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Lately I've been receiving a lot of e-mails that start off with "Dear Friend, I'm writing to let you know that I have just added your website..." and offering to elevate my listing to "premium status" if I link to their website. Great, just what the world needed, more keyword directories. I don't think it's a good idea to pay any heed to these messages. Here's why.

Firstly, when you go to their site, it has no content - it's one of those "keyword spammer " pages which have keywords and brief bits of description ripped off from other pages, and lots of links (to look popular) to fool search engines into ranking them higher in the results.

Secondly, the first time I did link to one of these sites and respond to the e-mail message, my site promptly disappeared from their page and I never heard from them again, even though I e-mailed them several more times. (I'm told this doesn't always happen, but it was my experience)

Thirdly and finally, although I should point out that apparently not everyone is in with the e-mail spammers, after responding to the particular e-mail I received, I got a ton of spam dumped on my e-mail address. It varies with the bot-user - so beware!

An example of one of these messages follow. Apparently it's some sort of automated webcrawler/spambot, from what I gather.

Dear Friend,

I'm writing to let you know that I have just added your website, <insert title>, to my directory.

You can find your listing here...

<insert URL>

I also wanted to gauge your interest in networking our websites together more closely for mutual benefit.

If you would consider linking to <keyword spammer's root URL> from your own website, I would be more than happy to increase your listing to "premium status". This will always ensure that your listing appears at the top of your category above all other normal listings, even if new webmasters submit their website to the same category in the future.

I think you have a fantastic site, and would love to have you as a strategic link partner.

If you're interested, simply reply to this entire email and let me know where you've placed the link to <keyword spammer's root URL> on your own site, and I will immediately modify your listing to premium status.

I look forward to hearing from you soon & keep up the great work...

Sincerely,
<name deleted>
<signature deleted>

I just report them to Spamcop.net and go about my business. These sites and spammers in general must die!

Update 4/5/05: I got the following e-mail from the person who sent the letter that I originally used for my example (now modified to the generic version):

Hi,

I'm <deleted> from <deleted>.

I have just read your article about the new kind of spam which can be found here ; http://www.wireball.com/scam_webmaster.htm

I was really amazed when I saw that your new kind of spam is my site !!

I just would like to explain you that I'm not spammer. I personally don't think that an e-mails asking for the link exchange are the spam. Especially, if I have a look those sites before I send e-mails out.

Yes !! This site was actually created by page generation software. I'm not refuse you that those pages can fool search engines into ranking them higher in the results.

But, I have never removed the sites which the owners decided to link back to my site. And the most important is that I have never ever sell e-mail address to the spammers.

By the way, if you don't want to be listed in my site, you can just let me know. I will just remove it immediately. Now, my site got around 300 visitors per day, I'm sure all sites that listed on my site will get some benefit.

I just feel that I was condemned for something I didn't do. If it's possible, I would be really appreciate it if you delete this article from your site.

Thank very much for your consideration.

All the best,
<name deleted>
<URL deleted>

My response: The article has been updated so it doesn't seem like the above e-mailer has done the things which he hasn't done. Aside from that, the article is accurate and I stand by it.

I may seem uncaring, but I find these kinds of sites to be bloody useless. It's not like a hand-organized directory that is oriented towards one particular genre and tries to be relevant - the directories I'm complaining about cram everything in, in the hopes of generating advertising revenue and getting more links, and it just ends up being incomprehensible.

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