Forum Moderators: skibum
Whilst sipping a glass of red wine and having a most enjoyable argument with glengara about <h1> tags I thought of a way to get my affilliate sites into ODP.
I can't be the only one to think of it as it's rather obvious so I wondered if you might share your experiences with me regarding this:
Here it is
Okay, I sell/promote widgets, and can't get the site an ODP listing as it is a type A site (just sells products)
So... I create a directory named 'History' and write a complet mini site about the history of widgets with a link back to the home page (where the products are) but, no direct affiliate links.
All original content.
My questions are:
Cheers
Nick
As you can see I have submitted a deep link page.
Please don't look at what this site is really all about by going to my index page!
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Why not take this time and spend the money to do a www.history-of-widgets.org site? A real history site with pages that cover blue widgets and pages that cover red widgets etc.
If the sub section is packed full of genuinely valuable content I see no reason it should be denied a listing. (or that I should be worried about the other sections of the site)
How the dmoz editor sees it is of course another matter...
Nick
In the vast majority of categories and branches, deeplinking is the exception rather than the rule. Deeplinks should offer content that is unique and extremely useful to a particular category.
[dmoz.org...]
Your first problem would be that you are asking the ODP for a deeplink to [affiliate-site.com...]
Problem #2: Affiliate site
Look at the content on the site, mentally blocking out all affiliate links. If the remaining information is original and valuable informational content that contributes something unique to the category's subject, the site may be a good candidate for the ODP. If the remaining content is poor, minimal, or copied from some other site, then the site is not a good candidate for the ODP.
[dmoz.org...]
From my experience the standard for original and valuable informational content is far higher for commercial sites than their non-commercial couterparts. And it is even higher for affiliate sites.
How the dmoz editor sees it is of course another matter...
I do think there are quite a lot of editors who frown upon webmasters who try to make money from their websites.
Looks like the safest be would be to run with Mikes suggestion then...
Nick
In my experience long pages that are written like a college research paper with lots of references to studies and books do well with the editors. I think it also helps to ask when a page has been rejected what, if anything, could be done to improve it to make it worthy of being included. Most editors are really nice and will give you a thoughtful answer. Worst case you'll know what not to do next time. I had one page that was intially rejected ended up being included this way.
Nick
Put on another hat Nick ;)
You are building a content site!
Money is always at a premium, just wanted to avoid the additional cost...
Nick
It's amazing what a little quality content can do. There only demos of the products but alot of added value.
Thanks.
>do you think a section of an affiliate site with 10-12 pages of original content will get in?
I don't have any sites that are mostly affiliate links so I don't have any experience in that area. I only have content sites that have some affiliate links for now. My guess would be that the DMOZ editors may judge sites where the majority of the site is affiliate links a little harder that a site where the majority of the site is content.
You may find it helpful to check out the category you are interested in and see how much content is in the pages already in the category for clues as to how much content you'll need to get in. I just got a page listed in a PR7 catgory based on one 30k page submittal. It's a pure content page I wrote specifically for the DMOZ category using an existing page in the category as a model.
Just this very topic has been floating around my head for some time. My first site which is mostily content got into odp with no problem, after plently of submissions I also landed a yahoo list for free. Not bad for a rookie, then I headed over to zeal one evening and took there little test three times before passing. But passed I did, now I have a strong (google pagerank) site and am able to link out from it. This will really help me in this next year as I sell out and try to make some money with affiliat programs.
With this in mind I have thought possibly of creating another "content" site with lots of strong content and getting those hard to get links from odp, looksmart and yahoo. This would kind of act as insurance for my commerical sites. Infact I think I would not even link to two content sites together but link to my commercial sites.
Nick it seams that the time and energy spent on creating 10 - 15 pages of unique content would be better off within its own domain. With cost so low over time such as site could really help out if you were to ever get bombed by google with your main site.
Of course the biggest problem is that this all takes plenty of time. Hopefully in 4 or 5 months I will be fulltime ;-)
Good luck on that odp listing!
Cheers,
Chef Brian
Yeah, I've been thinking about developing another "content spamming" site myself just to be on the safe side.
Do you think Google will ever get sick of content?
Do you think Google will ever get sick of content?
I should hope not!
It is not just pure affiliate link farms which are rejected. A "newsfeed" which is actually moreover.com's newsfeed of the Reuters and AP newsfeeds should not expect automatic acceptance. Deeplinks which are simply cut-and-paste jobs from Project Gutenberg (often very obvious because the exact same typos are reproduced) will often be turned down if another version is already available. Editors devoted to a specific topic can easily recognize sites which bear identical "study guides" (from the Columbia Encyclopedia, ca. 1909) or or "background information" (ripped straight from Encarta).
And from time to time, sites are visually revisited and may be removed because their affiliate content now outweighs the original content; a substantial number of about.com sites have been deleted over the last year for this reason.
Not to say a site with a lot of unoriginal content or sales links won't be listed, double-listed, deep-linked, even marked "cool"-- when the links are secondary to the purpose of the site, when the content is truly extensive to the point of being one-of-a-kind, and especially when the site is the first to present that content. If you've created the next New Advent, ParkNet, or IMDb, please do submit, we're waiting :).
Imagine a web directory compiled by jaded graduate students (not an insignificant number of us...). It would look like a research directory, full of official titles and monotonous descriptions, academic-- nigh-pedantic-- taxonomy, nondescript presentation, slow to update. It won't look anything like the yellow pages, except that you're selling surfboards and Pacific Bell has decided to base its yellow pages on ODP data.
Don't insult our intelligence trying to game the system.
What I've found is that a well executed content driven site can sometimes give life to some offspring sites that are more tailored to ecommerce or affiliate marketing. I don't even think about getting these into DMOZ. I enjoy developing content sites on topics that interest me, and also building an income stream from internet activities. Its possible to have it both ways. I think that's OK, and its not "backdooring" anything.
Well ... I believe there are exceptions. Choster, I've been around, and I've been an ODP editor myself. I know how to write content that should be acceptable to ODP but when those content pages are installed on my affiliate sites these days they tend not to get accepted. ODP has become very anti-affiliate site in my opinion. Now we've got some very intelligent people operating professional affiliate sites who know that getting a content page into ODP boosts the whole site's ranking in Google and will ferret out the back doors if need be. IMHO ODP should abandon the anti-affiliate stance and accept a page on it's merits, not on the merits of the affiliate or otherwise commercial site that it resides on, so we don't all have to play the silly back door games, mutually antagonize each other, and foul up the whole directory in the process.
