Launch directory
DirectoryA site where makers submit new products for review and publication, usually combining a dated feed of recent launches with permanent, browsable listing pages.
Directory
Editor's pick
A listing selected by a directory’s editorial team rather than by community voting, usually carrying placement, a badge, and any benefits that votes would otherwise unlock.
Also called editors choice, editorial pick, staff pick
An editor’s pick is a human judgment that a listing is excellent, made independently of its vote count. Directories use it to correct the main weakness of community voting, which is that voting measures a maker’s audience at least as much as it measures the product.
An editor’s pick usually carries placement and a badge. On this site it also carries the outbound link attribute: an editor’s pick is one of three routes by which a listing’s link becomes dofollow, alongside ten upvotes during the launch window and a verified badge on the maker’s own site.
That third route exists for two reasons. Some genuinely excellent products launch to nobody, because the maker built rather than posted. And seed listings, which are curated by the directory and have no launch window and no maker to ask, need a route that does not depend on votes at all.
The important constraint is that an editor’s pick cannot be for sale. A paid tier can buy review speed, placement and editorial writing without buying the judgment itself. If the pick can be purchased it stops being a signal, which removes the reason it exists.
App store equivalents are stronger still: Apple’s Editors’ Choice and the App Store Awards are the most valuable editorial selections in mobile.
Last reviewed .
See also
Upvote
DirectoryA single positive vote on a listing during its launch window, used by most directories as the primary ranking input and frequently as a gate on other benefits.
Link attributes that tell search engines whether to pass ranking signals to the destination. Dofollow is the default; nofollow asks engines not to count the link as an endorsement.
Badge embed
DirectoryA copy-paste snippet, usually an image wrapped in a link, that a maker installs on their own site to show they were featured on a directory.