How do you decipher a commercial site from a personal?

[amflores]

This question may sound funny but I'm interested in knowing where the line crosses in terms of rendering your website commercial or personal?

[DaveN]

do you sell anything on that site or take a commission from another site directly linked from your site : commerical

photos of you on holiday : personal (as long as people don't have to paid to see you on holiday ;) )

Dave

[Sinner_G]

DaveN, I'm not completely in agreement. Taking a commission would also include things like the Amazon Associates Program. But if I have a personal site about my hobby (e.g. widgets) and have an associate link to books on widgets at Amazon, I think it doesn't make my site a commercial one.

Sinner

[Marketing Guy]

I suppose you could further classify sites:

Information (hobby, comercial, academic, etc)
Forum (professional, commercial, personal, etc)
Blogs (current afairs, rants, personal, etc)
And so forth...

I guess it's all down to the particular site. Im sure we could all determine "what" a particular site is, but it would be more difficult to come up with a method of automatically classifying sites.

>photos of you on holiday : personal (as long as people don't have to paid to see you on holiday )

Could everyone please come and visit:

www.scottsweekendinblackpool.com

Very reasonable rates.... ;)

Scott

[DaveN]

sinner_g can you get the site into Zeal?

Dave

[Sinner_G]

Yes, I can. The Zeal definition of commercial [zeal.com] is about the primary purpose of a site. The primary purpose of my site would still be to talk about my passion for widgets, the different varieties of widgets and the inventor of widgets, Mr. Charles H. Widge.

[anallawalla]

sinner_g can you get the site into Zeal?

In my case, one of my family genealogy pages had some forgotten link to ancestry.com which was an affiliate program. I have never made a cent from it, hence I had forgotten about it. (My pages go as far back as 1995). I had to get rid of the affiliate link before it was acceptable to Zeal.

[dwilson]

Zeal does (officially) take a stricter line against affiliates than does DMOZ. But it all depends on the zealot @ Zeal and the editor @ DMOZ.

The answer to the original question depends greatly on the context in which it is asked.

[coconubuck]

I am new so this might sound strange, but why do you get penalized if you have a site that has to do with your hobby but also has links to places others can buy things concerning that hobby? I dont understand why I should be penalized if I have my own unique content that I update on a weekly basis, and a few links to places that others can get into what I am interested in. Maybe I am missing something, though.

[Sinner_G]

Well, the situation is thus: Directories don't want to make free advertising for those sites that are made to earn money. The problem they have to solve is where to draw the line. Clearly, a site which consists only of links to amazon-style sites, where the site owner gets money if a user coming from his site buys there is commercial, even if he doesn't sell anything himself.

As dwilson said, the line is drawn at different points by different people. I for example don't think that sites with some sort of more info section with links to online shops is commercial, provided there is enough unique content. But then it's a personal view and other zealots will handle it differently.

[coconubuck]

I can see what you are saying. It makes sense. I think I have a harder time with my site because I have content and then I offer a link to something similar to what my article was about (and sometimes that link goes to somewhere you can buy something). I think I have a good mix of new and interesting content along with a few links to help you learn more or buy something you need. It seems that the best way to go would be for me to stick with other sites that are similar to mine instead of going for certain directories.

[dwilson]

coconubuck, from your description your site may fit at DMOZ. There, if you are offering value to your visitors even w/o counting the affiliate stuff, you are listable according to the guidelines.

At Zeal, the guidelines are harder on affiliates - largely so that commercial sites will pay LookSmart for inclusion.

I would repeat, though, that much is left to the individual editors/zealots. The guidelines are usually seen as a rule of thumb, not a formula.

[amoore]

It sounds to me like you're trying to differentiate them or perhaps even distinguish one from the other as opposed to trying to decode something, or trying to interpret the meaning of something, as the use of decipher would tend to imply.

[coconubuck]

I think it is important to know the differences between all of them so as to make the most of your time and to offer the ones that will accept your site something that would be a good addition. I dont want to submit my site somewhere that isnt going to consider it in the first place. It would waste everyone's time. I am definitely going to try to submit it to DMOZ. It is alot heavier on content than anything else. That is the whole reason for the site in the first place. I dont think that a small amount of affiliate content should automatically count you out of certain directories.