by 30 people |
When too many links are too many
Here's a deeper look at our thinking on this issue and how it affects you.
Thanks for reading.
**Photo from clemmac on Flickr.
Read the whole Squidoo Policy Update
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NEWSFLASH! A Squidoo Policy Update
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June 2009 When Seth, Corey, Gil and I started creating Squidoo in 2005, we had a vision of openness, creativity, authenticity and generosity that has guided the Squidoo publishing platform, our company and our community to much success. A few years...
A little background
Making a lens to promote or sell something is a terrific endeavor. It's a big part of why a lot of our people are here.But less is more! That's not just marketing speak, it's also statistically supported. Junk lenses are often described by the relentless number of outbound links to the same exact domain. Being overly promotional rarely works. "Buy here buy here buy here!" never does. Whereas a few curated, commented and spotlighted products or links are most often followed.
So to help you focus your lenses, and sell even better--and to help surfers find our pages more useful overall--we're introducing a limit to the number of outbound links to the same domain that you can have on a lens. If you have more than 9 links to the same domain on a single lens, your lens could get locked for review.
**Photo from presta on Flickr.
To explain a little more...
Any links generated by Squidoo modules (like the Amazon module or the Wikipedia module or the eBay module) don't have a limit, nor do feed modules (like the RSS module or the Flickr module) or modules that your readers post in (like Guestbook and Plexo and Duel modules).
For those reader-submitted-content modules, it's up to you to moderate the links your readers post on your lenses however you see fit.
Furthermore, if your lens does have more than 9 links to the same domain, excepting the cases above, and it gets locked -- you'll be able to easily request a review of your lens. Chances are it could get greenlighted forevermore, and you will be free of the limit. Chances are also good it could stay locked. So if you'd rather not wait through that review period, pare down your links to the same domain. We're not just trying to be stingy for no reason: less really is more.
Last, and of course, we'll have lots of domains that are whitelisted out of this (meaning, you can have as many outbound links to them as you like), as well as sites that are blacklisted (meaning, even a single link to that domain will get your lens locked).
Important!
We're not out to write a new Constitution for the web.
We're also not out to run a whole anti-spam index.
What we're doing here is setting up some general expectations for our lensmasters, and describing some guidelines.
If you're making great lenses and linking to worthwhile sites and products, you're either going to be in whitelist territory already, or you're a Giant Squid without any limit, or you've gotten your lens reviewed and greenlighted, or you're well-served with fewer than 10 links to the same domain.
That's plenty of room for promotional goodness. In fact, infinite room for it.
If you're making lenses that are linking a lot to blackhat sites, though, chances are your topic is a SquidDon't topic anyway, and there are a lot of ways your lens might get locked. Not just because of the blacklist.
How this works
2. There will be a growing list of Whitelisted domains. Like Amazon, Twitter, Wikipedia, YouTube, Vimeo, Animoto, eBay, Zazzle, Etsy, Lulu, CafePress, Wordpress, Typepad, StumbleUpon and Facebook and lots more. See a sample list below. You can have as many outbound links to those domains as you want. But still, less is more, so go with good taste. We're constantly reviewing and updating this list.
3. On the flip side, there will also be Blacklisted domains, and that list will be growing as well (but not published publicly). Even 1 link to a blacklisted domain will get your lens locked from view. Sites that consistently show up on lenses that are consistently spam and overt junk and take advantage of readers, domains and programs that have earned a bad reputation because of spammers... we're putting them on a no-no list. This means: Blackhat SEO sites. Reverse phone lookup sites. Paid people finder sites. Lots of dating websites. Many affiliate websites that have proven to be a community of spammers. Like that. Even 1 link on your lens to those domains, and your lens will get locked.
Two special cases of note
Allposters and Clickbank
Lots of lensmasters use Allposters.com to punctuate their lenses with photos, as well as to make money from the Allposters affiliate program. For the most part, you do it fairly and well. You don't take advantage of your readers and you properly cite your sources. So Allposters is on the Whitelist for now and you can have as many outbound links as you like. But a word of caution not to overdo it.
Similarly, many lensmasters find great personal success with their Clickbank lenses. However, the number of people using Clickbank and spamming their lenses around the web is ruining it for the good guys. So while we're not blacklisting Clickbank on lenses, we're also not Whitelisting it. This means that the "No more than 9 outbound links to the same domain" limit applies to you. So be selective with your outbound linking and don't overdo it. (Reminder: Giant Squids are greenlighted out of this).
If you're making great lenses and linking to useful sites and products
...then chances are really good that...
a) you're in whitelist territory already and needn't worry, or
b) you're a Giant Squid without any limit, or
c) you've gotten your lens reviewed and greenlighted, or
d) you're well-served with fewer than 10 links to the same domain.
That's plenty of room for promotional goodness. In fact, infinite room for it.
An ever-growing list of Whitelisted domains
You can have as many links to these sites as you want, if you want.
But if you run a site that you'd like to submit for whitelist consideration, just to be safe, feel free to post it below.
Also note that we've whitelisted many popular lensmaster-run sites, like Squidutils.com, Squidlog.com, Squidoocool.com and Lensroll.com (plus many more).
about.com
allposters.com
alltop.com
amazon.co.uk
amazon.com
animoto.com
art.com
artfire.com
associatedcontent.com
blogger.com
blogspot.com
bukisa.com
cafemoms.com
cafepress.com
chowhound.com
cnet.com
creativecommons.org
delicious.com
dltk-kids.com
ebay.com
ecrater.com
ehow.com
etsy.com
ever.com
ezinearticles.com
flickr.com
freewebs.com
friendfeed.com
google.com
helium.com
heymonkeybrain.com
homeschoolblogger.com
homeschoolshare.com
howstuffworks.com
hslaunch.com
hubpages.com
hulu.com white
imagebucket.us
imdb.com
istockphoto.com
knowledgepedia.net
lulu.com
lulu.tv
meebo.com
mozilla.org
photobucket.com
photojojo.com
popshops.com
proinfosports.com
prostores.com
prostores.com
shareapic.net
squidbids.com
squidboo.com
squidlit.com
squidoo.com
squidtop.com
squidu.com
squidvids.com
stumbleupon.com
suite101.com
technorati.com
tmblg.com
tumblr.com
twitpic.com
twitter.com
typepad.com
vimeo.com
wikia.com
wikipedia.org
wordpress.com
yahoo.com
yelp.com white
youtube.com
zagat.com
zazzle.com
A sample list of Blacklisted sites
But to give you an idea of what could get blacklisted, sites that go against our SquidDon't an no-Porn policies like these will be listed:
CatchCheatingSpouse.com
10acne.com
acme-people-search.com
adultfriendfinder.com
Just for example.
Want to suggest a site to whitelist?
If you run a site that you'd like whitelisted, you're welcome to suggest it here. We'll review the inbox from time to time and add popular sites to the whitelist. In the meantime, you'll probably be well-served by using fewer than 10 links to the same domain on one lens anyway, no matter how good the site is!
DotGirlMoms wrote...
Hello, We write monthly articles that are posted at Kotex.com. We post links to these articles from Squidoo. Each link is to a different article on the Kotex site and provides our Squidoo Fans with an opportunity to follow us on another site. Notice we are not selling anything with these links. We would appreciate Kotex being whitelisted so we can continue to provide this information to our fans.
Posted November 09, 2009
SalonOfArt wrote...
Hi there! I use one of my lens for my monthly newsletter to send people to all the new products with my art on them. I have stores everywhere. With the holidays approaching I have many links on this months newsletter, so thought I would request a whitelist for 3 sites.
www.Artamatik.com, www.Greetingcarduniverse.com and www.imagekind.com
Thank you for considering these!
www.squidoo.com/SalonOfArtNews
Posted November 04, 2009
rtyndall wrote...
in reply to Home-healthcare I agree. I use Linksahe, Shareasale, Commision Junction. Google affiliate network. If these aren't white listed there is no point to trying to create lenses to sell our products.
I have yet to see any clarification on these types of affiliate management companies.
Posted October 26, 2009
dreamsgate wrote...
The greater majority of my lenses are about Blender 3d, an open source modeling program and I often link back to the "mother site" with educational /informational links. So could you white list:
http://www.blender.org/
Posted October 26, 2009
Home-healthcare wrote...
Please whitelist LINKSHARE and SHAREASALE. They represent good companies, and if you create a colorful and informative lens with photos sourced from there (linked to the specific affiliate product in the image) and also have a text link, your entire lens would go over the limit with just 5 products choices!
I am decimating (ruining) good quality lenses (my own and those I've worked on for others) trying to comply with the new guidelines - which are truly onerous if your lens is focused on a nice product category. Tons of work to create them...tons of work trying to take out links and still leave the lenses useful to visitors...REDUCE the quality of the lenses by good faith compliance!
Compare that with Ebay, Amazon, CafePress, where a single product module will have 5 product thumbnails. It would be unfair to be more onerous on quality affiliate networks such as these than Ebay, Amazon, CafePress.
PLEASE announce this whitelisting so we STOP wasting time and hurting lenses.
Posted October 25, 2009
TheRealJewell wrote...
Please whitelist www.authorsroundthesouth.com and www.sibaweb.com If there is more you need to know for that to happen please let me know. Thanks for you work.
Posted October 24, 2009
amy1980 wrote...
I concur on linkshare. It is how I do affiliate links for PBS.org. The domain on the link is linksynergy.com
Posted October 21, 2009
VJYoung wrote...
Please consider whit listing nonprofit web sites like www.envirocorps.org which have mutable pages that need to be linked to individually. If this can not be accomplished, I will need to move to another service if your limits are exceeded. I have used the target="_blank" tag to keep people on the squidoo site.
Posted October 19, 2009
Grangermdk wrote...
Please look into adding LinkShare to your whitelist.
They are a company similar to Clickbank. The HTML links all have LinkShare in the code, but they each link specifically to a unique product site. It has been my experience that they are a reputable and not spammy.
Not every single one of their product programs is desirable, but hundreds of them are. It would be up to the lens-master to focus on right programs. Lets not through the baby out with the bathwater.
Thanks for your consideration.
Posted October 10, 2009
goldenecho wrote...
I think www.biblegateway.com should be whitelisted. I can see where someone discussing a theological argument or Biblical topic might want to reference more than 20 passages of scripture, linking to the chapter or book so that the viewer could read more in context, or could read the same verse in a different language or translation. Bible Gateway is one of the most popular sites which includes the Bible text in nearly every available translation and various languages.
I'd also like to suggest http://www.bartleby.com/ , which has text to thousands of poems, plays, and other works of literature and non-fiction. These are free and open to the public, and I could see where a literary lens might link to more than 20 of these.
Posted October 09, 2009
Robin_Forlonge_Patterson wrote...
SourceForge - http://sourceforge.net/ - deserves to be whitelisted. It's a "location to download and develop free open source software". Two of my favourite games (e.g. http://sourceforge.net/projects/freecol/) are there, but it has heaps of serious stuff too, and each project can have numerous pages on the site, such as forums and bug reports and download pages.
Posted October 07, 2009
Dragon82 wrote...
Another music website request - Sellaband.com
They've partnerships with Amazon, The Orchard, AOL, Bol, etc so they're hardly small-fry. With only 9 links, I'm going to have to ditch content because I'm limited to how many Artists I can link to.
Cheers
Posted October 03, 2009
Dragon82 wrote...
A request to Whitelist www.Last.fm please. A lot of artists who I've made lenses for have full tracks available to listen to on Last.fm, and nine links barely covers one album.
Thanks
Posted October 03, 2009
California_Dreamin wrote...
The last time I published my lens "Great Texas Chili" a>, I was told that I'd exceeded the limit on outbound links to the same domain. That's interesting because I only added one link, to a site called The Ring of Fire, a linked list of chili websites.
The only thing I can figure is that because this site links many many websites together, the computer detects a number of links instead of just one (forgive me if that's an idiotic assumption on my part, I'm a little technically challenged).
Anyway, I'd appreciate it if the site could be whitelisted, or the problem could be fixed in some other way.
Thanks
Posted October 02, 2009
grannysage wrote...
I want to add http://icanhascheezburger.com/
I use them for cat pictures with captions for my cat lens. I think it is a main reason why people keep coming back to it.
Posted September 29, 2009
JonathanCR wrote...
php.net needs to be added to the whitelist: http://php.net/
Posted September 26, 2009
James-Falconer wrote...
I agree with the suggestion of whitelisting . . .
imagekind.com
It's owned by CafePress, and a great site for quality giclee prints of art and photos.
Also, is there a way to automatically exempt a lens which recieves good rating and good comments?? Surely the whole point is to ensure that lenses are what real people WANT? :)
thanks.
Posted September 23, 2009
