Repackaging Articles is Not Derivative Content

In this video, I clear up some common misconceptions about what qualifies as “derivative content”.

A few days ago, you learned about our recent crackdown on derivative content. Unfortunately, many authors became concerned that this new guideline included existing articles from their websites and blogs.

Let me be clear: You SHOULD submit existing articles and content from your website or blog.

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Posted by Christopher M. Knight on October 29, 2009 at 1:34 pm

2,725 views | Comments (98)

Derivative Content Be Gone

I just recorded this 4 minute unscripted video to give you some insights into my current thinking on the issues of the past few weeks:

Downloadable Versions:
           

After I finished recording the video, I watched it and made some notes about what I had said. Let me clarify a few points:

We’re not at war with Affiliate Marketers … the more we think about it, we’re really at war with people who submit highly derivative content … You know the type … You’ve seen this type of low value article as it looks like yet another rehashed works of every other similar kind of article instead of the fresh perspective that a true expert in their niche delivers.

Those who write & submit high value exclusive rights content have nothing to worry about.

Are you really an expert author if you write highly derivative content? No.

Ideal members write original content and own the exclusive rights to that content.
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Posted by Christopher M. Knight on October 26, 2009 at 3:52 pm

4,033 views | Comments (166)

EzineArticles.com #18 of the Top 50 Websites for Professionals

Website Magazine has ranked EzineArticles.com #18 on their list of the “Top 50 Websites for Professionals,” in their November, 2009 issue.

Websites that make the cut, like EzineArticles, Google, Yahoo, Facebook and YouTube, are considered the most important for Web professionals based on their popularity among Web professionals, the business community and consumers.

The accompanying article warns professionals to not “even think about ruling out content and article marketing as a way to shore up brand visibility and drive website traffic.” The article went on to note that success stories like EzineArticles “still generate the respect of many professional and aspiring Web professionals and will continue to do so until content is no longer king.”

According to Website Magazine, readers should treat the list “as an important starting guide for your Web Success.”

Follow @WebsiteMagazine on Twitter.

Something Unexpected

Against the recommendation of our management team, I wanted to share with you something we’re currently dealing with internally in regards to our Premium Membership service level.

We’ve been firing an average of 2 Premium members every day now as not being a good match. In some cases, we’ve had to fire members who were Premium, got fired, bought again and then had to be banned from Premium membership. We’ve had members plead to pay any price for speed or to be unbanned. One guy yesterday offered us $36k to accept his articles on top of our Premium membership fee with one exception: He wanted us to accept derivative content. No way!

Key Issue: Our team has been at great odds with ourselves because we want to deliver excellent service to our Premium members, yet a high percentage of our Premium members are not ideal EzineArticles members. We’ve essentially accelerated the speed at which our worst members can submit low value, thin content into our system.

This further frustrates our Premium members because they are getting downgraded (most are at Basic Plus level), having their articles rejected and are being shown the word “NO” more often than they’d ever care to see.

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Posted by Christopher M. Knight on October 20, 2009 at 3:11 pm

3,298 views | Comments (119)

Discover the Value of EzineArticles

Our internal team and our 200,000+ members all know about the incredible benefits of EzineArticles membership, but it’s always been a challenge to explain what we do to the rest of the world. This video strives to bridge that gap by answering two simple questions:

1. What is EzineArticles?
2. What’s the value of membership?

Watch this video to get the answers to those questions and more. And at the same time, meet 4 of the key players on the EzineArticles Team:

• Chris Knight, CEO & Publisher
• The Other Chris, VP of Operations
• Penny, Managing Editor
• Marc, Marketing Manager and Public Relations

Downloadable Versions:
           

We’d prefer you hear our message straight from the horses’ mouths (so to speak). In the process we hope you’ll see, and feel, the passion we have for EzineArticles, our team and our huge family of domestic and international members. None-the-less, we’ve also created a downloadable transcript of the video for those who may need it. [Download PDF - 236K]

Watch the video now. Then leave a comment to tell us what you feel are the biggest benefits of EzineArticles membership.

Posted by Christopher M. Knight on September 22, 2009 at 2:12 pm

2,155 views | Comments (35)

Twitter Action Required

Don’t miss out on a single tweet of your newest articles – update your account today!

Twitter recently made a change that required EzineArticles to undertake a 3-week long reprogramming project to modify the way we manage our members’ Twitter credentials.

Now that the project is complete, we’re asking all members to log into their EzineArticles Profile Manager and re-approve their Twitter account in the next 24-48 hours.

Beginning August 18th, we will no longer send new article Twitter Update alerts for members who have not authorized their Twitter Account using the new OAuthentication method, otherwise known as “OAuth”.

To Update Your Account:

1. Log into your EzineArticles Expert Author Account
2. From the Author’s Area, click on the “Profile Manager” drop-down menu
3. Select “Edit Author Bio”
4. Choose the specific author name you’d like to authorize
5. Scroll down until you see a box with the dotted outline
6. Click on: “Manage your EzineArticles Twitter Service.”
7. Click “Authorize Twitter Access”
8. Read the informational page and click the “Allow” button

You will then be brought back to the EzineArticles Author’s Area where you can automatically send a tweet informing followers you’ve set up your EzineArticles account to notify them of your new articles.

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Posted by Christopher M. Knight on August 12, 2009 at 5:10 pm

4,424 views | Comments (105)

Second HAHD Challenge Begins

The second 100 Articles in 100 Days Marathon Challenge (#HAHD) begins tomorrow!

Get ready, because here we go again! And this HAHD challenge is going to be BIGGER and BETTER than ever! 1,000 EzineArticles members qualified for the first HAHD. This time, we’re aiming for 10,000 qualifiers and we’re offering the prizes to make it happen!

TO QUALIFY: There’s no need to sign up! Just submit at least 100 articles between 12:00AM CDT tomorrow (Saturday, August 1st) and 11:59PM CDT Sunday, November 8th. That’s only 1 article per day for 100 days. Once those 100 articles are approved, you’re qualified!

QUALIFICATION PRIZES:

All qualifiers will receive:

• HAHD Certificate of Achievement (frame not included)

Upon request, all qualifiers will also receive:

• Original Limited-edition EzineArticles #HAHD Trophy Mug
• Limited-edition EzineArticles #HAHD Mouse Pad

The first 100 members to qualify and submit a prize request will receive:

• All of the above plus…
• Limited-edition EzineArticles Fleece Throw Blanket
• Limited-edition EzineArticles Hat

PLUS…

• Invitation to a private 4-hour Article Marketing Teleseminar hosted by Chris Knight, EzineArticles Publisher & CEO (Valued at $10,000)
• Access to the Article Marketing Teleseminar Replay and Downloadable MP3 File

ADDED BONUS #1:
The top 100 members for total number of qualified submissions will also receive a chance to win 1 of 10 FREE 1-year EzineArticles Premium Membership subscriptions valued at $582 each!

ADDED BONUS #2:
In addition to all of these great prizes, each of your approved article submissions will reward you with increased traffic, improved credibility and additional sales!

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Dear EzineArticles Members

There’s an old adage that says in order to be successful in business, you’ve got to love your customers. You have to know them almost intimately. You have to be willing to do just about anything for them. And most of all, you’ve got to love them for who they are.

For EzineArticles, the closest thing we have to customers are our members. Our members are the people we think about, and interact with, the most. So in our case it’s probably safe to say that in order for us to be successful, we need to love our members.

The nice thing is… we already do.

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Invalid URL/Link Detection Follow-Up

“Nothing is ever as easy as it first appears.” -Murphy

Last week we introduced our new approach to broken link detection and began notifying members if we found broken links in any of your existing articles.

The response from our members was huge… and much greater than we had anticipated. Since then we have been working diligently to address this overwhelming response.

I’d like to share some of the challenges that have been created and help you better understand what will be happening in the next few days.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly…

• The email we sent to members stated that we would be unlinking your links in 48 hours if no action was taken. This is incorrect and we apologize for the error. We will recheck and then unlink your dead link in 35 days (but would like you to fix it within the next 48 hours).
• In the past 48 hours we have received over 10,000 article re-submissions with your corrections. Wow! We had no idea our members were that fast!
• We’ve received over 2,000 emails to our Member Support Team providing us with a heads up. This is great! It shows that a good user experience is important to all of us!
• When you fix a dead link by editing your article…your article will be re-reviewed with today’s standard of article review and not the standard that was used on the original date your article was first accepted. Sorry, we don’t grandfather any article which means any article edited must pass today’s standards (that are always just a slight bit higher than previous years standards).
• When you delete an article you will notice that your links will still show as being invalid in your Article Diagnostic Center. We are aware of this and are working on a resolution.
• We sent out 2 emails to every member with a confirmed dead link – one went to your email address on file and the other was sent to your EzineArticles Member’s Inbox. These emails were identical. You can disregard one email if you have already addressed the broken link(s).
• If your Article Diagnostic Center shows no links to be invalid, you can trust that this is correct!

In addition, we’ve had to create a series of new internal tools to help our team support you.

All of this has, unfortunately, put us into a backlog both in Member Support and article approvals. We will be working on this diligently and our editors are dedicated to investing the overtime necessary to get us back to normal approval times.

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Perfect Press Release – 2min

The same great video in a much smaller package!

Back in April we released a video entitled, How to Write the Perfect Press Release. Most members agreed that the video was helpful and informative… but a bit too long.

So we took it back to the cutting room and trimmed the original 7+ minute video down to a leaner, trimmer 2 minute version which was intended for use on our sister site http://PressExposure.com exclusively.

After a little reflection, we realized it only made sense to share this sweetened, condensed version with our EzineArticles members as well. So here it is:

Downloadable Versions:
           
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