Spammers defined

MSN spam, spam definitions

[gehrlekrona]

OK....
In MSN's eyes there are only 2 types of web masters. There are spammers and there are spammer that haven't yet been defined as spammers. What we do is illegal , doesn't metter what we do, because tomorrow they will have defined us all as spammers anyway. What do they know about our intentions? Can you have a stupid computer tell you what your intentions were? If so, why don't we just skip the jurors and have a computer instead? "Ah... I can see here through my algo that you were out to steal something!"

Bunch o' BS! if you ask me! MSN sucks!

Addition: to all people that can't get into MSN anymore, your site has probably already been defined as spam so they won't let you in! Sites that has been removed, you have been identified as a spammer and have been removed!

[msndude]

Our approach is not meant to be unfair to siteowners, but at the same time is end-user-centric: we strive to provide our users with high-quality results, which also involved working constantly to eliminate low-quality spam results. The simplest way of thinking about spam is this: If you're engaging in techniques ONLY to rank high, and that add NO value whatsoever to users and visitors, then it's probably a spam technique. We know that the vast majority of siteowners are working within our guidelines, and we *want* your sites to be in our index!

Obviously, this isn't going to be a 100% perfect, which is why [e-mail] offers a means of re-inclusion in cases where you think we've made a mistake. This isn't as fast as we'd like it to be, and we're working on it. If, however, you are engaging in spam techniques, you're going to have to convince us that they've been neutralized, and that you won't use them again, before we include you again. Design and optimize for your users first, and we'll work to make sure you're in our index.

In case you're interested, our guidelines are available at: [search.live.com...]

[flanok]

Hi MSNDude.
You replied to my intial email stating that I was spammimg and hense removed.
I have completely changed the look of me site, added reviews, top tips, information pages, what if pages, (most were already there, just not in the visitors eye)took away several similar pages. etc.etc.

I have emailed both you back this information (twice)and webspam this information and have got no reply or feedback to tell me whether you feel I have done enough or not. Do I need to do more etc. etc.

You say you want us in your index, I say I want to be your index.
Does a non reply mean I have not done enough?
All I want is a few words saying yes, you have done enough or we are still unhappy with.

Please help us all! You want us in, we want to be in or we would not be complaining.
Replies to emails and forum posts would help us both.
The complaining would reduce and most of us would get back into the index.

Please Reply
Mark

[Ezer]

to MSNDude,

Thank you for pointing out the guidelines:
[search.live.com...]

The guidelines are reasonable.
Now I do agree with MSN.

I am truly apology that I had some misunderstood about MSN's ability.

Question:
Would MSN re-index a site(used to be a SPAM site) if the site does the all corrections and follow guidelines?
Get any chances?

Best Regards,
Ezer

[gehrlekrona]

I was advised that at least one of my sites was to no value to users because I was told that it used on-page spam techniques (whatever that means!) It's been like that for at least a year and as far as I know nothing has changed on that site, so about a month ago MSN changed something so now it was treated as a spam site and ALL other sites with it.
One site, I was told, seemed OK so it was going to be "released" again. This tells me that they didn't even look at the site and it was penalized just because I had this other site/these other sites on the same IP address/Name Server/whois info or whetever they used to ban all sites.
The site that I was told was using on-page spam techniques now only have ONE page left. No links and just some informational message why it has been removed so now it's got to be clean after MSN's standard and should be released again, right?

MSN still sucks!

By the way: sending an email to [e-mail], is that like saying I have spammed, please forgive me and reinclude my site? shouldn't you have at least 2 email addresses, one for [e-mail] where you can report web spam and one [e-mail] where you can ask to be reincluded?
It's like Google having to admit that you spammed just to ask for a renclusion.....

[edited by: gehrlekrona at 8:22 pm (utc) on Jan. 27, 2007]

[bobothecat]

If it's anything like the site in your profile... I can certainly undertsand why it would be considered spam.

Although there are execeptions... most sites penalized deserve to be so... that one included.

[gehrlekrona]

@bobothecat

and why is that? Please inform me why you think it deserves to be treated as a spam site and not included? I don't see your home page/web site in your profile! Why's that? Maybe we all could learn a little bit from it!

[pageoneresults]

Please inform me why you think it deserves to be treated as a spam site and not included?

First impressions are lasting impressions. I'll concur that many sites don't deserve to be in the index, particularly those that are Made for AdSense and offer very little if any unique value for the visitors.

I'd say they should be treated as "sites of lower quality" and be purged from the publicly available index to make room for other "sites of higher quality".

Please inform me why you think it deserves to be treated as a spam site and not included?

Unfortunately we don't really allow site reviews here at WebmasterWorld. There are some very obvious problems with the site in your profile hence the reason MSN may be flagging it as a low quality site.

[Marcia]

>>First impressions are lasting impressions.

The first impression when looking at some pages is that they're stuffed to the gills with keywords and keyword phrases - every possible permutation of keyword combinations that a webmaster would want to be ranking for.

The second impression when looking at some pages is that the way they're "written" (thrown together is more like it), there's no attempt whatsoever being made to actually communicate with human beings who would be visiting the page/site and might be interested in the offering.

[gehrlekrona]

I REALLY would like to get input what I can change so you guys that have usefult input can email me!
The site in my profile is NOT the site I have been talking about. It is actually the one MSN said could be left in from the cold!

[Marcia]

>>I REALLY would like to get input

Unforunately, there could be hundreds (or thousands) of folks who would love to get personal input, which is why the "no site reviews" policy makes so much sense.

In easy cases it can take 1/2 to an hour of time to spot why there might be a penalty or ban, but in most cases it can take hours of digging around to even make an educated guess. Unfortunately, it's harder to spot your own mistakes, but those are usually repeated across the person's own sites so if something is "wrong" with one, a starting place is to look for that same thing on other sites, and then dig for that little extra factor that pushed it over the edge.

[gehrlekrona]

@marcia,

THANKS! I'll do that and I'll also have a look at the site in my profile :)

[BillyS]

gehrlekrona - People that live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones.

I wouldn't mind it so much if MSN came out and told me I had a penalty applied - this way I could attempt to fix something. But their response so far has been less than helpful as my msn story [webmasterworld.com] points out. MSN currently accounts for around 0.3% of my traffic - and all of those are from Australia - unfortunately my target is the US. To tell me I'm not ranking well is just plain silly. I should be able to rank for my own site name. Clearly something is wrong with MSN - just wish they could figure it out.

[edited by: BillyS at 1:09 am (utc) on Jan. 28, 2007]

[Marcia]

>around 0.3% of my traffic - and all of those are from Australia - unfortunately my target is the US.

Think that might be because of a different algo and/or filters at local MSN Live than in other localities? I've seen it with traffic from MSN Canada and AU in past months.

[gehrlekrona]

@BillyS,
Not sure what you meant by throwing stone...?
You mentioned this in your other post: "You've got a large number of links and that can affect ranking" and this is why you have been banned is my guess. It seems like MSN wanted to do something about link buying, link exchange and everything with IBL's, OBL's and internal linking and everything went just to hell from there.
I still can not understand why and how they can ban all sites because of one site (or more?) failure! There's got to be something they can do to flip the switch. Even my mother-in-laws quilt site with 5 pages, no links in and no links out (as far as I know) have been banned.......

So yes, MSN sucks :(

Oh by the way, I just "love" this on their feedback page:
"If you found spam or expected a specific website in the search results but it wasn't there, enter the web address (URL) here"
Now who in their right mind would fill in something in that textbox?
Do you tell them it is a spam site when you fill in that box or do you tell them that you couldn't find MIcrosoft.com for example? If you type in Microsoft.com, do you report them as spam then?

[tigertom]

Are your sites similar (in design) to the one in your profile?

If so, I can see why they would be excluded by the MSN algo. And why an inspection by MSN staff wouldn't change that. And why your Mum's site got blitzed as a side effect, if they're going after mega-spammers.

You should look at sites that are ranking in MSN for your keywords, and compare them to your banned sites.

Saying 'MSN sucks' when MSNDude has tried to help you does you no favours.

[atlrus]

Well, I dont like the current MSN algo, but I agree - if your website is anything like the one in your profile - you should be banned for ever from the Internet itself!

Websites like yours gave me a really hard time when I was looking for a German Shepherd puppy last year.

I have always wondering what the SEs meant by "make your website for the visitors, not the search engines", and now I know.

I mean - look at your spanish link on your home page - what the F#%@$? There is no link that deserves to be that long. And your inner pages a clearly made for Adsense... Not to mention that it's ugly, poorly made and very confusing...
Spend $50 and buy yourself a nice template - most of us do it - not all of us are graphic designers.

I dont know, maybe it is my personal search experience that pissed me off so much, but yeah, good call on this one MSN.

[Marcia]

Incidentally, have other sites on the same IP had any problems?

[gehrlekrona]

Good input for the site and things I actually didn' even now about, like the spanish link.... wrong placed </a> tag so that sucks.
It's actually not made for AdSense. Adsense is a second thought to let people advertise for free. It used to cost money but not anymore!
I actually bought the template but if anybody have any good ones I should use instead, feel free to email me!

@marcia, yes, all sites same IP .

And I didn't say MSNDude sucks, because he doesn't! It's MSN as a product that sucks. If it wasn't for MSNDudes help here we wouldn't know anything and there is none at Google that come even close to anything what he does! So no, I am not complaining about MSNDude at all! I am grateful for his help so if you read this MSNDude and if Ihave offended you, then I do apologize for that! It wasn't meant for you personally!
I have always been wondering why not a lot of people have their home page in their profile, and now I think I know why... People with a lot of comments on my crappy site don't want to show off their own site. Would be nice to learn from the web masters here...

[appi2]

I wasn't going to post this but, you bitched agian.

I REALLY would like to get input

If I were you I'd delete it.

I've done a couple of sites (for friends) related to the area your trying to get easy cash from.
I wouldn't even reccomend them adding a free link. Never mind paying for one.

Would you advertise on that site?
If you were paying for Adwords would you be happy to be on that site?

[steps over the line]
Stop trying to leach of others.
How can you ask for $ to advertise, when you don't even make any effort to promote or provide a service. The site in your profile is nothing more than a MFA fake paid directory.
Most people in that area are not net savvy and just want exposure for thier small family site/biz/service. That site is nothng more than a sick twisted way to con others less knowledgeable out of money.

[steps back]
Go do some research and ask the people in that field what they want and expect.
Learn how to code basic html.

And I'll work on how to formulate a sentance, spell and be polite. ( you can join me in the polite bit.)

msn/live well done. kiss kiss

[gehrlekrona]

Well, thanks everybody for your input!

Glad I could bring out the best in all of you today :)
Learn how to spell and formulate a sentence? Not everyone is born here but most of us try our best at least.

Anyway, like most here I now don't have my home page listed anymore in the profile. Had enough of input for one day :)

[appi2]

Posted at same time.
If I'd seen the one above, I'd wouldn't have posted.

c'mon... make the net a better place. Help people don't use them.

[BillyS]

>>You mentioned this in your other post: "You've got a large number of links and that can affect ranking" and this is why you have been banned is my guess.

And this is the frustrating part - I wouldn't call 2,000 links a lot for a site that's been around for nearly 3 years. I rank fairly well in both Yahoo and Google and MSN has trouble with scrapers. Personally, I don't think they have the ability to tell a good link from a bad one or a scraper from a legitimate link.

[gehrlekrona]

My guess is that they are trying to do something about link spamming and I don't mind that at all!
The only thing I don't like is when all site are being penalized if there are one or more bad sites. I don't mind if a site that is bad is being removed because then you can check it out and do whatever is needed to get it back, that is, if you have any control over it.
I have been reporting to MSN sites that have scraped content off of my site(s) several times to look into these sites since they shouldn't be in their index and the links they might provide I don't want.
This morning, maybe thanks to MSNDude, I see that they are gone! and that's a relief! I also see sites have been released from the ban so hey, this is good!

If it's you MSNDude that made this happen, then THANK YOU! I do NOT want to break any rules and I think most people try to do their best not to.

[Tomseys]

Anone know msndude's email? I pm'ed him weeks ago and have not heard back. Thanks.

[Tomseys]

Msndude, I sent a stickymail to you. Can you review it and get back to me via mail when you have a chance so I can get your feedback and discuss it with you? I would appreciate it.

Thanks.

[edited by: Tomseys at 11:55 am (utc) on Jan. 29, 2007]

[Receptional]

Anone know msndude's email? I pm'ed him weeks ago and have not heard back. Thanks.

MSNDude is not the place / person / instrument of search engine to go for personal service. Same goes for Googleguy, AdwordsAdvisor, Adcentre411 and whoever looks after Yahoo users. There are several billion websites out there. MANY of those site owners would like a personal service.

The maths just doesn't work.

[Tomseys]

I have communicated with him/that username in the past more than a few times.

But thanks for your information.

[Hissingsid]

The most effective MSN spam I've seen is to buy an hyphenated domain name with the most commonly used/high traffic keywords in your market in it. Then it doesn't matter if your site/pages are a pile of poo you will still rank well and get traffic from MSN.

I'm seriously thinking about making a site specificly designed for MSN, I say designed but what I mean is any old rubbish thrown together and put inside a site with a domain name that includes the two keywords that are most frequently used in our market.

MSN search is a joke!

Well done Bill for supporting another charity case.

Sid

[Balle]

Our approach is not meant to be unfair to siteowners, but at the same time is end-user-centric: we strive to provide our users with high-quality results, which also involved working constantly to eliminate low-quality spam results.

This is obviously all good - but every time you manually remove 100 spam sites it looks like you also hit a couple of quality sites in the process. I feel that this has happened to my main site.

So what happens now? Well I guess the true spammers replaces their 98 spam sites with 200 new spam sites and get these to rank for a while, whereas I and my quality site will have to try and get trafic from other sources.

I guess the 200 spam sites in time will also be removed from the search index but please try harder not to remove the quality sites with real content made for the end users in the process, or you will end up with 400 new spam sites and 8 quality sites now missing in the index...

Repeate this example for a while and there will be noting but spam left in the index. In my opinion spam can not be defeated by removing sites manually....there has to be a better way.

In my niche doing a couple of reciprocal link exchanges is not really concidered spam - everybody does it - white, black and gray. We have all adjusted to what Google and Yahoo wants and Live search alone can not change the 'rules of the game'.