If you submit to certain directories that have relevant vacation rental terms you will be able to boost your site page rank.For example, http://www.Dmoz.com and http://www.Yahoo.com are the best. But it is not easy getting on Dmoz from what I hear, and Yahoo is quite expensive ($300/yr +). However, there are also some other specialized vacation rental directories that allow you to submit a text link for much less, such as http://www.vrwd.com and http://www.vacationrentalsdirectory.net.
If you know of any other vacation rental sites that sells text links that are good for improving google page rank please let me know!
I definetly agree with you. Dmoz is very biased and it seems like they have someone from Homeaway network working as an editor for their vacation rental category. They only seem to be adding new sites that belong to their network or sites that are not very competitive. Regarding yahoo, the listings get submerged into very deep subfolders that google probably does not crawl. I checked out vrwd.com and vacationrentalsdirectory.net and they seem pretty good. I did a reverse look up in google with some websites listed on these two directories, and it seems like vrwd.com provides very good search engine friendly links. Vacationrentalsdirectory has links in php and for some reason they don't seem to be crawlable by google.
Can anyone suggest vacation rental portals that provide a promotional link to advertise my own vacation home website?
Get as much as posible links to your web site!
Just go to google type "travel directory" and submit your site to the first15-20 directories.
That should help!
This is what I am actually doing, I am submitting my site to directories that have a PR3 or higher.
Cintaila, I really recommend that you submit to directories that are about vacation rentals. If you submit to general directories without specific vacation rental categories or content, you may obtain an increase in the PR number, but not an increase in rankings within google search result pages. You will dilute your web page importance under 'vacation rental' terms if you obtain links from general websites. This will most likely cause a drop in search engine rankings for the search terms your target audience uses. The algorithms google uses are quite complex, however I hope this brief explanation guides you in the right direction without understanding all the technical stuff behind it. I suggest http://www.vrwd.com if you are looking to place your vacation rental website in a good vacation rental directory. Dmoz.org is also a good place, however it is almost impossible to be listed there (It seems that the vacation rental category has not been updated in years). Unfortunately, there aren't too many (if any) vacation rental portals that provide good search engine friendly links to other sites.
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I know one really good travel directory that provides quality search engine friendly backlinks,
but I don't want this to sound as self promotion
Just go here for a list with some good travel directories: http://www.directoryrate.com/travel-directory-list.php
Hello Milan,
It's ok to self promote as long as you remain as objective as possible. I checked the directories you suggested, however I don't see any that are specific about vacation rentals. The URLs or link pages need to contain vacation rental terms in order for it to be worthwhile for vacation rental website owners to list their site. Some of the directories you mention may be good for those seeking to increase search engine rankings under the terms 'Travel' and 'Hotels.'
Hello John
I don't know many directories that are really specialized only to "vacation rentals",
but the most travel directories has special category for that.
Anyway, I will suggest in this case a listing on that "vacation rentals" site.
It has the target word in the url and in the site title, and in the site content, it offers direct links to the owners web sites, and it costs only 20$ for lifetime listing,
so it must "be worthwhile for vacation rental website owners"
Hope you will find it useful.
The website http://bestrentals.vacationrental-bo.com/ may help with some search engines, however google seems to ignore image links. Have you thought about placing text links on the site? It may bring some more advertisers to your site.
Back links are indeed very important to any website, and category specific are like gold. Creating a website, and getting it to look nice is hard work, but is nothing compared to the endless slog of obtaining quality links.
My advice to you, would be that unless you want to commit totally to the work, then forget it. As it truly is the most disheartening work you will ever do. Achievements in rankings, and extra traffic can be very shortlived, so it is a never ending job aswell.
As I read in an online SEO Newsletter, even the Directories that have 0 PR give you a one-way link and are excellent to submit to also. You can submit your website to my own Free General Web Directory.
North Georgia Cabin Rentals North Georgia Business Directory Blue Ridge Cabin Rentals
Here are a couple of travel directories that someone may find interesting.
The first one is Wideon Travel Directory and the second is a directory specific to the vacation rentals sector, and is Vacation Rentals Directory.
Please submit your relevant links, or you could PM me here.
Submit your site to targeted directories that offer SEO friendly links to your own site! That helps a lot!
I have just submitted some discount coupon codes here for 3 nice holiday rentals directories (http://www.vacationrentalscommunity.com/forums/t/270.aspx)
Use them to get 30% off the listing price. Good luck!
Google doesn't ignore image links it just doesn't help you rank for certain keywords. It actually dilutes yoru ability to rank for certain terms. Is waht I woudl recommend is you no follow all image links and then under the image put in the keywods you are tryign to rank for and point that keyword to the wbe site link.