Owning article directories

[blur]

Just curious: What are the downsides of running article sites? I am thinking about starting up on or two and monetizing with adsense. Is there a downside on this, besides having to filter through submissions?

Thanks

[waken]

You'll need large hosting space and bandwidth preferably your own dedicated server.

It takes time to build up traffic and real authors to fully be independent on its own.

[Rob Hall]

The real authors bit is the sticking point,

You've got to make people go out of their way to submit content to your site. People will only go out of their way to do this if their's a good enough benefit for them, in this case a high traffic authoritive site.

It takes time to build up a site of this nature, so if you're prepared for that long road, definitely take it as in the long run it could pay off :-)

[CliveG]

Seems like an OK business to be in to me. But there are quite a few already including some clear market leaders so you will need to have a new angle if you are to become successful quickly. The most obvious example of some form of revenue share has already been done (some say not too well).

Ask the Warriors what they really need (want) from such a directory that they don't get elsewhere and then provide it.

[bgmacaw]

Filtering out crappy content is the big thing. With mine, I generally don't approve an article unless I know the author.

Also, many of the free article scripts aren't all that secure so you have to take tough measures to prevent hacks. And, they often aren't supported well, if at all.

I've come around to the opinion that it may be better to do a cooperative WordPress blog with some form of revenue sharing rather than the traditional article directory.

[jitterbug978]

Well I just started my own article directory yesterday... Free Articles Directory | Submit Articles | Article-This.com


Hopefully I can do some good with it.

Having a 100% ad free article directory business model will do you a great deal better. There are far too many ad sense farms now as it is... But that is just my opinion.

I also agree with bgmacaw that many (I say almost all of them) free article scripts are not secured.

James

[netcatapult]

I agree with Rob Hall in that building a successful article directory will take time as most people want to submit their sites in high google page rank directories to get the most benefits out of it and it seems to be a pretty competitive market. But with hard work and effort, it could definitely pay off.

[acedalright]

Here are the problems...

There is little benefit to an author if they add an article to a new directory that has pr0 or pr1. Especially when they can add that article to Ezinearticles - PR7

Most article you do get will be duplicate and the ones that are not will be spun garbage.


You need to find profitable ways to make your directory grow by add new incentives and build your PR up. I know I wouldn't add an article to a directory below PR3 at least.

So it may take time and money to get some respect, but if you do, the adsense will pay the bills and you can add affiliate products to the article you write and make affiliate sales.

It will be hard work, so put 6 months of you life on hold and be prepared to build a ton of decent links and write a slew of unique content.

Good luck.

Originally Posted by acedalright

You need to find profitable ways to make your directory grow by add new incentives and build your PR up. I know I wouldn't add an article to a directory below PR3 at least.

Just wanted to say thanks for leaving all those millions of other customers to us that realize PR means nothing because a PR 7 site can be outranked easily ....

James

[cscarpero]

I'm getting into this myself. I think that if you get some script and just duplicate the other directories that you will struggle. Personally, I'm working on a niche directory and putting my own spin on it. It's still new but I feel in a few months it will be rocking.