Forum Moderators: open
I was wondering if anyone could answer a question for me, since Yahoo won't. I have just been referred to their FAQ'S.
I am trying to register two sites with Yahoo. One sells A*ult Toys, Lin*erie etc etc, the other one sells Leather Lingerie, B*ndage equipment and so on. GoTo consider them to be adult .....just about, but they are not porn sites.
As you know, Yahoo charge the remarkable figure of $600, just for considering a site offering adult content and/or services. My problem is that I cannot get a definition of what adult content and/or services are considered to be!
As you can imagine, there is quite a difference between gambling US$199 and US$600 on whether the site will be 1/ accepted at all and 2/ whether it is judged to have adult content! I could end up losing US$1200 as opposed to US$398!
Can anyone assist please? Would appreciate any advice. Thanks!
Welcome to the board Asap...
Maybe if you break the content down into smaller subsites you could submit those to other categories that don't fall into the $600 categories.
If you don't want to do this, what you might want to try is researching all category possibilities and finding out the costs of each...then you can pick one that is relevant but that maybe doesn't cost that amount.
I looked around a little and there seem to be a lot of categories that you might be able to get into, but then again I didn't look too in depth.
I haven't come across a clarification of what Yahoo defines as Adult, but I'll look around and if I find something I'll post it.
I put together and "optimized" a silly page as a "joke," an orphan page with no linking except 1, unrelated with no text in the link, and only a link out to my main site. It accidentally got a #15 Google listing, and started to generate a moderate stream of steady traffic under a certain search term. The page is no longer up, but I decided to look for some related products because there is a good amount of seasonal searching in that category - bridal - and it could probably do well with some effort.
I called the sales rep of a local l*ngerie manufacturer at the California Mart, who referred me to a fulfillment house local to me, suggesting them as a good, reliable alternative to ordering, dealing with UPS, wrapping and shipping, etc.
The conversation:
Me: Hello, you were recommended by (l*ngerie company) and I'd like some information. I understand I do the pages, and they link to the products on your site, where everything is then handled and I would just be sent a check.
Him: Yes, exactly. Although when they arrive at our site, on the same page we try to upsell them with other products. We carry 14,000 products.
Me: Oh, really, like what other kinds of products?
Him: Well, like le*ther and t*ys, those are our best sellers.
Me: Oh cool! Then I could do a couple more sites with different product lines under the same account, all hassle free. L*ather, like purses and wallets sell well I understand, and t*ys could be promoted on family, child-oriented sites, with teddy bears, crayon and art sets, educational software, and all that, a good variety. Good, then parenting web rings are a good source of promotion...
Him, interrupting: ummmmm, (long pause) no, not purses and crayons. We're an a*ult fulfillment house, you couldn't do the family sites.
I then realized what to*s were, because having worked as a Chat Moderator at a "g" rated site, I had to often deal with mob scenes when the ladies got into l*p dancing and talking about to*s, but to be honest, I had to ask the guys at work what le*ther was. I didn't have a clue. They were highly amused.
After checking Terms of Service at a number of web hosts, I found that not only the content on the sites, but adu*t content being linked to from the sites render it unsuitable for hosting there, and could have the site removed with no notice.
So according to web hosts, and the fulfillment house, yes, le*ther and t*ys are adult products. I imagine Yahoo would have the same view, and would likely check out links on the site.
Just like to express my thanks to everyone who replied to my enquiry! 2_much, thanks for the welcome. If you do find out anything, would appreciate it. It seems clear that Yahoo are obviously discouraging anything related to "adult". And having read some of the horror stories about the difficulty in submitting anything to Yahoo, it's probably better not to risk the $1200 !
Thanks again!
there is a big difference between what is 'adult' and what is going to cost you 6 bills @ Y!.
The reason why Y! charges so much for a 'p*rn' sites is because:
1.) they can:)
2.) they want to slow down the crap that gets submitted to them.
3.) it takes a password to (and more time to checkout) the backend of a pay site.... if they didn't check inside, a person would just build a 100 tours for the same members area.
4.) you need someone who not only isn't going to get disturbed by the explicit nature of the content, but actually knows enough about the industry to know when they are seeing duplicate or similar content.
...in other words, if you don't have have a closed door p*rn site, (most likely) you won't have to pay the big cash... but it depends on the cat. If you sell something like bandwidth and you have a site like adult-bandwidth.com (made up name), and there really isn't any 'adult' content or language in there, you will NOT have to pay the $600.... the further you stray from this type of submission, the more chances there are you will be faced with the $600 submit.
if you want to find out, do a dry run and see how much they will charge you... its a dynamic thing so you can quit once you know.
...oh Marcia, Marcia, Marcia:)
Thanks for the post.....sorry for the delay in acknowledging it. The two sites I have are not porn sites. One sells adult toys, lingerie videos etc etc and the other one sells leather lingerie and bondage stuff.
From what you have written, it would appear that the higher fee is "justified" because of the extra work involved in checking porn sites.
You mentioned that I could do a dry run. Are you saying that I will be told before I press the "submit" button, whether I will be charged $200 or $600? Would appreciate your feedback on this. Thanks!
clean your brower cookies, create a clean Y! profile, try to submit a bogus site in the cat you would be shooting for and take it to the point where they ask you for your card... see what you are in for.... then leave, kill the profile, delete the cookies, do it again for real and cross your fingers
Marcia...oh, Marcia! That makes twice today I've had to clean coffee off my monitor! :)
Thanks again for the excellent advice.
You know the funny thing is....I don't want to knock the competition, but when I look at some of our competitor sites, which have "made the grade" and are listed at Y!...I have to say, I don't know what the fuss is about. They certainly did not get there through quality! On that basis alone, I guess their content could be considered as unique:-)
Anyway, dogboy and others, thanks again for your help. You have provided very valuable info, which I was not able to obtain from other companies, who have claimed to be experts in search engines and directories!
Let me ask you this: Yahoo changed my description and moved my l*ngerie <why we can't say that in here I don't know> online store into the adult section. I have not changed anything on my site and I still just sell legit items. They put that I sell adult novelties in my description which would lead you to believe it's another type store and trust me it's not. I see sites still in the correct category for my site that have not been moved and sell the exact same things as we do. Any idea on why this happened? This site has been in Yahoo since 1996. If you want the url, sticky mail me. I'd appreciate your opinion.
Thanks,
Jill
As far as classifying your site as 'adult', it sounds like it is... you have nothing in there for, say, a 10 year old, do you? However, if they classified it as 'p*rn' and charged you $600, it would be a different story.
I get you on the 'novelty' thing, and if you don't sell them, then you have a case to change your description based on the fact it is misleading to a consumer.
No, but neither does the rest of the l*ngerie sites that were left in the category I was previously in and got a LOT of traffic from. Now if you search the term l*ingerie we don't even come up. You have to use adult keywords to pull up this category. So why we were moved and the others were not is a mystery to us. I have written Yahoo, but I'm not holding out much hope of them even answering my email. All in all, this stinks and our hands are tied. Our site was in the index long before they even thought about charging for listings, and I'm not about to pay for one now!!
(moved addition to new post)
We wrote Yahoo asking for an explanation as to why our site was changed, we received only an automated response (to my knowledge and as of this time) that said the usual "thank you for your email and we'll look into it, yada yada..."
This morning when someone checked the Yahoo listings we were back in a category that was similar to our original position, except it looks like an updated category. Looks like they added undergarments to the l*ingerie category and now we're in there along with a few others. We are satisfied with this. It is not our original category, but at least it's not in the the adult section. Hopefully this will help our traffic, or the lack thereof.
Just thought I'd let you know. I do not know if this was any direct result of our email request or if they just happened to do this. I'd like to think we hit upon an editor on the ball
