Dear Author of Submitted Articles….

You work for me. That’s right .. I consider you to be my “hired help” .. you are a “paid author” .. I have engaged you to guest author articles in one of my many blogs and contribute to the content of the blog. As for payment of your services .. I will maintain a permanent link to one of your sites or ventures that was provided in the “resource” section of your article.

I scan many free “ezine” and other submitted article directories .. and thought I would HELP YOU by letting you see some of the criteria that I might use to REJECT YOUR ARTICLE from inclusion into one of my blogs.

* You may consider these to be my TOP 10 PEEVES. Here is a summary, and I will expand on them below:

1) Articles were submitted to a place that limits me from using your articles
2) Don’t change the title of the same article sent to different article directories
3) Fact: I don’t use your articles because you have shady looking links
4) Don’t rehash the same article in twenty different ways
5) Based on a study from 2002 or earlier? What gives? This is a blog
6) The price of your article is just too high
7) Quit making up words or phrases
8) You don’t need repetitive links
9) I prefer articles that stand alone and are unique
10) Word count does not include your resource box description

* I also provide one great tip that gets my attention all the time and I’m a big fan of this article writer

(1) ARTICLES WERE SUBMITTED TO A PLACE THAT LIMITS ME FROM USING YOUR ARTICLES

www.articlehub.com/ – here are the terms at the bottom of every page:

Notice: If you use an automated tool to scrape the content off this site you are liable to be fined up to $150,000 per article.

If you wish to syndicate this site’s articles on your own site, you can copy by hand a maximum of 25 articles per year per domain you own, or use our RSS feed.

25 articles per domain. Are you kidding me? I would like to know why people submit articles to this site. It can’t be to promote their work – because, I will never publish it in my blogs. If I want a source that has articles that I can use – I will prefer one that I can use up to 25 articles PER WEEK PER BLOG!

(2) DON’T CHANGE THE TITLE OF THE SAME ARTICLE SENT TO DIFFERENT ARTICLE DIRECTORIES

I stopped using GoArticles late 2005

On my PetLvr blog .. I’ve got about 2600 posts. In the beginning I used to do searches of my own site to see if there was a duplicate post. It became too time consuming. Now – I rely on my wordpress. If there is a duplicate article posted with the same title .. there will be a -1 or -2 added to the end of the URL ..

Don’t try working your way around duplicate content filters of Google or something like that and change the title of the article, if it’s the same content. Yes .. I know that’s what SEO people tell you – “Trick the people” .. But, you should know – if you trick me once – I write down your name and keep a log. I found out back in late 2005 that most of these duplicate articles with different titles were 100% people submitting to GoArticles. I just unsubscribed all my RSS Feeds from GoArticles and don’t even bother looking at their articles anymore. Twice burned three times shy baby. I wish sites would look at the publisher’s content side of things, instead of the author’s SEO side of things .. and not push this concept .. like suggested here.

(3) FACT: I DON’T USE YOUR ARTICLES BECAUSE YOU HAVE SHADY LOOKING LINKS

Tasty Homemade Treats And Recipes For Your Best Friend
By Darrel Rondo

Although this post has less than 500 words, the content to me initially seemed to be satisfactory enough to post this article over on the PetLvr Blog. Recipes for homemade pet treats are always interesting, and can possibly save people money, or be a hobby for the pet lovers who want to put their own ingredients into their pets’ tummies.

But – the author chose to use the TINYURL link redirection to promote his site. I am not a fan of these, because you don’t readily know where you are clicking and going to – until you click on it. STRIKE ONE. Then, at the site .. the links are masked by a javascript, so when you hover your mouse over it – you can’t see where those link goes to either. STRIKE TWO. And, finally .. all these links are just affiliate links to clickbank purchase screens anyway. STRIKE THREE.

RECOMMENDATION: This site didn’t even have a link or page of the original article that was included in the Ezine Article directory. If there were more articles written by the author on this site, I would feel better that perhaps this person is an expert or at least can qualify as a “guest blogger” in my sites. Then, as the author builds up a reputation and library himself, I don’t see anything wrong with putting up a section of “Recommended E-Books For Purchase” that he seem to have hand-picked. Just state that in advance so we know. Right now, I would NEVER want to send any of my readers to your site.

(4) DON’T REHASH THE SAME ARTICLE IN TWENTY DIFFERENT WAYS

I was going through my Bloglines and I came across an author who wrote and submitted about 13 similar articles all about the same topic, ranging about 363 words in length. Although the title was much different on each article that made it curious for me to read and possibly select for inclusion into my sites .. by the 2nd paragraph on each article the whole point of the article was pretty much the same. Not only adding insult to injury, the final paragraph (the resource section) stated something like this.. “The author of this article would like you to visit {link to site here} and the {link to sitemap here}”..

By the way, I am aware of software that does this automatically, and other software that compares two articles and gives score – and I have it installed on my computer. I remember finding one author who’s 7 ‘different’ versions of the same article each reached a 79% difference from the original. Not too smart.

I have a piece of paper on my bulletin board of authors who’s articles I will never include in my sites, for various reasons and I have just added your name. YOU ARE CHEATING trying to fool the “duplicate content rule” and you may get away with it on a few articles – but, it’s very noticeable from a person who sees ALL your articles.

(5) BASED ON A STUDY FROM 2002 OR EARLIER? WHAT GIVES? THIS IS A BLOG

I’m looking for articles in a blog. People relate that to current events or new stuff. I just don’t see the point of posting articles that justify and try to explain the significance of studies from 2002 or earlier – before blogging became popular. Now, if you compared a 2002 study to a 2007 study and noted the differences – that would be interesting. Otherwise, I just pass on these type of articles.

Curiously so, when I do find these type of articles that are written .. the resource box usually ends up with something like .. “Read more articles like this in our article section” .. and it’s true – their resource section all have articles like that one – outdated analysis of old studies. I think studies and results of 2006 (one year behind) is pretty current and worth considering.

(6) THE PRICE OF YOUR ARTICLE IS JUST TOO HIGH

Some articles are quite informative and topical to my sites, but here’s another thing about shady links mentioned above. You might have written a great article, but if you link to puppy mill sites I’m never going to use you. This also goes for other similar articles and links.

Now, if you are just promoting your own site .. (for instance, you sell stop smoking aids) and write a really good article about tips to help stop smoking .. then link your “quit smoking” site .. I might include your article. But, if you are writing an article about a “quit smoking product or pill” to help you stop smoking as one of the tips, and link to some affiliation store .. I will not use your article. I’m looking for INFORMATION Content .. not Marketing content. There’s a current author going around writing about 450 word articles, and the last 250 are about his product. YUCK. That’s just as bad.

I know you are writing these articles for free and trying to generate traffic and your articles do save me time from writing them, or hiring writers .. and I don’t mind giving you a permanent link from my blog back to your site and products. But .. it’s my readers that will be clicking these links and going back to your site. If they get spammed or disgusted or taunted with “Buy-Me” products from the get-go .. I look bad. Bottom line. I don’t need that.

Imagine if I posted a “How To” type of article, and the author posts a link to .. well, not a porn site .. but a respectable blog or website on the surface, but the site has popups. And, when you try to “X” them out, more popups pop up. Can we say .. AN-NOY-ING?

(7) QUIT MAKING UP WORDS OR PHRASES

I can’t believe you are stupid enough and can’t spell .. because your grammar seems fine everywhere else and you can spell Mesothelioma and other 26 letter words! Please do not use your articles for experiments to make it easy to search for your articles on google or technorati. I will correct your spelling mistakes anyway .. because if I see it, I will not leave the error there – it’s my blog! If I use your article, I never promise that I will post an article with known spelling mistakes, just so you can search me easier. I am giving you your resource box and permanent link. PAID IN FULL. If I see too many of them on many different articles and it’s quite obviously a deliberate action so you can ‘search’ who is using your articles – your name goes on my list – and I will just not use your articles. Life’s too short.

(8) YOU DON’T NEED REPETITIVE LINKS

For the most part, submission directories allow the writers to include up to 3 links. But really .. LESS IS MORE. It is a frustrating making the links linkable, when it is something like this … HART is from the HART-Empire.com whish is a Site about HART and his EMPIRE and his sites he includes in his HART-EMPIRE NETWORK …

Can we say .. overkill? I use a wordpress plugin that converts all URLs to a clickable link. That’s all that is necessary. I think it’s okay to put both your name and URL .. so, something like.. “Visit PetLvr – [The Blog] at PetLvr.com/blog/ ” is satisfactory enough.

I should say, that unless you are linking to a 3rd party and unrelated site, I tend to NOT make good on clickable links throughout the article, or at the beginning of the article .. instead of at the end in the resource box. For instance, if linking to the Humane Society in Paragraph 2 is okay .. but, linking to a page of rescue organizations on your site in Paragraph 2 is not okay – i.m.h.o. – keep your links at the end!

(9) I PREFER ARTICLES THAT STAND ALONE AND ARE UNIQUE

I can tell you right now .. I try to avoid articles that have “PART 1” or “PART 2” in its title, unless I am convinced that I have all the parts, and all the parts are worthy to post in my blogs. Then, it could be cool. I might post one every morning for a future week, or all consecutively back to back. I do this only because I do not want to cross link them together in my blogs, because that takes time.

But, the worst offenders are the articles that the body text refers to previously written articles. For instance, “I mentioned in my previous article that ..blah blah blah .. now I will mention ..blah blah blah “. To me, all you did was just waste 200 words of text. I might never have posted your previous article, and I certainly do not have the time or energy to hunt it down -or, link them together from the permalinks in my blog.

(10) WORD COUNT DOES NOT INCLUDE YOUR RESOURCE BOX DESCRIPTION

Personally, I prefer to post articles that are about the 500 word count range. I think this is a long enough article to be able to have a point, make a point, and not loose interest or fall asleep half way through the article and click on NEXT. I can’t tell you how many articles I rejected, because that although the submitting directory would indicate that this article had about 500 words, there might be two closing paragraphs about the writer or the writer’s sites that take up 250 words.

WORD OF ADVICE IF YOU WANT MY BUSINESS

Here’s my one great tip that could help you write more articles that I might be interested in publishing on one of my blogs …. Michael Russell – Look. Learn. Do.

Why? I am a fan of Michael Russell’s style of articles that he submits for the following reasons:

1) The title is topical and informative (catches my eye in my Bloglines, about a specific subject)
2) I’ve never ever seen rewrites or duplicate articles (that I can recall)
3) His articles are usually more than 500 words (550’ish on average on the top of my head)
4) His resource section is simple – one line, one link.. “Michael Russell Your Independent guide to [link]” (SEO must be pretty good to link one keyword i.e. “DOGS” to one URL …think about it)
5) Each article is unique, and complete. (no Part 1, Part 2 or references to previous articles or promises of future articles)

* Hope this helps you. // HART

Do you use Ezine or other submitted articles for your blog? Do you have Pet PEEVES or suggestions? Feel free to add them in these comments!