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10

Starting to Doubt EzineArticles

By Jennifer Mattern on 11th January, 2008Filed in Making Money, Web Writing

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If you’ve been reading the blog recently, you’ll know that I’ve decided to give bum marketing a go using EzineArticles.

With only two articles published, I’ve already had two problems with editors who don’t know their own rules. I’m starting to wonder if it’s really going to be worth it to start publishing large numbers of articles with them versus sticking to something like Squidoo. Both articles were ultimately approved, but here’s what happened so far:

Article 1

My first article was accepted somewhat quickly without any problem (including the links). I later wanted to expand my resource box. I added a paragraph (with a link to this blog), and I removed one of the previous links (the other previous link remained exactly the same).

After resubmitting it with the new resource box info, it was declined, and I was told it was because of the original affiliate link. Well A) an editor already approved that link, so someone had to be clueless, and B) their terms very clearly state that you can re-direct or forward a top-level domain to an affiliate page (which is what I did).

I emailed them. They apologized for the “misunderstanding” (which is looking like a standard “oops, we f’d up” email,” and then they re-approved it.

Article 2

The second article seemed to take a longer time to get reviewed to begin with. I finally got an email from them saying it was rejected today, because it had a link within the first 1 – 3 paragraphs. I checked. It didn’t. Technically, it was in the fourth paragraph. Apparently someone couldn’t count, or didn’t know what a paragraph was. Lovely.

Instead of arguing with them, I just moved the link down to a lower position. I re-submitted it for approval, and received an email again rejecting it, saying the article contained more than their allowed number of links (they allow 6 total links, 3 of which can be to sites you own, I believe).

I checked my article. There were only 4 total links (3 of which pointed to sites I own). So apparently someone really can’t count. I sent them an email this time, and quickly received an email again apologizing for the “misunderstanding.” Who misunderstood what? You wrote the rules. I understood them and followed them. You either can’t count, don’t know enough about writing to know what a paragraph is, or don’t know enough about the Web to know what the hell a link is! Ugh.

So anyway, even though they’re ultimately getting approved, I really don’t think I’m going to have the patience to not only take the time to write these articles, but also take the time to fight to get them published each time. Squidoo is looking more and more attractive for article marketing at this point (especially since I don’t go around writing spam-like articles to begin with, and Squidoo can be directly monetized).

So… is it just me, or have other people had these kinds of issues with EzineArticles too? I’ve heard they get more lenient with you after your first 10 articles, but frankly I don’t know if I want to give someone 10 free articles to monetize their own site, just hoping they’ll be less ignorant down the road, when I can accomplish the same thing elsewhere (Squidoo to monetize it, and offering the articles as free content on my own content service site to attract more paying customers anyway).

Thoughts?

[tags]freelance writing,freelance writers,ezinearticles,ezine articles,article marketing,bum marketing[/tags]

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Related posts:

  1. EzineArticles Improving?
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  4. Article Marketing – One More Try
  5. Flipping Websites – eWritingJobs – Week 2

About the Author: Jennifer Mattern

Browse all posts from this author.

Jenn Mattern is a professional blogger and freelance business writer. She owns All Freelance Writing as well as several other sites and blogs covering PR, small business, and related topic areas. She is also currently writing a nonfiction book for freelance writers called The Query-Free Freelancer, and is the author of the Web Writer's Guide e-book series.

10 Responses to “Starting to Doubt EzineArticles”

  1. Sharon Hurley Hall

I’ve never had any problem with EzineArticles. In fact, it’s my favourite article marketing site. I’ve only had one problem in over 40 submissions and it was my own fault, but they were great about accepting the resubmission. If EzineArticles isn’t working for you, have you tried Article Marketer?

  • Jennifer Mattern

    • It’s not so much that it’s “not working for me,” but that some of the editors are apparently completely clueless about their own rules. I’m sorry, but there’s just no excuse for not being able to count to 6. If it were just one person, I’d have given it another try without question (I actually did that the first time they screwed up). They’re also pretty quick about fixing their mistakes, so I can give them credit on that front. But right now they’re 2 for 2 on screw-ups, so that’s my issue. I’m only using them, because everyone I know who’s actually good at the article marketing game for affiliate products has told me to use them over the other options. So I’d most likely go back to using Squidoo and my own sites (which have gotten me a decent number of affiliate sales for the effort already) over trying other article directories and submission software.

    I’m going to at least publish 3 more with EzineArticles at this point… I’m looking at this this way: best out of three. If they mess up and waste my time again in the next three, I’ll steer clear of them. If they get those ones right, I’ll finish the first ten before deciding whether to start posting large quantities of articles there. My time’s too valuable to keep playing games with them, so I think that’s more than a fair chance to show me whether they’re going to be worthwhile or not in the long run.

  • Shawn Shearer

    • I just happened on your site through EzineArticles. They are my major source of articles at this point (though I also use Associated Content, Triond, Helium, and have one on ElectricArticles).

    I haven’t had any problems like you have. The only “rub” I have is the exorbitant amounts of articles some of the writers put on there and the shoddy quality of them. So, I don’t think they actually
    “edit” anything. Seems like they just scan it for spam and check links.

    Though Ezine doesn’t pay, it does give you massive exposure and excellent backlinks. Plus, I’ve seen quite a few of my articles appearing on other sights, futher exposing my site. The others haven’t had the same results.

    Though I agree it’s not perfect, it’s worth your time for nothing else than the two benefits I listed above.

    Thanks for your site, too. It’s nice to hear things bluntly and honestly.

  • Jennifer Mattern

    Shawn,

    I wouldn’t say EzineArticles gives “massive” exposure. If anything, I’m hearing repeatedly that they’re so saturated now that you shouldn’t count on much traffic from them. Also from what I’ve been hearing (and seeing myself so far), most of the backlinks are from very low quality sites (such as splogs), whereas I can be spending more time marketing more effectively for high quality links (which so far I’ve done a decent job of securing for most of my sites). I’m at the point, where it really isn’t worth it. It might be good for someone just starting out, but I’m not in that boat.

    As of today, I’m abandoning EzineArticles. I’m not abandoning the bum marketing bit just yet… I have another strategy in mind though, and even if it doesn’t work out, I’ll still have reaped a few other benefits. I want to test it out a week or two before going into detail here, but I think it’s going to be much more effective. :)

    As for people on Ezine posting huge amounts of articles, it doesn’t surprise me. It’s saturated with Internet marketers… remember, Ezine is just a marketing tool; not an actual publication. I read just a few days ago on a forum about one IM who publishes 20-30 articles a day, which are all basically the same article rewritten. Ezine approves them without a problem… that’s just beyond me. Their interests are pretty clearly about making their own ad revenue with more keyword-targeted content, and not so much about approving quality articles for the benefit of publishers.

  • Jennifer Mattern

    Not only won’t I distribute anything through EzineArticles anymore, but I’ve also just deleted my published articles from their site. That’s because today I noticed that not only could some moron not tell the difference between 4 and 6 links, but they then went in and deleted two links in the article body (which met their requirements) and published it that way without my permission (as it wasn’t published as I posted it). It would have been one thing if they’d have rejected it, and I’d have just taken the article elsewhere without it going live, but distributing it in a way I haven’t authorized is beyond unacceptable.

  • Alevoor Rajagopal

    [Q]I’ve heard they get more lenient with you after your first 10 articles,… [Q]

    I have submitted close to 100 articles and my experience with them is not different from yours. But I would say, all these started only recently and it wasn’t like that when I started off three years ago. There were only 8 editors and I suppose it was easy for the owners to ‘monitor’ the editors unlike, perhaps, what it is today.

  • Dillon

    The problems have been outlandish. First of all, they say an article is generally reviewed in 7 days – more like 3 -4 weeks. Then,theres always a problem. I made the mistake of opening a 2nd account with a different name.(I found out later – only 1 account for 1 human)because i didn’t want to wait a month to submit more articles than 10. They freezed both accounts, I wrote an email explaining them that i was new to articles and asked if they would give me another chance to submit articles. So they did. I submitted 4 articles – about 3 1/2 weeks later they are put in problem status. I don’t know what the problem is – i followed all their rules, so I thought. I am waiting for response – they take about 3 – 4 days to respond to your email. Then when you change the articles to adhere to what they tell you it says the article is duplicate content. Way too many problems – I know they are the powerhouse in this industry but come on. Does anyone know of a better way to get free traffic without all the hassles of trying to get Ezinearticles to approve your articles. If you do please let me know.

  • Rachael

    I have not had any real problem with them until now. I submitted 10 articles that were approved. Instead of upgrading me to the premium level I got upgraded to basic-plus. They asked for 15 more articles before I could be upgraded to premium. So I have done just that. The first 14 were accepted quickly and without a hitch. Then the 15th article, the one that would upgrade me again has been a nightmare. They rejected it stating “misspellings and grammatical errors”. I checked it. No misspellings. No grammatical errors. I tweaked the wording a little bit and resubmitted. I got the same error. I then replaced it with a different article that I meticulously checked for errors and got the same rejection reason! These two articles were better than the 24 that had just been approved. I’ve received an A+ on many essays in college that were worse than these two articles. What makes me angry is that if I search around through their articles I find many that have terrible grammar! WTF? I’m suspicious that they don’t want me to write for them but I’m not sure why. Most of the articles are not even for affiliate products but for my own website.

  • Jennifer Mattern

    That does sound like an odd situation Rachael, so I’m sorry you’re going through that. I actually no longer use EzineArticles, and only have a few old articles still sitting on there. Pulling them off is on my ever-growing list of things to do before the New Year though. Better luck next time I guess. I can’t imagine why they wouldn’t want you at the premium level though. Have you tried requesting a manual editorial review or something? Seems like a ridiculous waste of time for something you’re giving them for free to earn ad revenue without any direct compensation, but what the hell? I guess it couldn’t hurt?

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