Yahoo! started as a simple directory of webpages, a listing that was created manually. Now, there are thousands if not millions of directories on the Internet. How are we to utilize them? And, can we?

My personal favorite online business directory is iamVermont. Although it is not complete, it has a tremendous amount of easily-accessible information regarding local businesses in Vermont. On top of that, the website offers feeds from a few of the state’s leading news sources. The news stories appear to be updated on hourly, which is refreshing to say the least since some newspapers throughout the state hardly update their content.

Using an online business directory can be tricky. For instance, many offer search options, but asking in too-much detail may disqualify some of the companies you actually may be looking for. The best approach is to start broad with your search terms and narrow down the field accordingly.

One of the features that iamVermont.com offers is a Most Popular page, in addition to a rating the listings feature. This web page highlights the most popular companies in the state of Vermont on iamVermont.com. If you are a company, you can post your listing for FREE using their submit tool ## that’s very cool for businesses without websites but looking for web exposure.

Aside from the basic search tool, the directory is organized by category and alphabetically to make browsing simple and quick. I think you’ll find the website to be very useful and hopefully it will continue to grow and assist visitors in getting in contact with merchants. To contact merchants, users are given the phone number and addresses of these companies. There is a map button that dynamically creates a link to a map & directions to the company’s location.

For some listings, there’s even web links that bring you to their website, or you can click the email button and fill out a form that goes directly to the vendor ## Best feature, yes?

In any event, online directories can be extremely useful when the need is more broad than a Google or Yahoo! search. I like the idea of going to iamVermont.com and typing the word “bank” and not getting millions of webpages found.