Are Multiple listings in DMOZ Allowed

Can we have multiple listings in DMOZ for a website, one for regional listing and multiple others for different fields of businesses the website features.

For example, if a site deals in boot camp training for microsoft, cisco and red hat certifications + it deals in web design and development, shopping cart (ecommerce solutions), technical writing & search engine optimization / web promotion services

Can this type of a website be listed in different categories for:

• microsoft training
• cisco training
• red hat training
• website design & development
• ecommerce
• technical writing & content management
• search engine optimization
• search engine submission[/list:u] for differnet URLs of the site.
  
  I have seen many websites appearing in DMOZ in multiple categories with different Titles & Descriptions for their internal URLs.
  
  Is this allowed for all? (What I knew was 1 top listing &amp; 1 regional listing only <img src="/images/icons/wink.gif" alt="" /> )

General answer - No.

You are correct that the normal permitted listings are main url once in Topical, and once in Regional. It can also be listed in Topical and Regional categories in World for each language the site exists in (just added for to give more complete information).

Sub sections of a site are occasionally added to the directory in cases where the content is unique to the site AND the sub category is not directly linked to where the main listing exists. You will always hear ODP editors refer to these as deeplinks, whether theyy take the form site.com/section1 site.com/section1/index.html , sitesection1.com or even spamfilledkeywordstuffedurlaboutsection1.com.

guidelines on listing deeplinks are at http://dmoz.org/guidelines/site-specific.html#deeplinks and another good read is http://dmoz.org/newsletter/2001May/deeplink.html

Hope this helps <img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

Hi gimmster,

I just went through the links provided by you and they were quite helpful.

I found that

Sites that have true research value and/or cover a number of different subjects across the directory to such a degree that one category isn't sufficient in describing the site's contents.

But I could not understand, whether as site like the above example such as koenig-solutions or vibrantbootcamp

or

a different site containing catalogues on various subjects such as vedamsbooks or bookloversindia can be listed under multiple categories or not with deeplinks with different content for different subjects.

Regards

<img src="/images/icons/cool.gif" alt="" />

[This post is targeted more at your previous post, not your latest one]

I don't know if the example you gave is a real example or just a hypothetical one but I could envision such a site getting two topical listings as well as one Regional -- one Topical listing in a miscellaneous computer training category (not one for each type of training offered) and one in Web_Design_and_Development/Designers/Full_Service (which covers your examples of "website design &amp; development, ecommerce, technical writing &amp; content management, search engine optimization search engine submission").

Thanks motsa,

This answered first part of my second post also. Actually, the example I gave is for one of our client's website that deals into two major different businesses ( as described by you) and wanted it to be listed in both the sections where presently, I have it under one top listing for training &amp; one regional listing (for training itself) only with the same title &amp; description and the same URL.

Can you please answer the second part too. (Both the sites are for books exporters / book sellers to world libraries with catalogue pages on different subjects. There are many more of the same kind. The first one is the one that I found listed in different categories for different subjects in DMOZ with different titles, descriptions and URLs while other is one of my clients who is in the same field.)

Regards

<img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

I'm having trouble with my dialup connection dropping so I'm not going to go look at the two book sites you mentioned but, no, I wouldn't expect that book sellers/exporters would be entitled to multiple listings for various sections of their catalogue -- we don't list Amazon, Barnes and Noble, or Chapters under every subsection of their book catalogue so why would we for these ones?

Motsa,

As you are unable to visit these sites, I would like to provide some more information on these sites. All these deeplink pages from these sites contain a huge list of different books along with their Author, Publisher, ISBN number, Prices and Book details that may be relevant for researchers,university students and faculties and are widely used in different departments of world universities, museums and also for individuals.

Some of the subjects they deal in are Art, (Books on Art, Paintings, Sculptures, etc.) Architecture, Culture, Tribal Studies, History (Ancient &amp; Modern History), Literature (Dance, Music, Drama,etc), Religion (Christianity, Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism, etc.), Philosophy, Women Studies, Biographies, Oceoanology, Social sciences ( Social issues, growth &amp; development), Bio Sciences, Environmental studies, Fauna &amp; Flora (Wild life) etc.

These students &amp; faculties may search for particular subject only in the directory and may not find refernces for booksellers / books exporters / publishers that can help them acquire these books &amp; reference material.

So I personally feel, that they may be allowed to get listed atleast in major subjects categories such as Art, History, Literature, Religion, Philosophy and Women studies apart from one top listing in Books Category and one regional.

While sites like amazon.com provide links to different companies and provide online shopping cart system for different items, these sites offer a huge list of books &amp; reference materials on different subjects to be chosen from.

Regards

<img src="/images/icons/smile.gif" alt="" />

I believe that you have somewhat misconstrued motsa's reply. In the end, the two bookseller sites you mention are both exactly that: booksellers. As a result, they would be listed once, in an appropriate category for businesses selling books. The category would be the most specific that would reflect all the types of books they sell; they would not be eligible for multiple listings in different bookselling categories, as the single correct listing should cover their entire business.

Barnes and Noble is an example of a bookseller with a wide range of books (much wider than your sites), and a variety of information about those books, including the types of information you mention: author, publisher, ISBN, etc. People in many fields use their site to find materials, but we don't give them a listing for each of the myriad subcategories they would cover. We won't give your sites multiple listings either.

Actually, I find it amazing that people from smaller businesses argue for multiple listings, when a consistent pro-multiple-listing policy would put them at a great disadvantage. In the specific case of booksellers, companies like Barnes and Noble or Amazon (not to mention WalMart and other general retailers that sell books...) would flood the directory with deeplinks, making it much more difficult to find the listings of smaller concerns. With one listing per company (in general), smaller businesses are on a more equal footing with their larger competitors.

The rule about multiple topical listings is best illustrated by a website with significant content on both cutlery and sheet music - two completely different subjects both covered in some detail. Publishing books on fiction and non-fiction is still just publishing books, although you could get a listing in Publishing rather than Publishing/Fiction and Publishing/Non-Fiction.

Thanks lachenm, for explaining things well. This answers all my queries. But, I would like to report that the example of vedamsbooks, I mentioned above, is the one that I saw listed under multiple categories in DMOZ.

Thanks John,
This was quite helpful.

Regards

Guddu

Multiple Listings in DMOZ

So, it is allowed to have multiple listing for your website in DMOZ under different URL's? Just as long as you have different descriptions for each URL, right? For instance, if you were listing your contact page as a listing at www.mycompany.com/contact, you could also have under a different listing www.mycompany.com. These two listings would have different information and descriptions. Or are the companies that are doing this going against what is allowed?

motsa said:

[This post is targeted more at your previous post, not your latest one]

I don't know if the example you gave is a real example or just a hypothetical one but I could envision such a site getting two topical listings as well as one Regional -- one Topical listing in a miscellaneous computer training category (not one for each type of training offered) and one in Web_Design_and_Development/Designers/Full_Service (which covers your examples of "website design &amp; development, ecommerce, technical writing &amp; content management, search engine optimization search engine submission").

Click to expand...

If:
www.mycompany.com/bluewidgets was submitted to http://dmoz.org/Widgets/Blue_Widgets and
www.mycompany.com/redwidgets was submitted to http://dmoz.org/Widgets/Red_Widgets

... we would ONLY list www.mycompany.com in Widgets as this would cover BOTH/ALL products. It is the webmasters job to facilitate the ability to navigate through pages and products.

One other thaing to keep in mind is that as the directory has grown (and grown, and grown) the need for deep links has greatly diminished. Editors now rarely approve new deeplinks, but at the sime time don't have a great need to go and remove existing ones, excepts as part of greater cleanup efforts.

So the presence, or absence, of other deeplinks is really not a factor in deciding if new deeplinks are appropriate. It is not specifically in the guidelines, but many editors prefer that no deeplinks be submitted, and a site owner's view of the potential importance of a deeplink is usually a polar opposite of what the editor usually thinks.

Since it is not allowed to have more than one listing in DMOZ for a company that doesn't have, or offer, two very different products or services, then how is it that companies are being listed more than once depending on how you search for companies? For example, if you would search by topics or by regions, some companies would be in both searches. How are these companies getting listed twice when they are offering the same products and services for both listing but only have their descriptions differ or how they are listed regionally or by business type?

You have just changed your question.

It is possible for a company to have a listing in a Regional category, if the company has a regional interest, and then additionally in a so-called "Topical" (i.e. non-Regional) and then, for every language that the site is written in which is not English, an entry in a category in the "World" tree. Each of these should be for the same URL, though.

For every guideline in the ODP there are exceptions, some more exceptional than others. Looking for hard-and-fast regulations would be a futile activity, in my opinion.

If your business has a brick and mortar location or a storefront - in other words a local presence - it is perfectly acceptable to submit your site to the proper Regional Locality. We love to list sites that qualify both in Regional and in topical categories. We are not going to list the deeplinks, just the main site but a listing in topical will not preclude you from a listing in regional as well, or vice versa.

Hope this helps.

Thehelper,

I just want to make sure that I have everything correct here.

- You can be listed by a regional category and by a topical (business type) category
- Within those categories the only way a company can be listed more than once is because they have significantly different products within that website. For instance they sell books and paper.
- This is the only way that a company would have multiple listing.

If companies are listed multiple times for the same services and products that they offer, how is that possible then?

1. Many companies can be listed once in Regional and once in non-Regional, if all the rules for those categories apply.

2. Some companies will not be listed in Regional, even though they are listed elewhere, since they are not considered to have a Regional interest - e.g. only online Shopping is provided

3. Some sites can only be listed in Regional, as they are only of interest to resident of a specific area.

4. Sites that are in more than one language may also be lsited in World categories, so in the case of a site in three languages, it might get quite a few listings in ODP.

5. Sites that have significant different content on the same site may get extra listings. For some categories where editors see a need to list more information, this rule may be interpreted more liberally.

6. For some sites, the multiple listing rules may be totally ignored as they are considered to provide a broad range of usefull content across many categories. This requires an agreement of several editors to make this decision.

Are you fishing for a particular answer? If so, just come out and state it.

The short answer is that the guidelines are not hard and fast rules, and editor discretion developed with time and experience is what drives listing decisions. In other words, there is no such thing as "the only way".

The long answer is that there are many reasons why a particular site could have multiple listings, many of which have been discussed on this forum repeatedly. Some of these include:

- evolving guidelines
- evolving category structure
- categories being reorganized
- a site fitting two or more specific topics well
- editor finding a better fit for a site, but didn't have permissions to remove it from the previous location.
- a site accidentally getting listed under different urls in different categories, then an editor fixes one of the listings (either correcting a redirect or fixing a dead url)
- a site being so darned good that we want to list it in multiple locations

If there is a specific example that you think is inappropriate, post it in the abuse forum thread.