Niche web directories are very under-rated. They need more exposure to encourage webmasters and visitors to use them more. A niche directories concentrates on just one subject and can range from art directories to web hosting directories and anything in-between.
It gives people the chance to find one particular item they are looking for rather than a general directory as listings tend to cross over into other subjects, often due to mis-placement by submitters but in some cases the directory owner will have more listings than they can cope with and just place them anywhere.

Niche web directories could be the new search-engines as they become more popular amongst both website owners looking for a free or inexpensive way to promote and surfers looking for an easy way to find products and services.

Advantages for the webmaster are numerous, exposure for their websites to thousands of potential customers as spiders crawl across directories, indexing links and listing them in search engines. Web directories also come into their own as webmasters tend to list each others sites, giving an even larger targeted audience.

An easy layout with catergories neatly laid out on the front page make it more enticing for the casual surfer who may be looking for a particular service but gets too many results from a search-engine. They are more likely to take a peek at the entries in a directory because they are less cluttered. Short descriptions and thumbshots previews make it easy pick out just the thing they are looking for.