The SoMuch.com Directory claims to be a search engine friendly link directory. However, if you view the titles on the subcategories where the sites are actually listed, as well as other key factors when it comes to being search engine friendly, this site does not seem to be well optimized for the search engines.
I'm not overly impressed with the layout or look of the SoMuch Directory either. The design on the home page is cluttered and busy. The categories are not listed in alphabetical order and they do not seem to be organized in any other way so it is difficult to find what you are looking for. For example, I had difficulty finding the health category.
Also, many of the more obvious main categories seem to be missing. For example, I don't see any category devoted to kids, science, home improvement, sports, food, or the environment just to name a few. They seem to have mostly categories where site owners would be more willing to pay for a listing. The site design does become less cluttered on the internal pages.
The SoMuch Directory seems like it may be a fairly young site as there aren't many listings in the categories they do have. In other words, this is not the type of site that most people would use to find information even though they are claiming this is the purpose of their site. From the links I visited that are included in their directory, it does not seem they are being very discriminating about what sites are included because there are many low quality sites listed in their database. They do seem to weed out any links that aren't "G-rated" or sites where you have to pay to access the majority of their content.
The SoMuch Directory seems to exist mostly to try to generate income from paid listings which they call "enhanced listings." However, for the quality you get from this listing and the price you pay, I can't recommend that you spend money on listing your site in this directory.
They do offer a free listing but you do need to take into consideration that they promote reciprocal links so they may end up being viewed by Google and other major search engines as a "bad neighbor." A bad neighborhood, in this context, is a web property that Google and other search engines consider a spammy and/or low quality site. I'm not saying that the SoMuch Directory is considered a bad neighborhood by Google and other search engines but the way the site is set up and how they promote themselves makes this a definite possibility.
Besides a regular listing, the SoMuch Directory also sells text ads. You can buy them for one month, three months, six months, and one year. They are honest about telling people that you won't get a horde of traffic by listing your site in this way. On the other hand, the price that they are charging given the quality of their directory seems very high compared to other directories I've seen that sell text ads. Therefore, I would not recommend paying for a text ad on this particular site.
While the SoMuch Directory is certainly not the worst site I've seen, it is not a site I would recommend for any purpose. It is certainly not a site that I would recommend to a person searching for information. As far as listing your site in this directory, I would personally recommend against it but it is worth a look.
