FreeIndex - Worth Registering?

[Power Lunch Club]

Then you have other similar sites, like Applegate.....so all these companies could spend their live registering their details.

Sorry, but what happened to good old fashioned sales and marketing. There are plenty of businesses with good stories to tell through PR as well.

I am not convinced by these sorts of sites. (But I don't claim to understand Google either). I see no real purpose in them.

It's a bit like Twitter, Facebook et al....everyone says you have to be on there to get your business noticed....but once 'everyone' is on there, it's back to square one. It just all become diluted.

To me all these things are like pyramid selling....it's only the people who got in first that really got all the benefits. What's left now is the scraps.

These directories are just like Yellow pages in IMHO now. But unless your operating a global or even just a national business what's the real point? Most of the businesses on here operate at a local level in their town and cities and I bet you most of their potential clients read newspapers and magazines more often that sitting surfing for services they need.

So in the words of Duncan from Dragon's Den when it comes to sites like FREEINDEX....'I'm Out'!!

[mturner]

Hi There.

My name is Martin Turner the founder of FreeIndex.co.uk.

I don't normally respond to forum posts about FreeIndex, but i just wanted to clarify a couple of things about the site, and about directories in general.

Unless your operating a global or even just a national business what's the real point? Most of the businesses on here operate at a local level in their town and cities.

FreeIndex is designed to work on a local level. We feature highly in search results for what people do, in their area. So if your a Bristol plumber we aim to have the best information about Bristol Plumbers and have the best genuine content for that search.

I bet you most of their potential clients read newspapers and magazines more often that sitting surfing for services they need.

I'm afraid that is just wrong. According to independant research, 80% of local business searches are now done online.

These directories are just like Yellow pages now.

FreeIndex is absolutely not like Yellow Pages, and we absolutely hate the comparison. Yell basically aim to get you to spend as much money as possible, and guarentee you very little in return. Others such as Thomson sell your data to who ever wants it for marketing purposes.

FreeIndex is based on trust and businesses putting effort into creating a highly detailed, high quality profile page which is useful to consumers, and as such should then rank well in good quality search engines. Businesses are ranked according to their customers reviews. We have all sorts of computerised checks and also a manual review to ensure that reviews are as honest as they can be. (You can spot a fake review a mile off).

We also block cold calls and only allow visitors to view a maximum of ten phones numbers in a day.

Maybe we should all be helping each other out by writing reviews for our SBF colleagues

Sorry we don't allow this. Our system identifies reciprocal reviews.

It'll take years before freeindex is of any serious use; it doesn't do anything that the likes of Yell doesn't already do, BUT is IS free!

We have just launched a new leads system, which allows our visitors to raise quote requests. These are then sent to the nearest businesses who can furfill that service. All quote requests are reviewed and filtered before being sent directly to your email!. There is loads of other stuff as well.. Not sure yell does Free Job advertising or offer Free Business Advice from a panel of 40 experts ?.

In a nutshell - FreeIndex is all about quality content. Yell is all about phone numbers.

Hope that is off some use.
Best Regards
Martin
FreeIndex - The free UK business directory
1.2 million visitors per month.
450,000 Leads generated every month by phone, email and web clicks.
180,000 businesses registered to date.

[TFGtv.com]

Originally Posted by mturner

FreeIndex is based on trust and businesses putting effort into creating a highly detailed, high quality profile page which is useful to consumers, and as such should then rank well in good quality search engines.

I'm afraid I found entering my business profile to be that absolute biggest pain in the backside ever... IIRC Your page attempts to railroad the tense and form of the profile? THEN eventually you get to a page where it can be more freely edited...

The end result is clumsy and convoluted and time consuming. And even editing it to make more sense later really isn't particularly easy. Life really is too short for this sort of thing. And I know several people who have given up on trying to list simply because what should be a basic task is made over complicated.

In the end I got my listing up. But you'll find I didn't log back into the account until the past day or two, when I receved your email about the 'lead generation thing... I've once again attempted to sort out some of the poor phrasing imposed on me; but in the end gave up! Your system wouldn't allow me to put the wording in proper paragraphs...

For these reasons I've not felt able to recommend it to anyone else. I don't use it myself to perform searches either...

A quick search for printers in Livingston produces 10 results... Including a Picture framer, a Photographer, DVD duplicator, a Baloon Decorator, T shirt printers and an Art Gallery!!! And they're spread as far as Falkirk! That's NOT local! ...In fact I'm not even sure that any of those listed are actualy plain simple old-fashioned printers!

And for our own part, as I say, I'm not aware of it generating a single enquiry... It's free, it does no harm to be listed but...

[mturner]

Thanks for your feedback thats very useful..

1. Freeindex is light on information in the smaller towns and areas at the present time. If you try a search for printer in Edinburgh then we have plenty of results, i know thats no use to you now, but we are working on it and up to 10,000 new businesses sign up every month.

2. I see your a Video Production company, and the only one we currently have in Kirknewton. In a few weeks you should feature highly for these terms in search engines, which means that when someone does want your services and they search for the correct keywords, they should find your freeindex profile page. So don't write us off just yet. Also check your webstats in a few weeks and see how many people come to your site from FreeIndex.

3. The profile wizard is there for a reason. I can see it got on your nerves, but many others tell us they love it, and it certainly stops us from getting complete rubbish submitted, which used to happen a lot. I'm afraid that not all business owners take the time to write the information as carefully as you, so the wizard and then edit method is the best solution we have come up with so far.

In October 2009, FreeIndex generated
- Over 5,800 genuine email enquires
- Over 160,000 Telephone enquires
- More than 330,000 Website click Throughs

Best Regards
Martin

[mturner]

Thanks for your feedback thats very useful..

1. Data...
Freeindex is light on information in the smaller towns and areas, as we haven't bought company data from anyone else. If you try a search for printer in Edinburgh then we have plenty of results, i know thats no use to you now, but we are working on it and up to 10,000 new businesses sign up every month.

2. I see your a Video Production company, and the only one we currently have in Kirknewton. In a few weeks you should feature highly for these terms in search engines, which means that when someone does want your services and they search for the correct keywords, they should find your freeindex profile page. So don't write us off just yet. Also check your webstats in a few weeks and see how many people come to your site from FreeIndex.

3. The profile wizard is there for a reason. I can see it got on your nerves, but many others tell us they love it, and it certainly stops us from getting complete rubbish submitted, which used to happen a lot. I'm afraid that not all business owners take the time to write the information as carefully as you, so the wizard and then edit method is the best solution we have come up with so far.

[TFGtv.com]

1) Livingston isn't a 'smaller town' or area... It's an industrial town (one of the 'New Towns') just a few miles from Edinburgh (pretty much annexed to it!) and is slap bang on the M8 corridor... And the fact that your directory was returning results as far away as Falkirk, but not actually in Edinburgh...

2) That's nice but not particularly relevant. If any of the under-3000 people who live in the small village of Kirknewton want to find me... They'll probably knock my door when passing anyway!! The nature of what we do means that we need to operate throughout the Scottish Central Belt, South West Scotland up into the West Highlands, up as far as Angus and down as far as Wooler in Northumberland...

3) Oddly enough for such a tiny place we do have several media people living here including another video producer... I've spoken to a few; most of whom had heard of you, but found the registration process frustrating to the point where they just didn't.....

To be effective from the searcher's point of view a directory such as your has to be as inclusive as possible. Even to the point of being pro-active. Otherwise the user either has to consult you and several of your rivals, or resort to a search engine....

In terms of results you're no worse than your rivals. But no better either. At the end of the day the results I've seen from searches aren't particularly relevant nor are they particularly complete... 10,000 new businesses may well sign up each month; but I'd be concerned with trying to find out how many don't and why...

[TFGtv.com]

One final point... For some reason our company name has been edited to read "TFG tv" ....NOT actually the brand we promote! Which is TFGtv.com exactly as I've just written it... I'd be content enough with 'TFGtv'... But the very fact this pedantry is extended to the point where it actually makes the information inaccurate is. at best, unhelpful!

[stugster]

Originally Posted by TFGtv.com

One final point... For some reason our company name has been edited to read "TFG tv" ....NOT actually the brand we promote! Which is TFGtv.com exactly as I've just written it... I'd be content enough with 'TFGtv'... But the very fact this pedantry is extended to the point where it actually makes the information inaccurate is. at best, unhelpful!

I have to agree here.. I'm pretty sure my record on FreeIndex was changed from "Easy PC Scotland" to "Easy Pc Scotland". Pc? That's not a word.

[Edit: this has either been fixed, or it was another directory site I'm thinking of]