strong category page listing for a minimal amount of 1$ or in a few case a 5$ or a 10$ minimum bid.
With practically a budget of 200 bucks, you can get 100+ "PERMANENT" quality backlinks for your websites.
That has to be the cheapest and the most cost effective way to build ones backlink portfolio.The fun does not end here, if you get a raise in your budget you can place additional bids to fight your claim for the top spots. The first bid gets your link in the directory index and future bids on the same weblink raise you position in the bid directory index if you already dont hold the top spot, with the higher bid being place ahead of the immediate lower bid. Say we have 3 bids of 1$;Link A , 5 $;Link B and 10$;Link C for a particular category. In this case the links would be placed in such a sequence
~Bid Directory Category
1.Link C - 10$
2.Link B - 5$
3.Link A - 1$
Now if you add an additional bid of 6$ to Link B the placement sequence would change as such
~Bid Directory Category
1.Link B - 11$
2.Link C - 10$
3.Link A - 1 $
The beauty of bid directories is that the highest and the lowest bids can coexist in the directory index.
Someone did ask me that with so many bid directories coming by the day how would one choose the best bid directories.
Well i follow a simple rule which you could also use to determine the best bid directories.
Firstly, the popularity of some bid directories are pretty obvious with the visible marketing effort one can see in the webmaster circle, so you would not have a problem choosing them to bid your links.
Now the second type of bid directories are ones with a good PR, if you are happy with the green thing in your toolbar you can bid for a few of your links.
A little warning here, the phenomenon of setting up directories at dropped domains with good PR is at large. Be wary of these directories as most of them see a big PR drop after just a single update. Remember if a domain name does not make sense (I have seen insurance domains being used as bid directories), do a background check for the domain to see if it is a dropped domain. Once you are sure that the domain is a dropped domain, you can follow two ways to approach the situation. One can be that you decide to wait for a PR update to see if the PR is being penalized of if you are looking for immediate backlinks, you can place a minimal bid for your links.
The last category of bid directories are the newly launched bid directories that's may or may not be promoted. These are the most visible one at the moment and the approach I follow is to place a minimal bid with plans to revisit them after a PR updates.
I hate to admit but PR sells
Hope this helped you in understanding the bid directory concept and was of some use to you.
Personally I feel that Bid Directories would soon feature as a promotion model in every SEO company's or enthusiast's link building strategy.