left arrow icon

Submit to 10 well-chosen directories

Startup directories list a product where people browse for tools, and the few with an active audience can send some visitors. Most send little: ShieldLabs' Yahor Papou reports that about 160 submissions brought 171 sessions out of 3,300 and 2 attributed signups. Google lists low-quality directory links as link spam, so treat directories as discovery, not link building.

Evidence B, moderate evidenceLow priority early

Stage
Stage 3. Faint pull, earn the right to distributeHow do more of the right people find it?
Category
Launches
Time
2 to 4 hoursAwiser's estimate of the active work
Cash
No cash
Live calls
No live calls
First result
Within weeks
Risk
LowMostly time: listings take weeks to go live, and a mass of low-quality links can count as link spam.
Needs
A listing kit: logo, screenshots, a one-line pitch and a longer descriptionTracking that keeps the source when a visitor moves from your site to your app

When does it fit?

  • The directory has people browsing it for tools: founders in an Indie Hackers thread say a listing nobody browses is just an SEO artifact.[4]
  • You can track where signups come from before you submit, with campaign tags and the referrer carried from your site to your app.[2][3]
  • You want discovery and a presence where buyers look, and accept that the traffic will be small.[3]

When should you skip it?

  • The goal is mass link building: Google lists low-quality directory links as link spam.[1]
  • You expect results next week: in Yahor Papou's run, 77 of about 160 submissions were still waiting for review after two months.[3][7]

How do you run it?

  1. Shortlist where your buyers browse

    Pick about 10 directories whose visitors look like your buyers and that list products like yours. Check each one is alive, free if it says so, and recently updated. Awiser keeps a fact-checked list of 124 directories at awiser.co/directories.

  2. Fix attribution first

    Add UTM parameters where a directory accepts them, and carry the original referrer from your marketing site into your app so signups keep their source.

  3. Write for each kind of directory

    Adapt the description to each type of directory instead of pasting one long text everywhere.

  4. Submit and log

    Record each submission with its date, its status and, once it is live, the kind of link you got.

  5. Check every live link

    Open each listing and look at the link itself: followed, nofollow, a redirect or no link at all.

  6. Read the results after a month

    Count visits and signups per directory, and stop updating the ones that sent nobody.

What usually happens?

  • Most directories send little: ShieldLabs' Yahor Papou reports 171 sessions from directories out of about 3,300, more than half of them from BetaList alone.[3]
  • Promised dofollow links often are not: in Yahor Papou's check of 89 live listings, only 47 gave a clean dofollow link.[3]
  • Directory lists go stale: Jim L, who publishes a directory list, reports that of 200+ directories tried, 60+ were dead or fake and 30+ were paid only.[5]

Who has done it, and what happened?

Each case is one team's own report: what happened to them, not a typical result.

  • Yahor Papou, ShieldLabs2026, Negative result

    Submitted a B2B fraud-detection SaaS to about 160 directories, launch sites and profile platforms over two months, and checked every live listing by hand.

    Yahor Papou reports 2 signups attributed to directories, and 171 directory sessions out of about 3,300.[3]

    Signups are undercounted: the source was lost between the marketing site and the app.

  • James Cummings, in an Indie Hackers thread2026, Negative result

    Listed an early product on about 30 directories in its first month.

    James Cummings reports no users, 10 referring domains that are all spam, and four visits a month.[4]

    A short forum reply; the product and the tracking setup are not described.

  • Jim L, operator of five websites2026, Mixed result

    Submitted five websites to more than 200 free directories over three months, looking for backlinks.

    Jim L reports domain rating rising from 20 to 29 and referring domains from 15 to 72, from about 110 listings.[5]

    The post reports no traffic or signups, and the author publishes a directory list, a stake in the method.

What does the evidence say against it?

  • Many listings can mean almost nothing: a founder in an Indie Hackers thread reports that none of roughly 30 directories sent users.[4]
  • Well-known directories are no exception: another founder reports that SaaSHub and the Indie Hackers products directory sent one visit between them.[4]

How do you read the result?

What to count
Visits and signups per directory
When to read it
Four weeks after each listing goes live
How to decide
Keep and update the one or two that send visitors, and stop there. In Yahor Papou's case, one directory sent more than half of all directory sessions.[3]

What goes wrong?

  • Tracking tags do not survive everywhere: many directories strip parameters, so keep the referrer as a fallback.[3]
  • A directory that used to be free can now charge for every submission: BetaList, the biggest sender in Yahor Papou's case, is paid only.[6]
  • Paying for a followed link breaks Google's link spam rules unless the link is marked nofollow or sponsored.[1]

How was it graded?

Evidence
B. Moderate evidenceSeveral independent founder reports with numbers agree that directories send little traffic and very few signups. No dataset with a stated method measures directory outcomes.
Verdict
Low priority earlyCheap but slow and small. A short, tracked list of directories where your buyers browse is reasonable; a mass submission sprint is not worth the hours.

How the grades and verdicts are decided

Sources

  1. 1
    Spam policies for Google web search (opens in a new tab)Google Search Central. Undated. Platform rules.
    Link spam is the practice of creating links to or from a site primarily for the purpose of manipulating search rankings.
    Low-quality directory or bookmark site links
    It's not a violation of our policies to have such links as long as they are qualified with a rel="nofollow" or rel="sponsored" attribute value to the <a> tag.
    Read on October 20, 2026.
  2. 2
    URL builders: Collect campaign data with custom URLs (opens in a new tab)Google Analytics Help. Undated. Platform rules.
    By adding utm campaign parameters to the destination URLs you use in referral links and ad campaigns, you can view which campaigns refer traffic.
    Read on October 20, 2026.
  3. 3
    What 160 directory submissions actually did for our B2B SaaS (numbers inside) (opens in a new tab)Indie Hackers, Yahor Papou. September 16, 2026. Founder report.
    most signups show up as "direct" because the source gets lost when a visitor moves from the marketing site to the app.
    Most launch-style sites send a small spike on launch day and then close to nothing.
    Over the last two months we submitted the product to roughly 160 directories, launch sites and profile platforms.
    89 listings are live, 77 are still waiting for review.
    Since July, directories sent 171 sessions out of about 3,300 total. One site, BetaList, sent more than half of that (94 sessions). The next best sent 15.
    Only 47 give a clean dofollow link. 6 are mixed, 17 are nofollow, and 15 have no direct link at all (redirects through their own domain, JavaScript buttons, or the domain written as plain text).
    The catch is that many directories only accept a bare domain and strip parameters, so for those we will rely on the first-touch referrer instead.
    Only 2 signups are attributed to a directory in analytics.
    Read on October 20, 2026.
  4. 4
    Which launch directories actually sent you users, not just a backlink? (opens in a new tab)Indie Hackers. September 26, 2026. Founder report.
    The few that work tend to have active communities attached, not just a submit form. If nobody is browsing the directory looking for tools, the listing is just an SEO artifact.
    Honest answer from someone with bad numbers: none of them sent users. We listed on roughly 30 directories over the past month.
    I launched a niche PDF form tool in early October and got listed on SaaSHub and the Indie Hackers products directory within days. Together they've sent exactly one visit so far.
    DA went from nothing to 3, referring domains went to 10 and they are all spam. Traffic is four visits a month.
    Read on October 20, 2026.
  5. 5
    My 3-Month Startup Directory Submission Journey - What Actually Moved the Needle (opens in a new tab)DEV Community, Jim L. April 3, 2026. Founder report, from a seller of what it measures.
    Domain rating : 20 to 29 (Ahrefs) Referring domains : 15 to 72 Directories submitted : 200+ Actually listed : roughly 110 Dead or fake : 60+ Paid-only (despite claiming free) : 30+ Dofollow confirmed : about 70
    Read on October 20, 2026.
  6. 6
    BetaList Support / FAQ (opens in a new tab)BetaList. Undated. Platform rules.
    All submissions are paid. There is no free submission option.
    Read on October 20, 2026.
  7. 7
    Why skipping the waiting line (Uneed Help Center) (opens in a new tab)Uneed. Undated. Platform rules.
    This might mean waiting several months for your launch slot.
    Read on October 20, 2026.

Sources last checked on October 20, 2026. First published on October 20, 2026.

Awiser is the builder network where founders show their skills, find collaborators, and grow their projects with an AI copilot.