Archive

27. June 2007:

Article Plagiarism: the Next Internet Ripoff?

By Gordon Goodfellow 

Content is King! shout the search engines. That's what the search engines love. We also love the non-reciprocal links that we get for our websites when our articles are published on other peoples' sites with our resource boxes dutifully appended below them.

To create a well written article takes time and effort. We have to get everything right: it has to be of relevance to the reader in that subject field; it has to be well researched; all spelling, punctuation and grammar must be correct; it has to be a genuine contribution to that particular area of specialization, and so interesting that the editor will jump at the chance of publishing it. And, oh yes, all the right keywords have to be there, of the right density and in the correct proportions.

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13. June 2007:

Tracking And Cloaking Links

Some of the information and links contained in this article are now deprecated and I ask you to refer to my later posts for up to the minute link cloaking advice and tips so....

PLEASE READ MY LATEST POSTS ON LINK CLOAKING FOR UP TO DATE INFORMATION

1) Affiliate Links and Internet Explorer

2) Link Cloaking Updates & Covert Links

3) Cloaking Links With Samurai Stealth Cloaker 

 

Update: I Now Recommend Samurai Stealth Cloaker As The Best Solution

If you have been promoting anything online for even a moderate amount of time, you will have seen at least some advice about tracking your links and ads. It is good advice, because if you have no idea how many people are clicking on things, you have no way of measuring the effectiveness of what you are doing and therefore no idea of what to change and what to leave alone. 

This applies to all of your links, whether they are contained in an email or located on your website or blog. If you are an affiliate, there are other benefits to tracking/cloaking your affiliate URL's too. The occurrence of affiliate link theft is probably overstated, but it doesn't do any harm to protect yourself against it and have the added benefit of more "user friendly" links. 

I'm offering two solutions to link tracking/cloaking - yes I know there are countless ways of doing this, but these two alternatives are aimed at those with limited technical knowledge. There are other alternatives, but some of the free services have saturated the market and click through rates have suffered. One ofthese suggestions requires that you have your own server space, the other doesn't, but both are free.

1) MyLinkGuard.com is a free system from Richard Legg. By using it you can easily turn long ugly affiliate links into far more appealing ones and secure them from most prying eyes. As an added benefit will create an additional income stream by using the program. Downsides - you will have to join a mailing list to get access (the number of emails is not ridiculous though), you must have hosting space somewhere even if it's with a free provider, and it's not the best way forward for tracking. On the whole though, it's a great and simple to use link cloaker for the price - i.e. free!

2) ClickAudit.com is probably the simplest way to both track and cloak your links. Sign up free at the website, type in the url you want to track, hit a button and presto, one cloaked link with tidy looks and real time tracking. Couldn't be simpler.  Clickaudit has since been shut down - sorry.

Note, to affiliates - whatever systems you use for link tracking/cloaking, be sure to read the terms of any company you are promoting. Some have strict rules about what you can and can't do with your affiliate links. 

TCH

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12. June 2007:

Google Adsense Rules

Back in April, Google announced that publishers could no longer show ads on sites rotating in traffic exchanges of any kind, be they manual or auto surf programs. This will probably catch a lot of people out for various reasons. 

It seems a rather harsh and uninformed stance to take if you ask me. For one thing, I doubt very much that the average traffic exchange surfer spends time looking at a site long enough to click on Adsense ads, and, if they do, it will presumably be for the exact same reason as anyone else clicks on an ad when they land on a website - because they want to! I know there have been instances of a couple of so called "Ads View" exchanges which blatantly encourage members to click on other members Adsense ads and Google are certainly right to clamp down on such blatant "click fraud". That type of site and its members are deliberately stealing - not from Google, but from Adwords advertisers trying to make an honest buck. I'm guessing that it is these bad apples that have contributed to Google's decision. To me though, it seems more a case of being seen to be doing something about a problem, rather than an effective solution. It is a problem which is unlikely to go away anytime soon and will barely register in the overall fight against invalid or fraudulent click activity.         

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11. June 2007:

Instant Article Wizard Follow Up

This is a rather smug and self indulgent "told you so" but I couldn't resist it. Instant Article Wizard is a great tool but article directory editors beware. Here is a classic example of the software's ability to mangle in the hands of either a non-English speaker, or a less than able user.

I'm not quoting the source page which was a sales page reached via a Google ppc ad. My "child and loaded weapon" analogy is borne out by this "quality article" - I think you'll agree. Here is the quote in its entirety:-

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11. June 2007:

Free Niche Marketing Sources

Free Niche Marketing Source by Jeremy Lawrence

Niche marketing strategies are something all Internet businesses and entrepreneurs are having to reckon with these days if they want to keep their head above water and profits in the black . I have had to learn niche marketing begrudgingly, perhaps like you, through some painful trial and error, and wasted money on over-hyped, expensive Internet marketing products. Yet, learning the ins and outs of niche marketing has been a matter of survival for my business. In this article I will share with you one of the most powerful and overlooked sources of free niche marketing traffic.

It is incredible to me with all of the hype over “Web 2.0” all of the so-called “gurus” have overlooked niche marketing strategies from one of the most visible and vibrant sources of free traffic on the Internet. This traffic source has been around since the beginning of the Internet and it is still important.

Internet groups.

Yes that means, Yahoo! Groups, MSN Groups, Google groups and other places where people freely congregate around their shared interests.

These groups offer a gold mine of interested, rabid prospects. People in these newsgroups will devour your information if it is good and properly conveyed to them. These are people who voluntarily joined a group to interact with others around a common interest; The same interest you are promoting in your niche. They were not bribed by a free newsletter, nor did they have other carrots dangled in front of them to join. You are not trying to sell them on your idea. They already get it and deep down inside, they want you to have the answer they are looking for. Read Full Article

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10. June 2007:

Web 2.0 Authority Black Book

I'm posting a short link to a new free e-book entitled Authority Black Book, written by Jack Humphrey which contains an astounding amount of information about web 2.0. If you have no idea what people are talking about when they refer to Web 2.0, this will tell you everything you need to know and covers a whole range of subjects from blogging through to video marketing, podcasting, social bookmarking, tagging, RSS feeds and a whole host of other useful information.

 

The best thing about it is that it's free to download - if you already consider yourself pretty wise in the whole Web 2.0 arena, you will still learn something from this book, so read and enjoy!

 

Click Here For Web 2.0Authority Black Book 

 

TCH

Specialist Hosting/Marketing Tools 

 

 



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09. June 2007:

Free Website Content or Duplicate Content Worries?

Because the debate surrounding duplicate content continues to rage unabated a lot of people are becoming paranoid about having their sites removed from Google for falling foul of search engine algorithms. Unfortunately there is a lot of totally unfounded scaremongering out there and, it seems to me, to be based on one thing  - marketing. 

Think about all the people who are making money off of the back of the fear of being de-indexed by Google - there are plenty of people selling software products that promise to save you from such a fate by ensuring that none of your site content will be considered duplicate. Think about it, if you've ever read The Rich Jerk you will know that one selling tactic is simply to prey on a person's fear - use that fear to convince them that they cannot do without what you are offering, that you can provide a resolution to their fear, whatever it may be. They say that sex sells - fear is a similarly powerful motivator. 

I'm no expert on SEO, and I know that there have been instances of sites running into difficulties over duplicate content but there are so many conflicting opinions that it's almost impossible to know who is right. I tend to side with those who feel that a great deal of what is foisted on us is nothing but guesswork, pure and simple. I have noticed the fearful questions on forums about the subject - should I write/distribute articles? Should I use RSS feeds on my site? Should I use Third Party articles? My suggestion would be to stop worrying about it, get on with producing your website or blog and provide the information that you think is relevant to your visitors. My view may be simplistic, but I'll be damned if I'll stay awake at night worrying about such things - it really is pretty ridiculous when you think about it. 

If you are in the business of creating junk/spam sites on a large scale, you may well fall foul of the search engines, which is, I believe, the reason they have these algorithms. "On a large scale" is a topic in its own right, but think in the region of hundreds/thousands, is my theory.  If your content is relevant, I don't believe you need to worry too much. Just think of all the news sites out there - by definition there content is duplicated every single day - headlines and stories published on thousands of places all over the web, often word for word via syndication. The web works on links and would be nowhere without them - can you imagine if search engines refused to index a site because it just happened to have the same story as one other site? A simple example of excluding a page from results would be generic affiliate pages - the kind that promise people their "own" site which is really just the corporate page with an ID embedded for each sucker, sorry, member - these are never indexed by search engines - if they were, a search for the company would produce thousands of results, all leading to essentially the same page. 

There are far greater experts than me who have spoken out on these issues and you will find the following links and resources useful. Some contain more useful links, and give differing theories and suggestions, but hopefully an overall balanced viewpoint to set your mind at rest.

Are you being Duped by the Duplicate content theory and other SEO theories?

Duplicate Content - Penalize Me, Please 

Avoiding Duplicate Content Penalties 

Duplicate Content Filter - What It Is and How it Works 

The Duplicate Content Penalty Myth 

Happy blogging!

TCH

Specialist Hosting/Autoresponders/Marketing Tools 



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07. June 2007:

Adwords Miracle Revisited

With all the recent excitement over Google Cash Detective as the latest and greatest Adwords software product to hit the web, I thought it would be timely to revisit a favorite Adwords product of mine - Adwords Miracle Guide.

This is a product I've been promoting on this blog since it began and have done so elsewhere too. The reason - it is still one of the most straightforward guides to anyone who wants to try making money with the combination of affiliate programs and Google Adwords. It is easy enough for beginners to understand, but also contains some great Adwords tips and techniques for the more seasoned affiliate marketer. (Please remember that playing the Adwords game will mean some investment on your part for ppc advertising - get it wrong and you can lose money very easily, which is why guides like Adwords Miracle are well worth studying before you start an Adwords campaign).

In short, if you can't afford the hefty price tags associated with many Adwords products, invest in Adwords Miracle Guide and learn how to earn money without losing your shirt in the process. All in all, an excellent Adwords guide for affiliate marketers, and well worth the price tag - $97.00. (If you think this is too much to spend on a guide that will probably save you a lot more in wasted pay per click costs, then to be honest, you are probably not ready to enter the Adwords arena anyway). This product takes the form of e-book and video guides and walks you through all the potential pitfalls. It is the hard won knowledge that you are paying for and as anyone who has made costly mistakes will tell you, "I wish I'd known all that before I started"!

TCH
Affordable Specialist Hosting & Marketing Tools

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05. June 2007:

Does Video Make Scams Look Better?

Judging by the recent influx of video pitches, the scammers certainly think so.

I'd just been reading Phil Miranda's latest post entitled What Is An Internet Scam and thinking about a video I received yesterday and then deleted, wishing I hadn't because I really wanted to expose it on these pages.

As if by magic I get another video by way of a large traffic exchange - using the same technique as the one I deleted, for a completely different program. I'm not saying this was a scam, it could be genuine. However, it is the approach that bothers me and I will issue a few words of warning.

If I wanted to show you "proof" of something online, it wouldn't be too difficult, so here is how I'm going to do it. I'll cobble together a web page making all the promises, pushing all your buttons about how you can quit the rat race, make a fortune, live happily ever after, spend more time with your family/cat/dog/supermodel - whatever. I'll make the strikingly original claim that "I've done it and YOU can too".I won't labor the point, I hope you get it. But here's the twist, I'll embed a video - it won't be too slick, because I want to prove that I'm just an average Joe, in fact I'm probably not as smart as you. See, I can barely operate this webcam and PC, but it doesn't matter, even a dimwit like me can do what I'm going to share with you.

Show me the money you're thinking - right? OK, I'll hold up an envelope from FedEx....I'll show you the date so you know it's real, it's still sealed even. I'm going to open it live on cam, to prove that this works. Ready? OK, exaggerated opening of package follows, and as if by magic, wow, $1000 in $100 bills. What more proof could anyone want? You want envelopes like this every day too don't you? (well, yeah, of course I do) Just imagine what it will do for YOU!

People, do yourselves a favor - delete the damn thing and forget about it. If was as unprincipled as these con men, do you really think I couldn't scrape together $1000 and Fed Ex it to myself? One of these programs is actually a gifting idea (supposedly) which means highly dubious, probably illegal and extremely unlikely to make you anything except $1000, $2000 or $5000 poorer. It amazes me that anyone would promote this kind of garbage, and if the person who sent it to me was not one of the perpetrators but a gullible "customer" I commiserate and hope you've learned your lesson.

If you're trying to make money online, you'll know how difficult it can be, but if you think you can persuade the average traffic exchange surfer to part with $1000 you're a better salesman than 99% of us. So, please, don't be taken in - your money will serve you better staying in your savings account and kept for investing in something that might genuinely serve your online business efforts. Failing that you could always spend it on luxuries like food.

TCH
Specialist Web Hosting For Marketers

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04. June 2007:

Joomla For Beginners

If you've ever wanted to build your own sites using Joomla you might have found it all a bit confusing. Indeed, the first time we ever looked at Joomla we were overwhelmed! Despite knowing what it could do, getting it to do it was another thing entirely.

With so many web hosting companies now offering Joomla installation via C-Panel and Fantastico it really was time for an easy to use guide on getting started. Joomla is powerful but bewildering for new users so finding a no nonsense guide to installing and using the software is just what the doctor ordered.

We can highly recommend ClubTVK Joomla Ebook which will make the process of setting up your first Joomla site a whole lot less stressful. It is a 91 page e-book, but it really does answer all your Joomla questions, Joomla Set Up, and Joomla troubleshooting issues in one fell swoop.

You can also find more great Joomla help at the following locations:-
The Joomla Blog
The Alledia Blog
WhyJoomla.com

 

We also have a selection of Joomla publications for sale, for both beginners and advanced users of Joomla at our online store 

 

TCH Leading The Way In Hosting For Marketers



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01. June 2007:

Instant Article Wizard - A Review

There has been a lot of buzz about this new piece of software and my inbox has been bombarded with sales letters for the product in the last couple of weeks. Basically, the software produces articles on pretty much any subject you care to mention, almost automatically. It does this by trawling the web for a list of keywords selected by the user and is hailed as being a huge time saver for those who were previously too busy to bother with article marketing.

Having visited the site and watched the videos of the program in action, I have to say that I have my reservations. Whilst it does appear to do everything the owners claim, there seems to me something rather "off" about it. I mean, plagiarism is always unwelcome and effectively, Instant Article Wizard commits the offence, line by mechanical line, to produce "quality articles". However, let me qualify my statements, because it is an impressive tool if used properly, without a doubt.

The biggest problem with this approach is that many users will follow the video demos in a robotic fashion, producing a series of sentences, every single one of which will contain the chosen keywords or keyphrase. The end result sounds appalling, and without an editor to inflict some kind of reason and writing style, the end result will be floods of these poorly cobbled together excuses for writing snowing under the article directories. (Ironically it is some of these directories who are promoting it the most). A bit like communism, it sounds great in theory, but basically sucks in the real world.

My recent piece on article marketing dealt with some of the problems faced by the participants and I believe that the launch of this software will only add to the difficulties. I don't dismiss the usefulness of the program, but I feel that it is akin to giving a four year old a loaded weapon! I'm also sure that some will use the program wisely and will indeed produce quality articles with its help, but they will be far outnumbered by the cowboys who will view it as another short term quick buck generating machine. I only hope that the directories will recognize these for what they are, but it looks set to make an already difficult task even more problematical.

The flood of Adsense optimized websites which degraded the online experience is slowly being brought to heel by Google, but it looks as though quality in the article marketing world is set for further degradation. My plea to those who purchase Instant Article Wizard is to use it sensibly, as I am sure the programmers intended. For those interested in purchasing or finding out more  you can do so at Instant Article Wizard

TCH
Specialist Hosting For Marketers

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