February 14, 2005
Another Affiliate Site Whinge...
Norberto from http://www.intercheat.com is having a whinge because his affiliate site got rejected after my review. He paid the US$39.95 for a sponsored listing, got reviewed, didn't comply with the submission policy planted infront of him at submission, and subsequently was rejected. Now the funny part. Norberto claims he is doing a review on directories to see which one's just accept money and take it from site owners. He can't seem to get the message that he lost his money for stupidity more than anything. Have a look at how things started.
Site Submission
Sent: Sunday, February 13, 2005 6:27 AM
Subject: Feedback: from anthonyparsons.com
Sponsored Category Purchase US$39.95
Name: Norberto #removed for privacy#
Email: #removed for privacy#
Category: Internet Essentials
Link URL: www.intercheat.com
Link Title: Affiliate Program Reviews
Link Description: Tips for affiliate programs, Best affiliate programs, tips, webmasters rights. Detailed incomes from most popular dating affiliate programs.
Ok, Norberto is not so good at writing descriptions, but hey, I adjust plenty of them for acceptable sites.
Submission Reply
Hi Norberto,
Your submission has been rejected as it does not comply with our submission policy. Your site is an affiliate review site, though you primarily use affiliate links throughout, thus breaching our submission guidelines. We clearly state that we do not accept sites that are based primarily on affiliate links. Even though you are an affiliate review site, this does not mean you necessarily must use affiliate links to entice your customers to signup and provide a payment to you.
Payment does not provide inclusion into our directory.
Your review fee is non-refundable as per the terms and conditions you accepted at submission.
Regards,
Anthony Parsons
http://www.anthonyparsons.com
Standard sort of stuff, subjectably written and unique for each site that is rejected, for each unique set of circumstances.
Our Submission Policy (Main Highlights)
The first thing he read on the page before typing anything:
Do You Want To Lose Your Submission Cost?
If so, then just don't read the submission terms and you will. We write submission terms for a reason, to maintain a certain standard.
The following sites will not be accepted;
Sites that advocate violence.
Sites that are based primarily on pay per click listings or affiliate links.
Adult content, pornography, illicit photographs or sexual nature.
Sites that run pop-up, pop-under or slide in advertising.
Gambling, gaming or any site related to or affiliated with gambling.
Pharmaceutical and drug related sites that sell illegal drugs against Australian law.
Mirrored sites or sites that replicate the same content through multiple domains.
Sites that contain no unique content.
Sites that are not completed, ie. Under Construction pages exist.
Weapons of an illegal nature.
Sites that promote illegal activity of any type.
Sites that contain spam, hidden content or blatant content against the search engines editorial policies.
Any site that is simply considered of poor quality from the editors viewpoint.
Websites that are not in English or contain an English version.
Websites that redirect to another site not within the domain listed.
We reserve the right to refuse submission of any site for any reason we deem as necessary.
Norberto's Reply
Hi Anthony,
This is a part of Intercheat review of directorys with paid submission.This experience will be commented at site.
Regards
Norberto
Excellent I think to myself. So I just have to reply...
My Reply
Great. Please make reference to my submission guidelines and that we have them for a reason, and that is not to state one thing and do another. This directory is trying very hard to be known as a strict policy directory. Thanks for helping me out.
Regards,
Anthony Parsons
http://www.anthonyparsons.com
Norberto's Reply (I think he's getting grumpy)
Hello
We will do. We are reporting exactly directorys that have abussive terms that permits owners take the money of the webmasters with any excuse or no real specific reason.
Any deep study of intercheat.com really reports that only 20% of the links placed there are with affiliate program code. Also has many other content with interesting links and tips not at all vinculated to and affiliate code. Also reports PR6 at Google and 3rd position at MSN search for "affiliate program" and 1st for "best affiliate program". Intercheat has thousends of backlinks at internet community and is 4 years old site. Site is also aproved by adsense for place its ads.
Obviously,with all this data, your decission seems just an excuse for take the money and run, as many others directorys we are studing are
doing. Your mails and justifications will be published togheter with our opinions, because Intercheat is a free forum for webmasters.
Kind Regards
Norberto
Oh oh, let's analyze this shall we?
Norberto Said: We are reporting exactly directorys that have abussive terms that permits owners take the money of the webmasters with any excuse or no real specific reason.
Anthony Said: Your submission has been rejected as it does not comply with our submission policy. Your site is an affiliate review site, though you primarily use affiliate links throughout, thus breaching our submission guidelines.
Well Norberto, sounds like a reasonable excuse to me, and specific even...
Norberto Said: Also has many other content with interesting links and tips not at all vinculated to and affiliate code.
Anthony Says: You must mean these quality links at the top left hand side of your affiliate review site?
Gee, now they look related to affiliate reviews to me? Not...
Norberto Said: Also reports PR6 at Google and 3rd position at MSN search for "affiliate program" and 1st for "best affiliate program". Intercheat has thousends of backlinks at internet community and is 4 years old site. Site is also aproved by adsense for place its ads.
Anthony Says: Gee, now that's all reputable. I have many PR6's, thousands of backlinks and rank #1 for my related key terms, so my site must be quality also? So why are you going to write something bad about me and my directory again? Are you sure your up to battle with someone like me Norberto?
Norberto Said: Obviously,with all this data, your decission seems just an excuse for take the money and run, as many others directorys we are studing are doing. Your mails and justifications will be published togheter with our opinions, because Intercheat is a free forum for webmasters.
Anthony Says: Well that's important stuff, isn't it? You are who again? Why are you so important and anyone would bother listening to your irrelevant half arsed reviews? Wow, again, being a free forum for webmasters, that must mean a lot hey? I have a couple of them also ... so why do you want to do battle with me, when I have all the same credentials, and some, on you? But wait, it gets better yet...
Side Note: I hope your spelling and grammar is going to improve ten fold when you write your reviews, because it sucks so far.
Anthony's Email Reply
That's great Norberto, but I think what directories are actually doing is helping to clean up directories from the rubbish that you are presenting, in that you are running just another affiliate site. The typical affiliate site has plenty of useless content, followed by affiliate links. Sound familiar. I think so, because that is what your site presented to me under review. It has nothing to do with taking your money, it has to simply do with presenting to our users a list of quality sites that deserve to be listed, and not just rubbish that want to make a mark and attempt to extort monies for actually doing little to nothing at all, which your site achieves this.
I see affiliate sites day after day, and yours falls directly into the category. If your site contained actual reviews, like you seem to have attempted to theme in that manner, then your site would be of great benefit to most directories users. But the instant you placed affiliate links to everything that you reviewed, you blew it. All you have done is present to users and especially directory owners, that your no different and attempting to make money for nothing.
A reputable site will clearly outline any one off affiliate link as such. That is being honest. Many users don't know what an affiliate link is, thus they click through and make you money for doing nothing. This is what my directory, and many others are working on bringing down.
So quite honestly, before you make half arsed hypocritical statements against directories, you should really take a step back and look at your site and what your doing. If your providing affiliate site reviews, then you can do that without the affiliate links. You must see it often enough also, a site about mobile phone reviews, suddenly every review has an affiliate link at the bottom to purchase that phone from another site. The list goes on and on, and your site has now fallen into that category. As stated, you have a good resource if you removed those links. Otherwise, you earn the reputation that you make for yourself and display to the online community.
Norberto, this is simply some food for thought for you. Maybe you should take it onboard and have a good think about what your doing. If you submitted your site to all the directories you have been rejected from, without the affiliate links all through your site, then count how many rejections you get then. Then you may have something credible to write about, otherwise your just blowing wind up people's arse with no actual factual experimentation behind you. I am classed as an expert in the SEO field, and I tell you what, your site falls into the affiliate category from your own doing. Maybe you should take my advice for correct testing and experimentation, as I have years of experience in this field, especially AB testing. Try that first. Hell, I would even help you out with something like that as I have done some AB testing on some directories that I thought where a bit suspicious. You need to get your facts correct though first, otherwise you may end up with a legal challenge in your backside from some directory that you have upset with inconclusive testing and ridicule.
Things for you to think about.
Regards,
Anthony Parsons
http://www.anthonyparsons.com
I crack me up at times.....
The above excerpts are from the email correspondance between myself and Norberto (the one who possibly lacks real grammatical skills). Enjoy.
Posted by Anthony at 11:08 PM | Comments (5)
That's The Way It's Always Been Done...
Its quite often funny to watch new talent in the online marketing arena bring up something new, something diverse, and generally something that all the old fogeys at the top of the industry (self appointed or not) tend not to like just cause its new. Why is that? Well, unfortunately its human nature not to like new concepts. People starting out and still moving within an industry are generall always open and receptive to new ideas and concepts. People who have been within an industry for a long time, tend not to like change very much at all, because "that's the way it's always been done" attitude is existent.
Chatting with clients and just general chatting about online tactics always tends to bring this to my attention of late. People often comment about how they are reading at High Rankings, Search Engine Watch or IHY forums and come across the same attitude, "that's the way it's always been done". I will say, that even I see this type of attitude upon the major forums and am quite sick to death of it. Part of the reason is that the same people generally moderate across all the forums, so none of the major forums are really providing anything unique, as all the same people keep giving the same advice over and over. How dull... I guess this is why the professionals within the industry do get bored, myself included, with the same day in, day out work, because we keep reading and replying the same information over and over. Yuk... Well, not me so much, as I don't think I would make a good moderator for my attitude... telling people how it is, is not often a good trait that administrators want at their forums. For them to do it is one thing, but for moderating staff is another. Fair enough I say.
I think it will be quite interesting to see some of the stale pinacle collapse and get out at some point, as they are taking the industry into a stale node as such. Forums need to mix and match moderators and staff to keep the content and answers fresh. Who wants to keep hearing the same boring answer from the same person over and over? Not me. I guess this is why so many don't bother mixing within forums, for the boring factor. Besides, even if your right or have something unique to add, something that hasn't been thought off, or even has but with a slight offspin that may just work differently than before, shouldn't that be given a chance and not ridiculed? I think so. You don't see it though as "they" won't allow it to much.
I guess I must say though, that Search Engine Watch is quite unique and does try and stay afloat of these type of issues. Danny Sullivan is on the job. I guess that is one person I do have a lot of respect for, for keeping it fresh and unique, always having an open mind and trying different things, or just listening to an offspin idea. That is what counts. Shame there's not more like him.
Another two cents...
Posted by Anthony at 10:21 PM | Comments (0)
PageRank Explained :: The Never Ending Question
I was speaking with a client today in consultation that had the opinion that PageRank meant lots towards ranking of a site. Well, the usual explanation had to then occur about the actual facts, without the fiction of the situation. The client got this type of information from some claim to be reputable sources, that aren't real reputable. I think what it more so is, is that people want to believe the easiest route in order to rank highly, then blame whatever, or whomever when it does not occur. I will say it loudly, "PAGERANK DOES NOT INFLUENCE RANKINGS". Think it does? Then keep reading and you will discover your wrong. I will give the facts from the actual original PageRank paper that Sergey Brin and Lawrence Page originally wrote. Most good sources are documented around this paper. The other two quality sources are:
http://www.iprcom.com/papers/pagerank/ and
http://www.webworkshop.net/pagerank.html
Nowhere in these papers does it detail how PageRank produces high rankings! Because it doesn't. It is only an interpretation of people without the technical mind to read and understand the papers correctly.
PageRank is only a measure of link importance, not ranking importance. Where people get confused mainly, is because PageRank is a measure of backlink importance, and backlinks are a direct result in ranking importance. Backlinks are one thing, a measure of those backlinks collaboratively is another. See the difference? The toolbar with the little green bar is nothing more than a marketing gimmick for Google. It does its job well, as most of the web got sucked into it, but all experts and true professionals know the difference.
Now, tell me something quickly. If you where investing in online marketing, which would you buy for $300 a month?
# Site A - PR8 with 10,000 unique vistors monthly, or
# Site B - PR4 with 50,000 unique visitors monthly.
I have PR7 & PR8 backlinks to my own site, not purchased, and they don't show up in Googles backlink count. So for all intensive purposes, I don't know if those links even count towards my rankings or not. Buying PageRank is what people attempt to extort to the online world nowadays, not its actual true value and purpose. It is simply a measure of Google's importance, nothing more. A PR9 page at Google that ranks #1 may rank on page two at Yahoo or MSN for the same search, because they are not seen in the same light.
Now for those Google nuts that are not aware, Google has placed more importance on Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) than previous, and including link text. What that means now, is more than ever you need to be like themeing your site structure, backlinks and so forth. Do you think it looks natural when a shopping portal has a site wide link pointing to a Website Design site? No, thus nor do Google. What would look natural and provide more gain for rankings, is a link from an SEO to a webdesign site, or the like. They are like themed and natural to point to one another, not the other way around.
Take these things into consideration before getting suckered into this WWW PageRank paranoia. It is not going to solve your problems to achieve high rankings, nor sustain any sort of relevant conversion rate once a user is upon your site. Forget it, and move on now, or simply plod along and wonder why your site is doing nothing for you. Your choice, not mine.
Posted by Anthony at 01:50 PM | Comments (0)
February 13, 2005
The Power of Content
Isn't it funny how we professionals have a hard time getting site owners to adjust and improve their content? People just don't want to do it for one reason or another. Now regardless of the current Google latent semantic indexing update, page copy is probably the single most important factor to good marketing. Why? I'm glad I asked!
Good page copy can achieve:
# higher conversion rates
# natural inbound linking opportunities
# improved navigation
# better understanding
# decisive and detailed specifics
Bad page copy can achieve:
# natural inbound linking opportunities
So, as you can see above, a quick difference between good and bad page copy. Quite a difference? People often ask how bad page copy creates link opportunities. Honestly, often people link to bad things to use as an example. Whether good or bad, people will link to it. Does your page copy need some work then??? If so, find a good SEO copywriter to do this, not just anyone.
Posted by Anthony at 11:15 PM | Comments (0)
Aaron Walls SEO Book :: My Scoop
I provided some feedback on Aaron Walls SEO Book the other day, and just thought it also required some recognition here. The post is on my forum at http://seo.anthonyparsons.com/forum/showthread.php?p=841#post841
Let me add something that I didn't add on the forum. I really had no intention off ever buying the book, as I just thought it was going to be another one of those annoying SEO books, however; how so I was wrong, and that is clearly indicated on the forum thread. Something that came to mind was an insert Aaron listed in their, I think near the copywriting section, in regard to Jill Whalens nitty gritty writing for the search engines; is that's another book I have never read for the same reasons as listed above, though I may have to go and get just to have a read and provide some comments.
Honestly, most of these books are nothing more than rubbish IMO, but this particular one has won me over, in that it is an honest book without the crap and the nice fluffy edges. When you buy a book to tell you something, or explain techniques to you, isn't that what you want? I know its what I want, and rarely get.
Again, thanks Aaron for writing such a great book. The best thing is, is for those of you who know little about SEO, forget keeping yourself up to date monitoring the forums and so forth, as Aaron updates that book on the fly as required and sends the updates to all paid subscribers. Saves you a lot of time IMO.
Posted by Anthony at 11:09 PM | Comments (0)
The Value Of Analytics
I keep seeing it time and time again with nearly every optimization project I provide advice or work upon. People don't use site analytics to get accurate feedback on what is going on within the site. That's right, it can all be measured, printed out and analyzed. Every single little click and going's on within your site is recorded within your raw log file. It's just a matter of retrieving that data with the use of some exceptional software. The use of Clicktracks or similar is an essential tool. Now I realise that not everyone has a spare grand or so to through around for one program to analyze your website, but I tell you what, many professional online marketers will have such software to analyze a site in-depth.
I often reject many requests for SEO nowadays, though I still provide them a quick feedback of my opinion just in case they come across a less than reputable SEO who try's to tell them otherwise. I actually also send them to a trusted professional for further contact even. Now that being that, most site owners are thinking, "Oh god, this is going to cost an arm and a leg, $30,000 +", but it's not the actual case in real life. Why? Am I skimping on telling them something? No. What it generally is, is that the entire site does not require full SEO to begin with. What the site does require, is some particular attention in a few key areas, then reanalyze and adjust the marketing plan. No marketing problem can be fixed in one foul swoop, and anyone who tells you they can, obviously has no true idea of what the hell their doing. Yes, that is a big statement, nevertheless; a true statement at that.
Saying that, yes, some sites are just a shamble and require a ground up rebuild, but most not so. With some good analytics and someone who knows what they are looking at, you can observe user behaviour. If users are landing and then exiting, why? A closer look may mean your navigation is unsuitable, your page copy is unreadable nor understandable, too much information, not enough, and the list goes on. Other sites a user may travel all the way through, want the item, but then stop at the checkout. Why? The checkout could be to complicated, your suddenly giving charges that were not mentioned back on the page, etc etc. The list is always long on each topic generally, but with some time and good analysis, the problem can be found.
You might often see someone mention AB testing. Meaning they test the same thing under one circumstance, then a different and measure the outcome. This is often a good way to find some finer problems and hone your site to its full potential. The web is slowly getting smarter, unfortunately, the users are not so when it comes to online advertising. Pay per click is not everything, and as prices have risen to near peak offers, more and more continue to turn to the free rankings. When I say free rankings, they are, but they aren't. It costs good money to have good analytics and marketing applied to your site, but it should always provide a better return than it cost, like any good business model.
Stay sharp, and think quick. Ask questions and lots of them before buying anything. A second or third opinion is always a good opinion. Ask 10 professionals if necessary, as you will often come back with 10 different answers, but a majority theme should come from it, which means the concept is correct. Remember, analtics will solve many of your online marketing issues without a complete rebuild.
Posted by Anthony at 07:13 PM | Comments (0)
February 12, 2005
An Interesting Thought Today
Something that I had pondered for some time now, was the ability to be capable of rolling any Adsense earnings into one's Adwords account. This just simply means saving a lot of time and concern sending cheques, cutting down more tree's to make the cheques (for those greenies), man hours and postage costs. Probably a few others, but who cares?
Anyway, I posted about this over at SEW today hopefully to get the adwords rep to pop in and comment on the post. A respondant already has commented that they have also wanted the same thing, just not publicly stated it. See how we go. What have I got to lose really? Not much. It would just be a great benefit to those who use both resources, and Google themselves. A win win situation I believe!
The post: http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/showthread.php?t=4167
Posted by Anthony at 10:38 PM | Comments (0)
February 09, 2005
Blog Spammers
Now whilst it is probably in some best interest to kinda stop by a relevant blog and post (spam) it to some extent with a useless comment in hope to have your link remain, what part of stupid are some that spam them when they receive a message, "all comments are first approved by administrator" that would make them continue to place their spam?
I laugh everytime when I open up my comments, see the usual rubbish comments from "sex me up baby" and "buy viagra now" and so forth, one after another on each post. Each single comment upon each post shows the same message, "all comments are first approved by administrator".
Now whilst some comment spam is quite necessary if the site and theme is relevant to the blog, utter comment spam under these conditions is seen as nothing more than a waste of time. Like, what do they expect the administrator to do? Open up the comments, see these crap headings and just hit APPROVE? Why would we bother turning on such restrictions if we weren't going to enforce them?
Spammers, atleast learn how to spam so your spam time is spent usefully spamming comments that you are going to be seen, and not those that you are not. Obviously you have to try once, but repeatedly when the comments are moderated. Please... wake up to yourselves.
Posted by Anthony at 09:42 PM | Comments (0)
February 07, 2005
Doorsites? My Theme For Today
The old fad of doorpages has been and gone, well, some even still attempt to use them, but to no evail, new trends are always taking off. I have seen this plenty before, but it seems that the use of "doorsites" is becoming more and more common with the "content is king" syndrome. Basically, people make a site of doorpages, that contain some sort of half useless content, though the main focus is actually the link or ad per page that points to the bigger schemed site. The main focused site tends to be the only one prominently displayed all through the site. Do people think where stupid? Possibly.
I have to say, it really just isn't a smart idea at all if you use or are thinking about using such an idea. Making doorsites is just another way of finding the main offender and for the SE's to take down your whole network of site, including the main core bread winner that you have dedicated so much time and money towards making all these crap sites around. Obviously not much thought goes into these things, and if this is the type of service that an SEO offers you as a possible solution, then you really need to keep on shopping. This is nothing more than an endless solution that will eventually collapse your entire network.
Some food for thought. Besides, it would then make my job so much easier, and plenty of other directory owners, by not having to reject so many of the rubbish doorsites.
Posted by Anthony at 10:28 PM | Comments (0)
February 05, 2005
Honesty Is The Best Policy
How many times do you go to a website and find the same thing, over and over? Nothing unique, but more content that near reflects others you have viewed whilst shopping. Layout changes, the look changes, but the content very much says the same thing, time and time again. Now from that, how many do you really think are being honest? Let's face it, I see directories that barely register on any sort of scale that say they receive hundreds of submissions daily. Absolute crap. I see SEO sites splash so much crap on their sites about who they service, without links pointing to them, and just so happens most of their sites are actually their own. In fact many have never even done SEO on another site... Intersting huh?
People have lost the honest approach in my opinion, which is really poor to view. People are so wound up now in having to liar one better than their competition has to capture the sale. I don't know about you, but I am quite sick to death of bouncing from one site to another and reading such crap. You can look at a site and generally tell alot from your first impression. Your first impression is generally the correct impression. What you see is what you get. If you read a lot of fluff surrounding the real issues, then expect to get a lot of fluff surrounding the real issues of your purchase, whether goods or service.
This is something that has saddened myself for a long time now, but I am just so sick of it, its time to voice it a little. I think people get the idea about me when they read my business site, and submit a site to my directory. Submit crap, get a crap rejection response, lose your money, etc. Its not my problem. I take the honest approach, and quite honestly, I get more from it than all those who are trying to fluff and pretty the facts for people. I think we have become so sceptical about online anything, that we just fail to purchase directly for our scepticism.
I see more sales from my own honest approach and writings, than I see for customers who tell me to change my work, you know, fluff it up and make it sound better than it is. Why? Because people always want something better for nothing. Did people forget the secret recipe for this, "you get what you pay for"! No longer does that phrase apply online with all the corruption and scams so easily accessible to the world.
A little more honesty, and a little less bullshit, might just take you a long way on the net today. Trust me, people are sick of the bullshit and just want someone who is actually going to tell them how it is, give them the facts, without the fiction, and do their best to provide quality for any monies exchanged. Simple?
Posted by Anthony at 09:59 PM | Comments (0)
February 04, 2005
The Big Secret "How To Make Money Online" Scheme
Running a directory, I see so many of these submissions it just isn't funny. You know the one's; they're a one page wonder that you can't understand how you made it this far in life without reading this page of utterly life important information. From time to time I read bits and pieces to have a good laugh. Like really, do you honestly think your going to follow their 500 page e-book and become an online millionaire?
The truth of the matter is, that maybe 0.5% of such schemes actually make enough money per month to live from, let alone make you wealthy, or even rich. The truth is, if you buy that sort of rubbish, you would most likely end up with something that is a hand me down e-book, renamed a 1000 times to remain appealing. You won't become rich from paying the money to access that sort of information people. The truth: YOU WILL NOT BECOME RICH BY READING THAT RUBBISH.
Do you want to know how to succeed online? It's simple. You take a normal business idea, something that is unique, honest and provides a benefit, and guess what? You begin to make money. But you won't make money overnight, nor within a few months, or even a year. To set up credibility online will take a good year or more. People want to know who you are, what you have, why your better and why they should trust you. That is the secret.
I see more and more of these get rich quick non-sense schemes which are all exactly that! Non-sense. These remarkable e-books to get rich quick simply tell you silly things like; setup affiliate domains all over the Internet, write an e-book, sell a one page marketing wonder site, etc etc. People I know have asked me all about this type of stuff, and then they have told me what they purchased and read to come up with the idea. It's not an idea, it's a scam.
What they don't tell you is that most search engines and directories reject / penalize affiliate type sites and such rubbish, thus making it hard for one to advertise. Secondly, they forget to tell you the cost off online advertisement that you WILL require to even get seen.
Let me tell you something from my point of view with online marketing. It takes serious dollars and time to get the return, and even then, your taking a considerable risk to lose your monies. I see some small end business come to me and pull away when I tell them that they have one of the smallest means for advertisement online, and its going to cost them US$4500. Your just not going to get the required exposure for $500 or even a $1000 online.
Anyway, you get the idea. Honestly, those with such a small hope to find a million dollars from just a $70 investment, need to think again. You can become a millionaire from $0, a good idea and just lots of solid and dedicated work. That's what you want to aim at, not these crap one page marketing wonder sites.
Posted by Anthony at 09:03 PM | Comments (0)
January 30, 2005
Are People Just Stupid? Or Ignorant?
Now this is not a first, but from someone I expected a little more commonsense from, I didn't get it. A forum member around the place submitted his site to my directory. Guess what? It was rejected before I even looked, as he used the free submission and didn't link to the partner I had listed, but instead linked to me. For the record, the partner site is currently "Phynder Web Directory" (this makes sense in a minute).
Now this person sends me back an email, and says, "yes, the link is located on the page and that my email must of mistaken the URL". No, I looked at the page, and to my eyes, still the same link back to my directory was residing upon the page. Now is it just me, or are some people just stupid! This person puts himself within the SEO realm, and makes an idiot of himself quite often IMO, and then decides to tell me that a reciprocal link between us is much more beneficial.
Now, the page he was listing me on was a directories page, a list of quality directories or something like that, and the site is an SEO resource site. Great, all themed. The first thing I thought was, so how did all these other directories get onto this page? Did most of them have to reciprocate a link? So is it really a quality resource then? If so, either just list my site or not, dependant on whether he viewed it as a quality directory I guess.
Anyway, if the page is about directories, and he is willing to just list directories for reciprocate link trades, then you would think he would just list Phynder Directory without any problem and be done with it. No, he doesn't want to do that. Me being me, his options emailed back:
#1 Submit in accordance with the submission policy.
#2 Use the express submission for a one way link.
#3 Don't submit and stop pissing me off with worthless emails.
Maybe people are just confused! My directory is shaping up to be quite a quality resource. Whether people submit their site or not, I don't care, as I add sites to it as I find them, quality sites that is. Not many of those IMO that aren't just another affiliate junkie or some want to be talking PageRank. Just so happens that this person talked nothing but PageRank. 'But your link on this page is worth so much, cause I just got 10 x PR7 links, 15 x PR6 links, blah blah blah, to the page. Who gives a flying shit how many PR links you got to the page, it doesn't relate to traffic, nor quality.
I think these so called want to be's need to get out and find themselves something they are good at, instead of annoying an already over annoyed industry.
Posted by Anthony at 01:30 AM | Comments (0)
January 18, 2005
Directory Submission Policies
Now I don't know what you think about this, but I'm going to express my views on directory submission policies. I've had many problems recently with my customers submitting sites to my directory and being rejected, paid or not. Is my submission policy to hard? I think not. Am I to hard by standing by my submission policy? Not at all. Why else does one have a policy if it is only a guide instead of an actual policy? Retorical question I guess!
Now I know from submitting my own sites to directories, that many policies are simply not used, as any old thing gets in, especially if you pay some $$$. People have a hard time rejecting sites when money is concerned. I don't understand why, when you should be standing by your policy. Providing a directory issue's a link to that policy upon the submission page, and the legalities are quite simple with this one, in that you only need to have a simple sentence near the submission button, something along the lines off: "By submitting your site for review, you accept the terms and conditions / policy of this website", or words to that affect. There is no actual legal statement, but it is the mere meaning of the statement that is important.
Are directory owners just too scared to say no? Why do they say, we will not accept sites with pop-ups, when they do; or will not accept affiliate based sites and their directory pages are ridelled with them! I have had some people recently comment to me about my stand on my policy, some good, some bad. Some that have been rejected got offended, especially because they paid money, small and larger amounts; and others just said, "ooppss, I missed that, sorry, my fault". I think I'm pretty fair in most instances, in that I will accept another site in place of the rejected site, or the owner fix the fault and then I will accept it. Mind you, I have done that a couple of times, bookmarked the sites for later review, and they simply changed it back. Submissions deleted immediatly.
Why do I as a directory owner and business man, have to succumb to others ways and ideals? I don't last time I looked, thus the stand I take by my submission policy. People think DMOZ is hard to get into for the wrong reasons. Website owners think that their site is not off good enough quality to be listed, when in actual fact, it is more like most submission to DMOZ simply go by the wayside as they cannot get enough editors to proof the submissions, thus they end up in fairyland. I have no doubt that my current directory, and then the new Palewise one when released, will be known as one of the toughest directories to be listed in. I think this will only make people try harder to be listed, more as a challenge than anything. I know I would want it more then. Go figure, human behaviour and good marketing all rolled into one.
Admiting that when I first started the directory, yes, I let some dubious sites in, but I have removed most of them now and constantly checking listed sites for changes and so forth. I guess its more like a constant 10% check or something like that that I perform. Doug Heil from http://www.ihelpyou.com is currently working on a script that will basically pull a site apart and look for known spam and basically crap sites. If Doug and his programmers are succesful with this script, I have already approached them to incorporate it within my directories, and thus it would then be placed on a rolling basis to continuously monitor and check sites listed to ensure they maintain that compliance. That will make things interesting for people to get their sites listed in my directories just a little more...
I don't personally think I'm being hard, and I don't really care if people think I am, as my policy is quite simple and clear. Lets have a look at the main statement of what I won't accept. The below is what is clearly listed on the submission page, and then further exhausted with all other legalities and what not within the terms and conditions of the site.
The following sites will not be accepted;
# Sites that advocate violence. (Pretty simple I think)
# Sites that are based primarily on pay per click listings or affiliate links. (example - http://www.online-loan-guide.com)
# Adult content, pornography, illicit photographs or sexual nature. (Simple, also meaning sites that link directly to explicit nature sites, such as - http://www.adult-dvd-rentals.net)
# Sites that run pop-up, pop-under or slide in advertising. (example - http://www.lovepoemsandquotes.com)
# Gambling, gaming or any site related to or affiliated with gambling. (Pretty simple and straight forward)
# Pharmaceutical and drug related sites that sell illegal drugs against Australian law. (This covers most of them)
# Mirrored sites or sites that replicate the same content through multiple domains. (A good example is a network of sites that sell the same thing, such as blinds, but each domain talks about a different blind)
# Weapons of an illegal nature. (95% of guns are covered here, acceptable, paintball and BB which do not require licenses)
# Sites that promote illegal activity of any type.
# Sites that contain spam, hidden content or blatant content against the search engines editorial policies. (Yes, this means those page with tiny text full of crap at the bottom of the pages : rejected)
# Any site that is simply considered of poor quality from the editors viewpoint. (A good example was a Real Estate site I rejected, which looked like it was built by a four year old. It didn't suit the business it was selling at all)
# Websites that are not in English or contain an English version.
# Websites that redirect to another site not within the domain listed. (Obvioulsy some people still can't read, cause they submit it, it redirects to another domain, and they are rejected)
# We reserve the right to refuse submission of any site for any reason we deem as necessary. (The legal clatents clause in case anything was missed when writing the policy)
Now come on, I don't think there is actually anything harsh there at all. I am pretty easy to please really. Most directories have the same or similar policies, but simply choose not to stand by them, that's the only difference in my opinion. What do you think?
Posted by Anthony at 10:44 PM | Comments (6)
Google Gmail Invites
Isn't it just amazing that when it all first started they where the hottest property on the net, and now? Well, you can't even give them away. I had seen Rusty Brick have 12 on his blog in which nobody had replied last I'd seen. Normally his are gone like hotcakes. I have six and can't give them away, when normally the day I advertise them, they are gone.
Funny how the hype works ha?
Posted by Anthony at 12:31 AM | Comments (0)
January 16, 2005
SEMPO Sucks Dust Again...
Once again, good old SEMPO is sucking the dust of the newly formed group, SMA. SMA is not about sitting still in a country, but actually doing what SEMPO has been saying for the past two years, getting out and representing the online marketing industry as a whole, and not just a little controlled zone, such as the USA. SMA started in the UK, then moved to Europe and now North America, covering US and Canada. Ouch, SEMPO is not happy.
Read all about it at Ian McAnerins new blog. Funny stuff!
http://mcanerin.blogspot.com/2005_01_01_mcanerin_archive.html#110512341284182355
Posted by Anthony at 04:34 PM | Comments (0)