56 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}
56 {{ upvoteCount | shortNum }}

The Nail In Buzzle's Coffin

by samjaynz
45 replies
Just logged into my buzzle account for the first time in months to see what's new. First thing I saw-

"New Editorial Guidelines-

External link not allowed"

Yep, thats right, the only benefit from submitting to Buzzle (ie getting a link and some traffic) has gone.

Now who said article DIRECTORY marketing wasn't dying?
#buzzle #coffin #nail
  • Profile picture of the author myob
    Can you spell syndication?
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928529].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author samjaynz
      Yes, it's spelled 'nice one captain obvious'

      Of course syndication will still continue, but quick traffic doesn't seem quite so easy to be honest.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928536].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author JRCarson
      Originally Posted by myob View Post

      Can you spell syndication?
      I don't get it...

      Okay, so you get content published all over the web. Your content doesn't link anywhere. Your author page doesn't link anywhere. Soooo...what's the motivation?

      To have people go to Buzzle to find information from you?

      Seriously, someone explain Buzzle to me.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928587].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author packerfan
        Originally Posted by JRCarson View Post

        I don't get it...

        Okay, so you get content published all over the web. Your content doesn't link anywhere. Your author page doesn't link anywhere. Soooo...what's the motivation?

        To have people go to Buzzle to find information from you?

        Seriously, someone explain Buzzle to me.
        I could be wrong but I think he's saying focus on other forms of syndication. Don't just rely on a couple directories. Contact site owners directly, etc.
        Signature

        Nothing to see here

        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928599].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author Saito
          If that is the case, then it IS a sign that [easy, traditional, time-effective] article marketing is dying.

          And screw Buzzle. They can choke on their own pomposity, visions of grandeur, and self-defeating policies.
          Signature
          Do You Suffer From Incomplete Funnel Syndrome?
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3931685].message }}
          • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
            Banned
            Originally Posted by ankur420420 View Post

            There goes another way of getting backlinks
            Well ... maybe, but since you and I joined this fine forum in late 2008, that hasn't been an effective way of getting very useful backlinks anyway, Ankur, one could say? Not when you had to give them previously unpublished content. :rolleyes:

            Originally Posted by alan.brymer View Post

            If that is the case, then it IS a sign that [easy, traditional, time-effective] article marketing is dying.
            Nah ... that kind of article marketing is positively flourishing.

            It's only the temporary newcomer "article directory marketing" whose funeral invitations are finally being sent out.

            Originally Posted by alan.brymer View Post

            And screw Buzzle. They can choke on their own pomposity, visions of grandeur, and self-defeating policies.
            Can't argue with you there.
            {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3932199].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author myob
          Originally Posted by packerfan View Post

          I could be wrong but I think he's saying focus on other forms of syndication. Don't just rely on a couple directories. Contact site owners directly, etc.
          This easy, traditional, time-effective article marketing model of syndication is alive, well, and most vibrant!
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3932121].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author samjaynz
        Originally Posted by JRCarson View Post

        I don't get it...

        Okay, so you get content published all over the web. Your content doesn't link anywhere. Your author page doesn't link anywhere. Soooo...what's the motivation?

        To have people go to Buzzle to find information from you?

        Seriously, someone explain Buzzle to me.
        Once upon a time you could submit an article to Buzzle with a link at the end to your own website/blog. They ranked pretty well in Google (this isn't the case anymore) and you could get your article syndicated with that link in it.

        Now you are just submitting unique content for absolutely no benefit.
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928620].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author JRCarson
          Originally Posted by samjaynz View Post

          Once upon a time you could submit an article to Buzzle with a link at the end to your own website/blog. They ranked pretty well in Google (this isn't the case anymore) and you could get your article syndicated with that link in it.

          Now you are just submitting unique content for absolutely no benefit.
          Exactly. I actually had an account there once...

          I just started getting really confused looking Buzzle all of a sudden now that there aren't links allowed!

          People are still writing like MAD there! WHY? What are they expecting to get out of it? Is it like an "American Idol" mentality of the masses? "Maybe a famous publisher will see my articles and want to hire me?"
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928637].message }}
          • Profile picture of the author Raindance
            Originally Posted by JRCarson View Post

            Exactly. I actually had an account there once...

            I just started getting really confused looking Buzzle all of a sudden now that there aren't links allowed!

            People are still writing like MAD there! WHY? What are they expecting to get out of it? Is it like an "American Idol" mentality of the masses? "Maybe a famous publisher will see my articles and want to hire me?"
            Buzzle is a very weird place. There TOS has kept on getting more and more unfriendly and the numerous people that write for it, I've heard from a credible source that they have been hired by Buzzle to write for them to make their site look alive. Firstly, they don't accept any content which has been published elsewhere and now no links. That's utter nonsense. They are acting as if big players like Wall Street Journal and Time magazine pick their writers from that site.

            For Internet Marketing purposes, Buzzle was very less helpful and now no use whatsoever. Even I seriously wonder, who's gonna post articles there now that such stupid guidelines have been implemented apart from their hired writers, of course.
            Signature
            Making Money without Websites
            {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928844].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author arttse
    If external links are disallowed then the only writers it will attact are those that want to focus on branding.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3928672].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author samjaynz
    Originally Posted by Chris Kent View Post

    Buzzle is dead then. As someone said, it will only attract those who want to brand.

    Yet another directory who was happy to use us while the going was good and then want to fleece those who helped make them.
    Yup, just the same as Ezinearticles and all the others.

    Makes you realize just how prescient people were in saying 'build your OWN website first'
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3929293].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author myob
      Originally Posted by samjaynz View Post

      ...Makes you realize just how prescient people were in saying 'build your OWN website first'
      ^^
      This, precisely.
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3930908].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
        Banned
        "Buzzle" was dead to me before I even got online and started: it was the only article directory which wouldn't re-publish an article already posted and indexed on my own site. Even when I first started off, with very little idea of what I was doing, and was making almost every mistake known to article marketing, I knew "Buzzle" was a non-starter. I don't want to sound too overcome by schadenfreude here, but it really was pretty entertaining, around the time of the famous Panda update, that their ludicrous policy of requiring previously unpublished content didn't seem to help them at all.
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3931095].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author Alex Barboza
          Originally Posted by Alexa Smith View Post

          I don't want to sound too overcome by schadenfreude here,
          Well, you do . But seriously, who wants to waste their time or efforts sending un-plished content to article directories?
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3931117].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Anup Mahajan
    There goes one more way of getting traffic. Haven't used Buzzle much in the last few months but I agree that once upon a time it was a great way to get links and traffic.

    Anup
    Signature

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3929336].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author axus_auto
    Frankly, without a link, there is no point putting any article there
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3931121].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Lee Murray
    Buzzle never got much respect from this kid. Only one link allowed (now zero... that's half, right? ), content must be totally unique to their directory, and their cute little "Intelligent Life on the Web" slogan... yuck!

    And now that they're losing traction in the SERPs and don't offer any real benefit to their contributors, they are truly a lost cause. G-H-E-T-T-O!
    Signature
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3931161].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Zeus66
    Google is trying to tell us, if we'll only listen...

    Be unique and give your visitors a good experience. Stop trying to game the system. Content for content's sake is going bye bye. Put your stuff on your own site, make it damn good, and do the things you need to do to impress visitors. Do you think Google "sees" the typical affiliate site loaded with nothing but affiliate outbound links and some garbage rehashed nonsense for content as worthy? They're getting better at sniffing those out. If that's all you have, you better start figuring out how to spiff things up.

    Or...

    Ignore Google and find other ways to get your traffic. Hey wait! Can that be done? :rolleyes:
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3931312].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Bradley J Anderson
    Is that direct links only? Or can they still be used within relevant anchor text?
    Signature
    BRADLEY ANDERSON - Tips, reviews & resources to make your online business more profitable.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3932124].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Paleochora
    Glance down and look at the auto-generated tags for this thread.

    Never have I seen a thread summed up so well in just three words.
    Signature
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3932165].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Tom L
    There are plenty other opportunities out there, I've noticed that they erased some of my articles that were already present on the account. Only one is left with a link still attached. Move on to shallower waters with actual fish in them... forget Buz.... what was the name of it...
    Signature
    Get my list of 25,260 article directories for Article Marketing Robot

    5,000 auto-approve blogs, perfect for Scrapebox, updated weekly
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3936831].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Cosmo Demopoulos
    I've used Buzzle with good results but then they mysterious closed my account down. Now I don't need to worry about them.
    And yah, I was giving them very good unique content too.

    (they were about polite as Google when they shut down an AdSense account too)
    Signature
    Wine - bubbles and more
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3937567].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author NicoleBeckett
    I can't even imagine what service they think they provide if they're going to eliminate all outbound links. I can see wanting to crack down on shady or irrelevant links in content, but to get rid of them altogether is short-sighted IMO. All it's going to do is cause people to go elsewhere. Sure, it will get rid of the spammers, but it will also get rid of the quality writers.

    It's just another reason to have a variety of good article directories at your disposal. That way, when something like this happens, you won't lose everything.
    Signature
    Sick of blending in with the crowd? Ready to stand ahead of the pack? The right content writing services can get you there...
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3938184].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author JamesGw
    Was never a fan of Buzzle. Since they're alienating most of their content producers, I see them falling off the face of the Earth unless they want to adopt a MSM model and compete with those companies. Good luck with that, though.
    Signature
    Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Techniques | Precision SEO
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3938293].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Jeremy Banks
    They are basically just going to be a private site now, probably changing directions and having their writers do all the work.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3938330].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author H.Miller
    I was never a fan of buzzle. Glad I didn't waste anytime posting articles on their site.
    Signature
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3938587].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Dean Jackson
    Well I guess its "Intelligent Life On The Web" slogan just went down the pooper lol...

    Nice, Buzzle. Nice.

    Dean
    Signature
    NEW: CRAZIEST Copywriting offer ever offered on WF
    My top student WILL make your sales go BANANAS!
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3938995].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Shazia Mirza
    First I want to congratulate you, many people don't even get accepted into Buzzle.

    IMHO, I don't blame Buzzle for doing this. Their goal wasn't to get article marketers to produce content, I am pretty sure they wanted content from quality hobby writers that have experiences to share.

    Hopefully Buzzle is not taking off links on the existing articles, I will be losing a fair amount of link juice.
    Signature
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3939031].message }}
    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      [DELETED]
      {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3939105].message }}
      • Profile picture of the author arttse
        What has "nofollow" got to do with this thread?



        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        The "nofollow" tag is tricky. I have done some testing with it and sometimes
        Google does take them for consideration. For example, I set up a brand new
        1- page site and posted an article on a well known portal. I watched my
        server stats and after 2 hours of the article going live Googlebot came to
        check out the site. There was no other links to it and no pinging was done
        either. I specifically wanted to see how Google will react.

        Anyway, nofollow links might not pass link juice and PR directly, but a good
        amount of them could be an indication for Google to give you better treatment.

        What I think is happening is that Google evaluates all your nofollow links
        and assigns a score based on traffic you are getting and quality of the content
        where the link was used.

        Don't bet on that though, I am just assuming
        {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3939131].message }}
        • Profile picture of the author affhelper
          Originally Posted by arttse View Post

          What has "nofollow" got to do with this thread?
          LOL sorry, I read the thread wrong. I guess I haven't woken up yet.
          {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3939171].message }}
          • Profile picture of the author Alex Barboza
            Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

            Are you serious? Look at the original post

            OP stated he didn't like that Buzzle changed their links to "nofollow".
            I said that it could still be beneficial in some way.
            Actually, the op says that Buzzle allows NO links at all from now on
            {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3939177].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author website12
    Banned
    I loved when buzzle was good and we could get some good article links and traffic.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3939197].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author viktor
    Buzzle is now deleting some articles, about 30% from one of my accounts and 50% from another. No warnings, email notifications or reasons. Articles are just gone. I see no patterns, so I believe they'll remove them all.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3969416].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Ephrils
    I stopped using Buzzle long ago and after re-reading their updated terms when I paid them a visit , maybe a year back, decided I wasn't about to give them content that I was getting the short end of from linking and visibility.

    They did find 3 words to kill a business. "No linking allowed".
    Signature

    Two Signature lines for rent.

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3969584].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author evollusion
    I could understand if they wanted to start profit sharing with their writers, but this makes no sense at all.

    What would really get me upset is that if I had a great deal of content there and they just did it. I checked things out and it looks as if they just went and dynamically changed everones outgoing links to internal pointing links. So, they've esssentially taken someones content who put it there in exchange for an external link and removed the "payment" for the content.

    I would write them a pretty ugly nasty-gram stating that I want them to remove all content which I had produced and hold the copyrights for.
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3973724].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author Aunty
    Time's change and things move on. No use bemoaning how things used to be - new things will be bigger and better and if they don't exist yet or we haven't found them yet, that's just a reason to be excited about what is yet to come. (oooh optimism ... I LIKE IT!!)
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3973761].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author thebitbotdotcom
    I have never submitted an article to Buzzle. From the first day I saw their policies, I knew I wasn't interested.

    With respect to duplicate content, Buzzle is full of it despite their policies. Thinking a policy can stop that is insane and they have known it all along.

    The easiest way to school them is, of course, to submit to them before all of the other copies show up in Google. It's all about timing.

    With respect to them not linking out. That is the dumbest thing I have ever heard. They are no longer a resource then. Resources link to other resources.

    With respect to article marketing dying...not even remotely close...changing? Yes. It will be interesting to see if Warriors catch on to the change happening as we speak.
    Signature
    Do Your Copywriting Skills Suck?

    Let Us Help You Develop Your Writing Skills!

    Submit Guest Posts With [ TheBitBot.Com ]
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3973770].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author LilBlackDress
    Such a lack of respect for the authors who helped build the community.
    They delete the articles and don't have the courtesy to notify the authors.

    I just saw that in my case they deleted my articles, stripped the link and even stripped by name from them.

    Happily I never did much at Buzzle and I have Google's cache and just took a screen shot of the article titles. I saved my articles and will now be plastering them all over the internet for the links.

    So much for Buzzle only wanting the articles on their own site.

    Really hard to believe they would have the nerve to strip the author's name out and the link.

    Yet another GREAT reason to build your own websites!
    Signature

    Pen Name + 8 eBooks + social media sites 4 SALE - PM me (evergreen beauty niche)

    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3973853].message }}
  • Profile picture of the author omk
    It's interesting that you said you haven't logged in for a few months! - that's one more indicator of their decline, lol
    {{ DiscussionBoard.errors[3973876].message }}

Trending Topics