EzineArticles is arguably the top article directory on the internet, and also one of the best places for people who are learning article marketing to get started.  In this post I outline why, and link to some of the free resources that EzineArticles has to offer.

What makes EzineArticles the Top Article Directory for Beginners?

Recently I took a look at the top 10 article directories for affiliate marketers, and EzineArticles was the clear winner, for the following reasons:

1. it gets high traffic – over 10 million unique visitor per month from the US alone;
2. it has a pagerank of 6 – making it a high authority site in Google’s eyes; and
3. because it allows 2 self serving links in resource box (which can be affiliate links if cloaked via a root domain).

But there are a few other things which make EzineArticles one of the top articles directories for learning about article marketing:

1. the EzineArticles guidelines;
2. the free training they provide;
3. the fact that all articles are reviewed by a human prior to publication.

The EzineArticles Guidelines

The EzineArticles submission guidelines and terms of use are comprehensive and incredibly easy to understand.  So much so that there is no point in me providing a detailed summary of them here.  They cover what is and what is not allowed, the formatting requirements for articles, and outline several best practices when it comes to copywriting in general.  Find them here.

Even for those wanting to submit articles to other article directories, chances are that if you comply with the writing style that EzineArticles sets out then you will probably comply with most of the requirements for the other article directories as well.  Now this is something will need a bit of double checking, as the requirements vary.  However, you can see a table summarising the terms of use for the top 10 article directories in my last post.

Free Training

On top of the handy editorial guidelines, EzineArticles also provide free training on article writing.  This includes not only things to watch out for regarding particular topics, but also ways to make articles as valuable as possible for the reader.  They also provide a number of article templates which can really help structure things and speed up article writing.

Did I mention that this training is free?

Human Review Prior to Publication

Some may view the fact that articles must pass human review before they are approved for publication on EzineArticles  as a negative.  I view it as a massive positive, for a couple of reasons.

First, it means a better quality of articles in the directory and that we won’t be competing for directory space against spammers.  Also, if the quality is maintained, Google is less likely in the future to impose any sort of a negative filter on articles published via EzineArticles.

Second, having an expert review our articles enables them to give feedback on areas for improvement, either where articles are fine tuned prior to being published, or where they are partially rejected.  I haven’t gone through this process myself (having paid fairly close attention to the detail in the editorial guidelines), but getting this sort of attention from someone who specialises in article writing could be quite beneficial in the long run.

Your Thoughts?

I’d be interested to hear what others have found when using EzineArticles – both good and bad.  Please add a comment if you have any particular experiences you would like to share.

© Tom McEwin
AffiliatePlayground.net

In this post I finish my look at the top 10 article directories for affiliate marketers, summarising my investigation and outlining some of the things I noticed during this process.

The Top 10 Article Directories (for Affiliate Marketers)

My final list of the top 10 article directories for affiliate marketers is (in order):

1. ezinearticles.com
2. buzzle.com
3. articlesbase.com (nofollow)
4. thefreelibrary.com
5. articlesnatch.com (temporary nofollow)
6. ehow.com (subject to self serving links being permitted)
7. searchwarp.com (nofollow)
8. articlealley.com (nofollow)
9. selfgrowth.com/articles
10. goarticles.com

This list was compiled having reviewed the traffic stats, pagerank and terms of use for each directory, as discussed in my last post.  For ease of reference, here is a summary of what the terms of use for the top article directories have to say:

• RB = Resource Box;
• Ezinearticles affiliate link cloaking must be via a root domain;
• This table is a summary only – for the full detail (and traffic info), see my last post.

Some Things I Noticed

1) Article Directories Want Unique Content

It is fairly obvious that article directories don’t want to become clogged with spam.  All of the top article directories I looked at require original articles, or at least unique ownership of an article (such as exclusive rights to use a particular article).  This means no re-badging of private label rights material, and no posting of public domain resources.

But it goes further than this.  It seems that article directories don’t like articles which have been spun.  This is where a percentage of an article is changed (such as the wording of a particular sentence or paragraph), but the structure of an article and the points covered remain largely intact.

It seems that directories particularly dislike articles which have been mechanically spun using an article spinner.  This is completely understandable given they can turn out some real gibberish (notwithstanding what the sales pages for these spinners might claim).

I can see this being one particular area where article directories are really trying to clean things up.  See, for example ezinearticles.com (@28).  GoArticles is another directory which takes a strong stance against articles which have been spun – prohibiting them all together.

2) Article Directories Don’t Like Duplicate Content so Much

Article directories don’t like mass distribution of the same article (eg via an article submitter to 1001 directories), and some require that an article not have been published anywhere else before it is submitted to a particular article directory.  If you want to submit the same article to multiple directories, then this is something which would need to be done with a little bit of care in order to not breach the terms of use for those directories.  Not only do some directories prohibit duplicate content outright, but the terms of use vary in their requirements.

3) Effective Pagerank for Links

The pagerank of a particular directory will be different than the pagerank of a particular article on that directory.  So the dofollow links which come from an article page will not get the pagerank of the overall directory.  Often the actual article pages will have a pagerank of 0.

If we look at ezinearticles as an example:

• the front page has a pagerank of 6 and has links to a selection of articles from a given day;
• the Internet and Business Online category has a pagerank of 5 and includes links to the 30 most recent articles in this category;
• the Internet Marketing sub-category has a pagerank of 4 and includes links to the 30 most recent articles in this category (out of a total of >50,000); but
• most of the actual articles in this sub category will end up with a pagerank of 0 (unless there is some link building done to that article itself, or the article gets syndicated).

So What?

So now we have a list of the top 10 article directories and some observations about things they don’t like and the weight of the dofollow links which may eventuate.  Now what?

Well, give the stance they take against spam, spun articles, and mass submitted articles, then not doing these things would seem to be a better way to keep the top article directories on side.

As noted by the guy who claims to have coined the phrase ‘linkwheel’, Google is after the most valuable content for their end users and this is what people themselves are more likely to share, subscribe to, and respect.  To quote him directly (because I couldn’t think of a better way to express this):

Content is king?

Hell no.

Value is king, and always will be.

So there we have it – the top 10 article directories and a reason to create valuable content (and not all unique content will be valuable) for your articles.  Not just because this is what the article directories want, and readers will get most benefit from, but also what Google is after and will reward in the long run.

© Tom McEwin
AffiliatePlayground.net

In this post I look at what I think are the top 10 article directories for affiliate marketers and why each article directory I include deserves its spot.

In my last post I set out my methodology for doing this and included a table of the top article directories sorted by Alexa rank, with a traffic estimate included.  This time I have sorted the table in order of traffic estimate, to streamline the process of choosing the top 10, and added a couple of directories I missed the first time around.

I will run down the list and consider each of the directories and their respective terms of use, until I settle on the best 10.  This gets a bit long and involved, so if you want to jump to my final list of the top 10 article directories, just CLICK HERE.

But if you are interested in how these directories work, and why I have come to my conclusions, then read on.

eHow.com

The first article directory I excluded from my original list was eHow.com.  Unlike most of the top article directories, eHow works on a freelance writing system where authors are either paid for submissions (when writing on a topic of eHow’s choosing), or can get a share of the ad revenue for ads displaying next to their articles (when writing on an approved topic of their own choosing).  This comes with a couple of catches however, as  authors need to go through an application and approval process before they can submit articles to eHow, and it seems that there will be a fair amount of restriction regarding the choice of topics available.

While eHow usually doesn’t allow syndication of articles uploaded, given it gets a phenomenal amount of traffic and has an outstanding page rank of 8, this doesn’t pose too much of a problem.  Articles must be original and unpublished elsewhere.  Affiliate links are prohibited, but there doesn’t seem to be any ban on self serving links.  Although given there is human review prior to publication, and the stance eHow appears to be taking generally requiring neutrality of reporting, these would need to be used very carefully.  In the event that self serving links are banned (which is unclear to me) then I’d say that eHow wouldn’t really be suitable for affiliate marketers.  But as things currently stand, and given the page rank and traffic that eHow gets, I’ll include it in my list of the top 10 article directories, but this is subject to confirming that self-serving links are allowed.  Also due to the restrictions on topics available, eHow won’t be claiming top spot on my list.

ezinearticles.com

Ezinearticles is widely regarded as one of the top article directories on the internet, and for good reason.  It has a huge amount of traffic, an excellent page rank and is deserving of top spot on my list.  Submissions must be approved by human moderators – something which keeps the quality of the articles high.   Up to 2 self serving links are allowed in the resource box of an article and while these can be affiliate links, if they are then they must be cloaked by a root domain.  It requires original articles, and while the Ezinearticles guidelines don’t provide a definition of ‘original’, their blog does. While it is fine to upload articles already published to a blog,  it is a bit unclear whether uploading articles already published to another directory would be allowed, although it seems (@ comments 22 and 36) that this would be fine provided that the same author name is used.

Suite101.com and Helium.com

Suite101 has a heap of traffic and a great page rank, and requires original articles at the date of publication.  Unfortunately it doesn’t allow self serving links anywhere in the article (body or resource box), but does from the author profile page.  It is also a but unclear regarding posting articles elsewhere once you have submitted to them to suite101.com – the FAQ indicates a delay of 12 months is fine, but it doesn’t say whether reposting an article elsewhere once it goes live on suite101.com would be allowed.

Helium.com seems to operate along similar lines as Suite101, with great traffic, and page rank and requiring original articles, and prohibiting duplicate content and self serving links.

Both Suite101 and Helium provide authors with a share of the advertising revenue for ads showing alongside their article.  Helium authors can also get a small upfront payment for certain approved topics.  But if an affiliate marketer is able to draw readers willing to click on Google ads, I’d suggest they are better off having their own blog and not sharing the spoils.  While suite101.com and Helium.com offer some interesting opportunities, they don’t really seem geared to affiliate marketing and I have cut both from my list.

Buzzle.com

Buzzle has great traffic and pagerank.  It requires original articles, and doesn’t accept any sort of duplicate content.  It also doesn’t seem to have any problems with affiliate links, or the restrictions that ezinearticles imposes – these can be posted “as often as you’d like – through your articles and the links you submit with your articles.” Definitely a worthy inclusion in my list of the top 10 article directories.

Articlesbase.com

Articlesbase has a very high traffic and page rank.  Original articles are required, duplicate content is probably not allowed and it seems that there is human review prior to publication.   Direct affiliate links are not allowed but other self serving links seem to be fine.  It also has nofollow tags applied to links inserted in an article, so links placed in articles uploaded to Articlesbase won’t be as useful in helping rank the target page on Google.  Still, given the traffic that Articlesbase receives it is easy to include it in my top 10.  I have also heard that articles on this directory may themselves have an easier time of ranking on Google (something to consider it targeting very low competition niches).

TheFreeLibrary.com

TheFreeLibrary has an excellent page rank of 7, and a high amount of traffic.  It requires original articles, but doesn’t seem to require that initial publication be with TheFreeLibrary.  Direct affiliate links are not allowed and articles themselves cannot be ” a press release, advertisement, self-promotion, or hype”.  Up to four self promoting links are allowed, provided they are located in author’s resource box.  On this basis, I’m happy to include TheFreeLibrary in my list of the top article directories.

ArticleSnatch.com

ArticleSnatch has a respectable level of traffic and page rank.  While it initially applies no follow tags on links of new authors, these tags can be removed upon request after publishing 5 articles.  Original articles are required, but I couldn’t find whether ArticleSnatch allows duplicate content (or whether it only accepts ‘original’ articles that have not been published via another article directory first).

Articlesnatch.com doesn’t allow direct affiliate links, but allows self serving links in the resource box.  I am not sure whether domain cloaking of affiliate links (as ezinearticles permits) would be allowed, but I suspect not.  Nevertheless, ArticleSnatch is definitely among the top 10 article directories.

Bukisa.com

Bukisa requires original and quality articles, and has an interesting revenue sharing model whereby users get earn a small amount when content they add receives unique visitors, and when they access the content of “friends, friends’ friends and their friends (up to three levels).”   Content already published to other sites is allowed, but unfortunately “self-promotion/self-advertisement by an individual or a company” is forbidden.  So this rules out affiliate links, and probably most self serving type links as well.  As with Suite101 and Helium, this means that Bukisa isn’t on my list of the top article directories for affiliate marketers.

SearchWarp.com and ArticleAlley.com

Both SearchWarp and ArticleAlley receive a solid amount of traffic, have decent page rank and apply nofollow tags on links.

SearchWarp requires original articles and doesn’t allow duplicate content. Affiliate links are prohibited but up to 3 self-serving links are allowed providing they are not to ‘thin affiliate’ sites or opt in forms.

ArticleAlley also requires original articles and mentions that it may remove duplicate content which has been submitted. It isn’t entirely clear whether this refers to articles published elsewhere, or only to articles which have been uploaded into multiple categories on ArticleAlley.  The only restrictions on links mentioned in the ArticleAlley guidelines are that only 3 links are allowed and they must be on topic – no prohibition on affiliate links or self-serving links.  ArticleAlley also claims to have an associated network where submitted articles are automatically republished to.

Notwithstanding the ongoing nofollow tags for these directories, I’m inclined to include them in the top 10 article directories given a) the traffic numbers for the other directories start to really drop off, and b) the auto syndication for ArticleAlley.

SelfGrowth.com/Articles

SelfGrowth.com is a site dedicated to self improvement.  While only articles in topics related to self improvement can be uploaded, the list of approved categories is much broader than I was expecting.  Solid pagerank and traffic make this an easy inclusion in the top 10 article directories.  The rights to use an article must be 100% owned by the uploader.  There doesn’t seem to be any sort of express restriction on affiliate links or other self serving links, nor does it seem necessary to confine these links to the resource box.   Nevertheless, articles undergo human review prior to publication and anything which looks too spammy may be rejected.

GoArticles.com

While the page rank for GoArticles is a bit lower than the other directories on my shortlist, given the traffic involved, it is still one of the top article directories going around.  The submission process seems to be automatic (no human review), with articles indexed by Google within 24 hours.

Submissions that are “commercial or advertorial to promote a specific product or service”, or have been created using an article spinner are considered to be spam and will be removed.  Still, there doesn’t seem to be any express restriction on affiliate links, although self serving links must be confined to the author bio box.  While original articles are encouraged this appears to be more of a copyright concern than anything else, and it doesn’t seem that there is a prohibition on uploading articles that have also been published elsewhere.

Final List of the Top 10 Article Directories

Based on the analysis above, my list of the top 10 article directories for affiliate marketers are (in order):

1. ezinearticles.com
2. buzzle.com
3. articlesbase.com
4. thefreelibrary.com
5. articlesnatch.com
6. ehow.com (subject to self serving links being permitted)
7. searchwarp.com
8. articlealley.com
9. selfgrowth.com/articles
10. goarticles.com

What Now?

This post was far longer than I was originally intending, but I think this is necessary in order to adequately deal with each article directory and not arbitrarily split things across multiple posts.  In my next post, I’ll include a table which summarises the terms of use I looked at above and extract some of the important things the top article directories have to say about article marketing.

© Tom McEwin
AffiliatePlayground.net

In my last post I compiled a list of the top 10 article directories, based on Alexa rating, Google PageRank, and whether or not a particular directory imposed nofollow tags on links.  In this post I’ll be outlining why I think a more detailed analysis is warranted when considering which article directories are best for affiliate marketers.

Alexa Rating vs Traffic Estimate

Rather than simply relying on the relative Alexa Ratings of article directories to give an idea of the traffic that each gets, I thought I would dig a bit deeper.  The Alexa Rating might be useful to rank the directories, but it doesn’t provide any sort of traffic weighting, something which will be quite important in formulating my final list of the top article directories.

So I tapped into Compete.com to get some estimated traffic for each of the article directories I was looking at, and came up with the table below.

The Compete.com traffic estimates are for unique views from US traffic only, extrapolating from a 1% sample of US internet users.  So the actual unique global traffic that the top article directories receive would be more than this (for example, Buzzle.com says that only 70% 0f the traffic it receives is from the US). The figures are also a little out of date as well, given they are from March 2010.

Still, assuming there are no errors which have crept in along the way, it would seem to give a much better picture (as compared to ranked Alexa Ratings) of the relative benefits of choosing one directory over another when it comes to the sort of traffic that articles might receive from a particular directory.  I think that already my shortlist of the top 10 article directories needs a bit of amending, but before I do so I’ll dig a little deeper.

New Method for Picking the Top 10 Article Directories

I’ve decided my new method will be to:

1. Rule out any article directories not suitable for affiliate marketing, and consider the terms of use for each of them;
2. Include those directories with mega traffic regardless of nofollow tags;
3. Prefer those directories with higher traffic and/or page rank to those with less.

The first of these points really goes without saying – in compiling a list of the top article directories for affiliate marketers, the directories included need to be suitable for affiliate marketing.  Most on the above list are quite suitable, others are not.

The second of these points is something which I spent a while considering after my last post.  I discovered on the Articlesnatch.com blog that the reason they introduced nofollow tags was to “help recover from a strong Google Filter”. It may be that articles on directories with nofollow tags have a better shot at themselves ranking on Google. This is something that could end up being quite important for micro niches where there isn’t too much competition for a keyword phrase that we may be targeting.  Plus there is also the traffic from the directory itself.

The third of these points is also fairly straightforward – affiliate marketers need traffic (and targeted traffic is best).  If we can get this straight from an article then great, but links from high authority article directories will help to rank on Google, which itself will provide a source of traffic.

In my next post I’ll be looking at each of the directories I want to add to my final list of the top article directories for affiliate marketers, and concluding with a list of the top 10 article directories.

© Tom McEwin
AffiliatePlayground.net

There is a lot to like about article directories.  But with the huge number available, it can be a bit difficult deciding which ones to submit to.  In this post I’ll be discussing some of the things affiliate marketers should look for when choosing the top article directories, and wrapping up with my shortlist of the top 10 article directories.

Why Bother With Article Directories?

Article directories are essentially websites where people can upload/publish their articles.  These articles will then be available for people browsing those directories and can also be republished by other websites looking for content.   Not only can article directories be a great source of information, but for an internet marketer they offer a couple of great ways to get targeted traffic.

Firstly, readers might like the content of an article and decide to click on relevant links included in that article.

Secondly, the links within articles can assist in climbing the Google rankings for a particular keyword phrase.  Some of the top article directories have quite a high authority in Google’s eyes so links from these sites can provide a fair amount of weight.  If an article gets republished then this can also provide additional back links, although the weight of these links will really depend on the credibility of the websites doing the republishing.

Finding the Most Popular Directories

The logical place to start is to find a list of the most popular article directories and then narrow the list down from there.  I managed to find a site which has a live list of the top 50 article directories that can be filtered by either Alexa rating or Google Pagerank, and identifies which of the directories use ‘no follow’ links.  Here are the top 20 article directories from that list as at May 2010:

Narrowing down the list

As explained at Dosh Dosh, the Alexa Rating is “a ranking system which bases its ranking schema on the level of traffic each website receives from the number of people who visit a website with the Alexa toolbar installed.” While people using the Alexa toolbar may have different browsing habits than the general internet user, the Alexa rating still provides a useful indicator of the popularity of a particular article directory compared to others. So all things being equal, a lower Alexa rating is better when choosing which article directories are best to submit to, as it means more traffic for that particular directory.

Google Pagerank is essentially a rating of the credibility which Google gives a particular webpage, using a complicated linking formula.  Basically the more links the better, but credible links carry much more weight than less credible links when Google decides how a particular page will rank (and how high it appears in search engine results).  For the purposes of selecting the top article directories to submit to, the higher the PageRank for a directory the better, as it will more greatly benefit the site being linked to by an article.

One thing I am inclinded to avoid are directories which have ‘no follow’ links.  While search engines use regular links help rank a page, they ignore links which are denoted as ‘no follow’ links.  As can be seen in the list of the ‘top 20′ article directories above, a number of them apply ‘no follow’ tags to the self serving links allowed in the article.  While this may not matter if we are just interested in attracting readers who will click on the links in an article, it really will make a difference if we also want the articles we submit to help increase the rank (and search engine traffic) of a particular web page.

A shortlist of the Top 10 Article Directories for Affiliate Marketers

Applying the reasoning above, a shortlist of the top 10 article directories for affiliate marketers (as at May 2010) would appear to be:

1. ezinearticles.com
2. suite101.com
3. buzzle.com
4. helium.com
5. goarticles.com
6. articledashboard.com
7. selfgrowth.com/articles.html
8. ideamarketers.com (Alexa) / sooperarticles.com (Pagerank)
9. amazines.com (Alexa) /articlecity.com (Pagerank)
10. articlerich.com (Alexa) / isnare.com (Pagerank)

The first 6 would seem to be an obvious choice, with articlesbase.com, articlesnatch.com and articlealley.com excluded as a result of their ‘no follow’ tags.

After these there seems to be a step down in the numbers, and while I include selfgrowth.com/articles.html due to its high page rank, it only accepts articles in very limited (ie self improvement type) categories.

The final 3 spots on the list really depend on making a choice to go for Alexa Rating (ie raw traffic to an article directory) or Google PageRank (ie the authority of backlinks).

But Wait, There’s More

Now that we have a shortlist of the top 10 article directories, the obvious step would be to write a unique article and submit that article to all of these directories.  Unfortunately the terms of use for these directories make things a little bit more complicated than that.  In my next post I’ll be looking into this when deciding on the top article directories that I will bother submitting to, and which directories I will cut from the shortlist.

© Tom McEwin
AffiliatePlayground.net