1 Self Serving Link in Ezine Article Body

[wolverine1971]

Hi Warriors,

I'm sure some of the vets may be using this already but for some of you that don't this tip may help you add some variety to your Ezine backlinks.

They are clear about the fact that you can only have 2 self serving links but most people think these have to be in the resource box. You can have 1 self serving link in the article body if it is in the 2nd half of the article (can't be in the 1st two paragraphs or above the fold though - they want their Adsense clicks)

You can put a natural looking self serving backlink into the text of one of your keywords as long as that particular landing page adds value to what that term is speaking of and isn't just a blatant sales page. This is a nice way to add a backlink to an inner page of your website for a term you want to rank for while creating a strong call to action in your resource box to focus on 1 link to your money site landing page.

I like to use this technique adding my anchor text to the beginning of a sentence in a paragraph or by putting the anchor in the last sentence at the end of a paragraph.

like this:

I love going to the Warrior Forum because the people are so nice and helpful. My wife gets bored with me when I talk about internet marketing so it's a great place to go and talk about affiliate marketing techniques.

Then your resource box call to action -

I like using this method because sometimes I don't want my other link competing with a squeeze page and visually they are attracted to that one link.

Enjoy your day!

[Yoel Cohen]

Originally Posted by wolverine1971

Hi Warriors,
You can have 1 self serving link in the article body if it is in the 2nd half of the article

"We do not accept articles with active or inactive links in the first 1-3 paragraphs."

That's quoted from EZA so only in the 4th paragraph...

But, yes you're right, you can do that and that may drive more traffic to your website. BUT that is a rel="nofollow" Backlink.

When you're submitting articles you are after 2 things:

Traffic and backlinks! EZA used to allow 3 backlinks in the resource box and they cut it down to 2. So by putting that link in the body you're losing potential link equity.

If you are after CTR then articles which are well written and properly pre-qualify the visitor will get a higher CTR through your resource box alone.

The Idea is to keep the visitor reading, get their trust and attention and at the end do what you tell him/her to do..you want the visitor to go through your "funnel" and make him/her want to click your resource box links, not "escape" through the article.

I tried that a few times and have seen that perhaps CTR is higher but opt ins and sales (on the site) are lower - and that's more important.

Just my opinion...

[Alexa Smith]

Originally Posted by wolverine1971

You can have 1 self serving link in the article body if it is in the 2nd half of the article

Er ... no.

It's really clear - Editorial Guidelines, 2 (f) (iii): "confine your self-serving links to your resource-box", and above that the term "self serving link" has been defined as "links/URLs to a website that you own, control, or have an interest in".

You can have a non-self-serving link in the (later part of the) article body. (If you want it).

If you're getting away with it, you're getting away with it, but if you'll excuse the observation, I don't really recommend advising others to try it too.

[TimG]

The editorial guidelines are just that "guidelines" that are to be followed but in same cases the editors of EZa have some leeway on making a judgement call in which case they will allow one self serving link in the lower portion of the article (usually last paragraph). They will 100% of the time not allow 2 self serving links in the article body.

However, keep in mind that the higher quality article you write and the longer it is the better the treatment from an editor. A well written high quality 500 word article will always get better treatment then a 300 word peice of garbage.

Respectfully,
Tim

[Steven Wagenheim]

Okay folks, I once put a link in my article that was non self serving at all,
to another person's web site, gave me absolutely no link juice or benefit
whatsoever...

And the article was rejected.

If you're getting away with links in your article, regardless where, power to
you, but I do NOT recommend passing on this advice to others.

Besides, you want people to keep reading your article and NOT wandering
off someplace else.

Your main link, the place where you ultimately want people to go, should
be in your resource box and NOWHERE ELSE.

Why?

Think about it and use a little sense.

The purpose of the article itself is to EMOTIONALLY prepare the reader
to go to your site.

You can't do that if they haven't finished reading the damn article yet.

Provide some REAL value to the reader and believe it or not, you'll get
more clicks through your resource box than through any links you could
possibly have in the article body.

And since they are no follow, what's the point anyway?

Think people...think.

[Yoel Cohen]

Originally Posted by Alexa Smith

Er ... no.

It's really clear - Editorial Guidelines, 2 (f) (iii): "confine your self-serving links to your resource-box", ....

If you're getting away with it, you're getting away with it, but if you'll excuse the observation, I don't really recommend advising others to try it too.

That's a tricky guideline!

Alexa, I know you don't recommend putting a link in the body (me too) because its not a good practice, but, it doesn't mean it is not allowed to. If people want to do it they can - they don't need to feel like victims "getting away with something".

I think it's more important we give them a solid reason why NOT to do it...

Editorial guidelines (f) (xiii):

"If you put both of the active self serving links that we allow in the body of your article, we will reject it."

How about one? Well, you can! Do I recommend it? NO, not at all....why?

Because it was tested NOT to work...no guessing...statistics...there are so many people that just "wing" it and say "this has got to work" or "I'll just do that" if you're not testing, how do you know?

Tell you the truth I couldn't care less of EZA they're "big boys" and can take care of themselves...

Its the readers attention and interest you want and by putting a link in the body you're losing it...you're not getting the message across.

Originally Posted by TimG

They will 100% of the time not allow 2 self serving links in the article body.

However, keep in mind that the higher quality article you write and the longer it is the better the treatment from an editor. A well written high quality 500 word article will always get better treatment then a 300 word peice of garbage.

Very true...

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

The purpose of the article itself is to EMOTIONALLY prepare the reader
to go to your site.

[danemorgan]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

...
Your main link, the place where you ultimately want people to go, should
be in your resource box and NOWHERE ELSE.
...

Robert Plank recommends using only one link (or, more accurately, a single link destination) in emails to your list.

I notice that a lot of people spend a lot of time talking about how many links you can put in an article at one article directory and another, but I wonder whether Roberts advice might apply here too. It might apply even more so since there is already a lot of other stuff competing for your reader's attention on an article directory page.

[samuraiwriting]

Does Ezine even work for getting people to your site? I haven't seen any articles listing high in Google recently. It seems Ehow is taking over but since DS changed policies, you have to work for them to write anything.

[Yoel Cohen]

Originally Posted by samuraiwriting

Does Ezine even work for getting people to your site? I haven't seen any articles listing high in Google recently. It seems Ehow is taking over but since DS changed policies, you have to work for them to write anything.

EzineArticles.com articles still rank high...65% of their traffic comes from the SE 65% out of 8 million uniques per month is not bad..I'll have a piece of that cake if you don't mind

[Al_duke]

Can you guys please explain me why ezine and other directories dont allow links in articles body. Is it that theyre afraid that google may see it as payed article with dofollow link and might penalize them, or there is some other reason.

[Alexa Smith]

Originally Posted by Al_duke

Can you guys please explain me why ezine and other directories dont allow links in articles body.

EZA does allow a link in the article body.

It always has done.

It just doesn't allow a self-serving link there.

Different article directories have very widely differing rules, policies and procedures. I suspect that theorising about their motivations for them is of comparatively limited value, not least because these are ultimately not questions that can be proven/disproven and are therefore destined to remain somewhat theoretical. With apologies, that was really just a pedantic way of saying "I neither know nor care"!

But welcome to the Forum anyway.

[katiemcdonald]

Sticking to the guidelines is key. Personally, if I have to back to an article that was rejected, fix it up and resubmit, this is simply a waste of time. I'd rather stick to the nitty gritty rules, post a good article, hope for some traffic from the resource box - since my content is interesting and relevant - and call it a day.

[Al_duke]

Originally Posted by Alexa Smith

EZA does allow a link in the article body.

It always has done.

It just doesn't allow a self-serving link there.

Different article directories have very widely differing rules, policies and procedures. I suspect that theorising about their motivations for them is of comparatively limited value, not least because these are ultimately not questions that can be proven/disproven and are therefore destined to remain somewhat theoretical. With apologies, that was really just a pedantic way of saying "I neither know nor care"!

But welcome to the Forum anyway.

Tnx for the welcome Alexa. I wouldn't care either but since you put it that way i guess i'll have to say it even though i would rather not :P. I'm in the middle of negotiations with my friend and his programming team to start making article directory similar to ezine and such but with several new twists. To cut it short since these kind of posts can lead to many unwanted things, i want to learn as much as i can before we start, so this one detail was really bugging me . Yes, i know you can put link in body if is not self-serving, i was just lazy to write it like that sry .
The thing is, i would really want to let people put even self-serving link in body but i don't know the downsides of it.

[warriorkay]

I do it many times and it works, self-serving or
not. But like TimG said, it works better if the
article looks pretty good. If it's a tiny 250 word
article, it just might not get approved, but if
it's a 400+ word masterpiece, why not,

Kingsley

[GameVoid]

Originally Posted by samuraiwriting

Does Ezine even work for getting people to your site? I haven't seen any articles listing high in Google recently. It seems Ehow is taking over but since DS changed policies, you have to work for them to write anything.

Like everything else in IM : "It depends".

I have articles on EZA that pull in decent traffic for my amazon affiliate sites. I create simple buying guides for product categories and send them to EZA. Not only do these buying guides get better traffic than my other articles, they also have a high CTR and a decent EzinePublisher count.

[tsgeric]

Thanks first of all for pointing out how "guidelines" aren't always drop-dead rules.

I haven't really posted articles to article directories, but am thinking of starting to do so, and would be interested in using software to automate that.

As I read this thread, I realize that to submit to different directories, which presumably have different guidelines, you probably have to write the article to the most conservative guidelines. Is that what what you do? And following on that thought, how do you manage what is the appropriate content for the resource box when you are mass-submitting?

[Alexa Smith]

Originally Posted by tsgeric

As I read this thread, I realize that to submit to different directories, which presumably have different guidelines, you probably have to write the article to the most conservative guidelines. Is that what what you do?

It's what I tend to do, yes. I'm doing this for a living, so I take it fairly seriously, and publish all articles on my own sites first, then submit to EZA and (often) some other directories. So, I write and publish them myself according to EZA guidelines, exactly as you say, being the "most conservative". Then all I have to do is add a resource box (which obviously I don't use in the same way on my own sites).

EZA guidelines, in reality, will get you in anywhere else as well (apart from "Buzzle", which I never use, because their terms of service are just too ludicrous for words).

Originally Posted by tsgeric

And following on that thought, how do you manage what is the appropriate content for the resource box when you are mass-submitting?

I wouldn't dream of mass-submitting, or submitting with software, so it's not really a problem that arises. I have tried it in the past, but like many other professional article marketers, am now doing very much better since I learned a lot more about it and abandoned it.

[WillR]

Originally Posted by Al_duke

Can you guys please explain me why ezine and other directories dont allow links in articles body. Is it that theyre afraid that google may see it as payed article with dofollow link and might penalize them, or there is some other reason.

I would imagine a BIG part of it has to do with their revenue. Everyone knows the most action occurs above the fold of a page. So naturally they don't want our links up there as it means their users are more likely to click on their ads and earn them some $$$.

[tsgeric]

Originally Posted by Alexa Smith

I wouldn't dream of mass-submitting, or submitting with software, so it's not really a problem that arises. I have tried it in the past, but like many other professional article marketers, am now doing very much better since I learned a lot more about it and abandoned it.

Tell me more ...

Is it that mass submitting software programs just don't do a good job, or something else?

[Jerry Toga]

Yes I'm also interested in your stance on mass-submitting software Alexa. I've steered clear until now, but only for vaguely ethical reasons of decreasing the value of the article. Are there other reasons?