How to get listed as a diversified company?

Hello,

We are a big international supplier of automated material handling solutions and related equipment, which actually does not fit into one single category.

However, we tried to get listed at least in one category, namely
http://www.dmoz.org/Business/Indust...dustrial_Supply/Materials_Handling/Automated/

We have been trying this for months now, sending several submissions from different regions. But Dmoz.org, or the editors of the named category respectively, just seem to ignore us completely.

Before posting our submissions, we actually had read all terms and submission guidelines carefully, and we are very sure not to have made any formal mistakes.

Nonetheless, the only entry we can find is a regional one under
http://dmoz.org/World/Deutsch/Regio...und_Gemeinden/O/Offenbach_am_Main/Wirtschaft/
which actually only refers to our headquarters and has nothing to do with our products and services.

We really begin to get frustrated by this fact and wonder how it is possible that a leading international supplier of products and services in the logistics business with more than 3.700 employees gets ignored in this way.

Furthermore, it is not possible to reduce our rather broad range of products and services to one category only (as recommended in the guidelines).

So what to do as a diversified company which provides several lines of business, ranging from single (hardware) products to complete IT and turnkey solutions?

Or better: How to get listed at all?

We believe that the argument that only volunteers function as Editors, and that delays are "normal" therefore, should not apply without any restriction. We have been waiting for months now. If the editing system of Dmoz.org is so inefficient, we wonder how the whole system should make sense at all in an environment so much determined by being up-to-date as the Internet.

We appreciate any hints or assistance regarding the issues in question.

Thank you very much in advance.

Best regards,

Dralon

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We believe that the argument that only volunteers function as Editors, and that delays are "normal" therefore, should not apply without any restriction.

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You´re perfectly entitled to believe that. Unfortunately this Directory is based on not having special treatments for those who want a site listed within a specific timeframe.

Not being listed within some months is not something unusal and there is not much anybody can do to speed up the process.

We have been trying this for months now, sending several submissions from different regions. But Dmoz.org, or the editors of the named category respectively, just seem to ignore us completely.

Before posting our submissions, we actually had read all terms and submission guidelines carefully, and we are very sure not to have made any formal mistakes.

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You must have missed the part about submit once to the single best category.

One of the wonderful things about the ODP is that the webmaster of the smallest company receives the exact same priority as the webmaster of the largest company. There is no undue influence, no large company virtually shoving smaller ones aside as they try to race to the head of the line. In fact, there is no line.

When editors look in the suggestion pool there is nothing to indicate that this suggestion is from a mega-company or a mom-and-pop.

This very level playing field is one of the things that help us attract editors.

Nonetheless, the only entry we can find is a regional one under
http://dmoz.org/World/Deutsch/Region...in/Wirtschaft/
which actually only refers to our headquarters and has nothing to do with our products and services.

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So you are listed, at your corporate headquarters location. Hopefully that site links to all of your products and services. Otherwise, you are squandering the opportunity the listing presents.

just seem to ignore us completely

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Umm, you already have one listing, I would hardly call that ignoring you.

which actually does not fit into one single category

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Companies that are much larger and much more diverse than yours are rountinely placed in a single topical category. I'm certain, given the fact that you have made multiple suggestions, that one of our editors will eventually find a place within one of the topical category where it fits -- assuming it is eligible for a topical listing.

Hopefully you are not making the mistake that others routinely make -- suggesting deeplinks or related sites. We are really only interested in your company's single root URL. If that site does not lead visitors to your products and services, then it is not reasonable to expect an editor to go searching for those very same products and services.

Remember, the service we offer is to the web surfer, not to the we master.

Given your stated history of multiple suggestions, the best advice I can offer is to not make any further suggestions.

Hello,

and thanks for your comprehensive replies.

You must have missed the part about submit once to the single best category.

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That was one of my initial questions: What to do for a company which has many (more or less equally important) branches in different regions or even on different continents? Or for a company that sells single products as well as turnkey solutions?

There is no single best category in these cases, so it depends entirely on the will and on the conceptions of the Editor (i.e., on his or her bias) what is defined as the "single best" category. This is a valid critique one could raise against the "single best category" concept.

One of the wonderful things about the ODP is that the webmaster of the smallest company receives the exact same priority as the webmaster of the largest company.

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Yes, I also like the idea of a world of fairness and equality. I also like the open source spirit and the related concepts (I am using Linux myself at home).

But let's stay down-to-earth: Just like software quality is the final determinant in the Open Source movement, for a web catalog it ultimately is all a question of relevance. If I am a procurement manager looking for a turnkey logistics solution, I would expect to find the big names of the industry in the related category (or categories). It might be nice to find some small local freight operators on the same page, but I would not really be interested in that.

So, for the ODP, in order to fulfill basic quality requirements, and be user-friendly at the same time, it should seek to propose the most relevant results to its users - if necessary, also in several categories.

In other words: Would you still be using Google if you were looking for "Porsche" and received a manufacturer of car models for kids on the first rank in the results list?

There is no undue influence, no large company virtually shoving smaller ones aside as they try to race to the head of the line. In fact, there is no line.

When editors look in the suggestion pool there is nothing to indicate that this suggestion is from a mega-company or a mom-and-pop.

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This is another objection one could raise against the current system: Wouldn't it unduly distort competition if a big company, let's take Apple for example, would have to wait 6 months longer for its (product) listings to get updated than Microsoft or Red Hat, only because the latter sent in their updates some weeks earlier?

I think that the egalitarian idea only works among equally relevant competitors, and does not apply to the relation between a locally focused website and a global player, for example.

So the ODP should seek to weigh out quality-relevance against equality-irrelevance in order to not lose out against other (commercially oriented) directories who actually would prefer quality of service over equality of service. Please see this as a recommendation, not as a sign of me being offended or something I am only doing my job as you do yours.

Regards,

Dralon

Thank you for your comments.