Food For Thought for LL owners

[Carrie]

Okay guys and gals. Not trying to start a firestorm. Just tossing out some food for thought.

- If your submissions are closed, could you please put this at the TOP of the submission page rather than make us spend 20 minutes reading through your rules, hopping to another page to get your recips, going back to the submission page only to get to the bottom and find out that submissions are closed?

- It would also help if the (quickly growing) list of "sponsors who aren't accepted" was at the top of the page - perhaps in a sidebar? This way we'd know right off whether to keep reading or move on.

- The niche recips were a good idea once upon a time until Google caught on and is now penalizing for A-B recips. Isn't there a way we could still do the "keyword in the link" recip without linking directly to the page we're being listed on? Like linking to the page with the categories listing? (The keyword in the link will then still be found in the category listing and description, yet won't be a direct Page A to Page B directly back to Page A link.)

- Two (or more) links per every recip, and demanding to be listed with X number of other LLs... did you ever stop to think that each of these multi-link recips makes our page look like a link farm to the SEs and further devalues the weight of the recip (not to mention the whole A-B issue again)?
It's just frustrating to see that all of this is being done for SE weight yet the methods being used are actually things that will get both the webmaster's domain and the LL's domain penalized. (Or at the least make the link absolutely worthless so all of the trouble gone through by both the LL owner and the webmaster to use the recips is for naught.)

- I've seen a lot of LLs rules lately saying that they won't accept sponsor content at all anymore. What do we do if we promote solo girls or sites with exclusive content? It's not like we can just go to Matrix and grab some content that will sufficiently represent the site we're trying to send the surfer to. A note added onto the end of that rule saying what we do if we're promoting solo or exclusive sites would be most appreciated.

- This one is more of a question... with so many LL owners using link-checking bots now, why the "your site will be listed for 3 months" or "6 months" thing? The bot will find sites that go down or redirect, so why just drop them? Don't you want extra archive pages for advertising and SE spider food? I honestly need help understanding this one?

- I understand that an easy way to check on cheaters is to look at domain registration info, but isn't there some other way that we can do this that doesn't compromise a webmaster's privacy? Some webmasters NEED that privacy.
Plus it's not real kosher when your LL domain's information is private but you're telling the submitters they must have their info out in the open. Isn't their family's need for security and privacy just as valid as yours?

- Since when did a 200-pixel wide table of text with three rows become a "button"? (I've seen LLs referring to these as "buttons", seriously.)
Okay so that one is more of just a head-scratching gripe than anything constructive.

- Please take into consideration the width of your required recip when your rules also state that our sites must be 800x600 compliant.. please, please, please. Add to this that most LLs say they must be listed with X number of other sites and suddenly we've got an entire screenful of 200+ pixel width recips at that resolution. For an 800-width resolution you really have about 750 pixels wide to work with (accounting for scrollbar and margin) so you can't even fit 4 of today's common "recips" onto a row. Then we move into the height of the recips (most are three lines of text now, many are more) and at three recips per row we're getting a pretty long recip table.

If a standard could be agreed upon, say 150 pixels, that would be SO nice. (Plus at 150 we could get more onto a row, making the page much more presentable and not have a recip table that takes up an entire screen from top to bottom.)

- Isn't it time that we consider dropping the 800x600 rule? We're building sites for a small minority of surfers. Most sponsors now offer videos that are bigger than 800x600 and pics are usually 1024 on the SHORT side, yet we're supposed to convince a surfer they can get this high resolution stuff at the sponsor when our sites are only 750 pixels wide? Seriously, it's like having a salesman trying to sell you a Cadillac but he'll only give you a test drive in an Escort. I can't think of any business that would restrict/punish 80+% of their customers and limit the business' own opportunities for less than 20% of the people that come through the door.

For those LL owners who say "I surf at 800x600"... please bump your resolution up to 1024x768 and surf around the sites on your LL for an hour, and see how ridiculously TINY the sites look. That's how most surfers are seeing the sites on your LL. It makes the sites, and your LL, look really *dated*. Like they're stuck in 1999 and not keeping up with technology.

It's also a bit contradictory when the minimum pixels on the long side of a photo have gone from 450 to 600+, which admits that there's a consensus (by number of LL rules increasing their photo size requirements) that surfers' resolutions have gotten bigger, yet we're still building sites at the same size we were when the minimum width/length of the long side of a photo was 450 pixels.

For a compromise, you could try adding a "high resolution" section where the sites are all built for at least a 1024 width resolution. Test it out for a while, see how much traffic it gets, how many of your normal bookmarkers go into that section. It won't hurt anything, it'll give you more pages to advertise on, and you'll get to really see with your own traffic how many people *want* to look at sites at that resolution rather than just assuming something based on what your AWStats "browser" section tells you. Or hell, you could put up a poll or send out an email to your mailing list asking your surfers if they'd like to see sites built for wider screens. It never hurts to try, or to ask.

Like I said, just some food for thought. For every issue I brought up I *tried* to think of a compromise or suggestion, so that it wasn't just a gripe session.
Hopefully it'll spur some ideas.

[DJilla]

All good points and I think you'll see if you aren't already some of these ideas being adopted slowly. I think trends are developing along many of the lines you mention.

[ronnie]

Some of the rules you mention are few and far between, meaning few LL's have those rules. Also, many links lists are open to custom recips, it's been said over and over, many even encourage it. I've seen many recip tables with a large number of recips that look good.

As for sponsor content, the reason has always been so it's not over used. Not much value if a LL has the same set of pics/content listed over and over.

ronnie

[swedguy]

All issues will be discussed at the next Illuminati meeting.

[Carrie]

LOL@Illuminati!

Ronnie I realize the reason for the sponsor content, that's always been a problem (and always will be); I'm just hoping to see a workaround for the sites where we can't buy the same content. Maybe just a "first come first served" thing would work, although this is generally what the rule on sponsor content used to be and it must not have worked or they wouldn't have changed it to "none at all".
Still, it's not like every surfer clicks on *every* site in the list. If there are three or four sites in there using the same content and he sees every one of them, he really needs to get out his wallet.

[Nenad]

Originally Posted by Carrie

- I understand that an easy way to check on cheaters is to look at domain registration info, but isn't there some other way that we can do this that doesn't compromise a webmaster's privacy? Some webmasters NEED that privacy.
Plus it's not real kosher when your LL domain's information is private but you're telling the submitters they must have their info out in the open. Isn't their family's need for security and privacy just as valid as yours?

Am asking same question. Ok, somebody wants to see my domain name whois - i dont have anything to hide and thats ok..BUT, if i use unmenaged server and for unmenaged server i must use private DNS ( because there is NO other option) why DNS infos ( whois of dns domain ) must be visible? Where is the privacy? Because somebody allmost marked me here as a cheater i was put DNS domain name visible and i AGAIN have privacy problems. Anonymous phone calls and other bullshits. Is that price which i must pay if i wanna submit my free sites to LL?
If i submit free sites and follow all rules, and my whois info is visible, and am couple of months free site submiter its obliviously that am ok submitter, right?
Sorry for oftopic, i agree with Carrie in his whole post

[Carrie]

Well, hopefully the lack of response by LL owners means they're mulling over some of the ideas, lol.

[MrYum]

Originally Posted by Carrie

Well, hopefully the lack of response by LL owners means they're mulling over some of the ideas, lol.

Or, perhaps it means that much of your food for thought has already been discussed in these very forums. Let me see if I can come up with a cliff notes version;

Originally Posted by Carrie

- If your submissions are closed, could you please put this at the TOP of the submission page rather than make us spend 20 minutes reading through your rules, hopping to another page to get your recips, going back to the submission page only to get to the bottom and find out that submissions are closed?

Frankly, if you're taking 20 minutes to figure out submissions are closed, you're doing something wrong
When you hit the submit page, scroll down...look for a submit form or a link to a submit form. If you can't find a submit form, they're probably not taking submissions. Shouldn't take more than a few seconds and no time wasted reading rules when submissions are closed.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- It would also help if the (quickly growing) list of "sponsors who aren't accepted" was at the top of the page - perhaps in a sidebar? This way we'd know right off whether to keep reading or move on.

I'm only aware of 2 sponsors that can be problematic with some lists. If you're not getting listed, check with the site owner and I'm sure he or she will enlighten you as to why. Or, post in these forums and you'll no doubt get an answer.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- The niche recips were a good idea once upon a time until Google caught on and is now penalizing for A-B recips. Isn't there a way we could still do the "keyword in the link" recip without linking directly to the page we're being listed on? Like linking to the page with the categories listing? (The keyword in the link will then still be found in the category listing and description, yet won't be a direct Page A to Page B directly back to Page A link.)

I have yet to see any concrete proof that direct recip links cause problems with the engines. Yes, I've seen inuendo and speculation...I also still see several of the major link sites and tgps at the top of the serps. That said, if you want to arrange some special linking relationship with an owner or owners...hit em up and ask...you might be surprised by the response

Look at it this way, IF indeed you're right about direct recips being a problem...why would you want your new style of linking widespread? Seems as though it would only be a matter of time before it too became problematic.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- Two (or more) links per every recip, and demanding to be listed with X number of other LLs... did you ever stop to think that each of these multi-link recips makes our page look like a link farm to the SEs and further devalues the weight of the recip (not to mention the whole A-B issue again)?
It's just frustrating to see that all of this is being done for SE weight yet the methods being used are actually things that will get both the webmaster's domain and the LL's domain penalized. (Or at the least make the link absolutely worthless so all of the trouble gone through by both the LL owner and the webmaster to use the recips is for naught.)

Many link sites (mine included) will no longer accept sites containing other recips with more than 2 links. This came about because a handful of sites went over the top...one that comes to mind has a whopping 10 links in his recip

Very few link sites 'demand' that their recip be with X number of other recips. This is a common sense thing for the most part...as long as you have at least 5 other recips, you should be fine. Most sites I see these days have 12 to 16 recips, so 24 to 32 outbound recip links...hardly a link farm.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- I've seen a lot of LLs rules lately saying that they won't accept sponsor content at all anymore. What do we do if we promote solo girls or sites with exclusive content? It's not like we can just go to Matrix and grab some content that will sufficiently represent the site we're trying to send the surfer to. A note added onto the end of that rule saying what we do if we're promoting solo or exclusive sites would be most appreciated.

This one is a little tougher...I know there are some sites that indeed don't accept sponsor content at all. However, most of the larger sites will accept it if they haven't seen it before. Again, owners of a lot of the larger sites frequent these forums...if you have trouble getting listed...post and ask about it. But, if you grab the content quickly and get it up before someone else does...I doubt you'll have much trouble.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- This one is more of a question... with so many LL owners using link-checking bots now, why the "your site will be listed for 3 months" or "6 months" thing? The bot will find sites that go down or redirect, so why just drop them? Don't you want extra archive pages for advertising and SE spider food? I honestly need help understanding this one?

This issue isn't really very widespread...there aren't many lists that drop sites after a few months. If you run across one that does and you don't like that, simply don't submit there.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- I understand that an easy way to check on cheaters is to look at domain registration info, but isn't there some other way that we can do this that doesn't compromise a webmaster's privacy? Some webmasters NEED that privacy.
Plus it's not real kosher when your LL domain's information is private but you're telling the submitters they must have their info out in the open. Isn't their family's need for security and privacy just as valid as yours?

This subject has come up numerous times. The bottom line is many owners (myself included) want to know who we're doing business with. I think the best analogy I've seen was from GG...would you do business in the brick and mortar world with someone who wouldn't tell you his name???

To be blunt, if soneone is so concerned about it being 'found out' that they work in the adult business (for shame!)...perhaps they should re-consider slingin porn for a living.

Originally Posted by Carrie

- Since when did a 200-pixel wide table of text with three rows become a "button"? (I've seen LLs referring to these as "buttons", seriously.)
Okay so that one is more of just a head-scratching gripe than anything constructive.

- Please take into consideration the width of your required recip when your rules also state that our sites must be 800x600 compliant.. please, please, please. Add to this that most LLs say they must be listed with X number of other sites and suddenly we've got an entire screenful of 200+ pixel width recips at that resolution. For an 800-width resolution you really have about 750 pixels wide to work with (accounting for scrollbar and margin) so you can't even fit 4 of today's common "recips" onto a row. Then we move into the height of the recips (most are three lines of text now, many are more) and at three recips per row we're getting a pretty long recip table.

If a standard could be agreed upon, say 150 pixels, that would be SO nice. (Plus at 150 we could get more onto a row, making the page much more presentable and not have a recip table that takes up an entire screen from top to bottom.)

Most link sites are quite open to custom recips. Some sites (like mine) actually encourage use of custom recips. This enables the free site builder to customize recips to best suit his site and also adds the side benefit of some slight variation on keyword anchors if done properly.

more coming...

[MrYum]

continued...

Wow! That's a first...overloaded the script and had to break this post into 2 parts. Do I win an award or anything Greenie???

Originally Posted by Carrie

- Isn't it time that we consider dropping the 800x600 rule? We're building sites for a small minority of surfers. Most sponsors now offer videos that are bigger than 800x600 and pics are usually 1024 on the SHORT side, yet we're supposed to convince a surfer they can get this high resolution stuff at the sponsor when our sites are only 750 pixels wide? Seriously, it's like having a salesman trying to sell you a Cadillac but he'll only give you a test drive in an Escort. I can't think of any business that would restrict/punish 80+% of their customers and limit the business' own opportunities for less than 20% of the people that come through the door.

For those LL owners who say "I surf at 800x600"... please bump your resolution up to 1024x768 and surf around the sites on your LL for an hour, and see how ridiculously TINY the sites look. That's how most surfers are seeing the sites on your LL. It makes the sites, and your LL, look really *dated*. Like they're stuck in 1999 and not keeping up with technology.

It's also a bit contradictory when the minimum pixels on the long side of a photo have gone from 450 to 600+, which admits that there's a consensus (by number of LL rules increasing their photo size requirements) that surfers' resolutions have gotten bigger, yet we're still building sites at the same size we were when the minimum width/length of the long side of a photo was 450 pixels.

For a compromise, you could try adding a "high resolution" section where the sites are all built for at least a 1024 width resolution. Test it out for a while, see how much traffic it gets, how many of your normal bookmarkers go into that section. It won't hurt anything, it'll give you more pages to advertise on, and you'll get to really see with your own traffic how many people *want* to look at sites at that resolution rather than just assuming something based on what your AWStats "browser" section tells you. Or hell, you could put up a poll or send out an email to your mailing list asking your surfers if they'd like to see sites built for wider screens. It never hurts to try, or to ask.

Once again, discussed many many times...even very recently as I recall. The consensus is yes, the time does indeed draw near. I'm going through a complete redesign at the moment and really had to decide if I wanted to stay at 800 wide (which I did for now). See, even if only 15% of surfers are still at 800 wide...do you really want to alienate 15% of your customers? Isn't it better to build for the largest customer base possible? Those 1024 wide surfers can still easily see the site, so they're not getting cranky. But, if you widen out the sites...you are indeed taking the risk of making those 800 wide surfers cranky when they have to side scroll. The time is coming though, and I'd suspect we'll be there within the next 12 to 18 months.

Whew...think I may have worn out the 'QUOTE' feature

Look Carrie, it's obvious you put a lot of time and thought into your suggestions...so i tried to respond to them individually. But, something you missed is that each of the link sites is owned by an individual person. Yes, we do try to keep some consistency as a group with the major issues. But, there are always going to be some nuances to each link site...since to some degree, those sites are a direct result of the values, morals (yes, porn slingers have morals) and needs of that specific site owner

[ronnie]

I see so many people worried about privacy. In over 7 years my whois has been public with NO problems. Sure I've gotten some junk mail, mainly domain registrars, but thats it. I know others with their whois public and never heard of any one having problems. I really dont understand people being so worried about it. It's been said "many" times, if your so worried about some one finding out about your adult sites, you should'nt be in this business...

As for sponsor content, what use is more then one picture set of the same scene/girl? I dont see you changing any ones mind about that. Not to mention, if a surfer sees the same thing over and over, will they be likely to stick around the site and look further? Or come back? The biggest problem, SO many dont read the rules and LL owners see so much of the same exact content over and over. There is also the train of thought by some that webmasters who actually buy content, should be more serious and stay around.

ronnie

[ronnie]

Seems I posted the same time as MrYum..

I agree, all of this has been talked about many times, as said, probably why lack of response.

ronnie

[Mr. Blue]

Originally Posted by ronnie

I see so many people worried about privacy. In over 7 years my whois has been public with NO problems. Sure I've gotten some junk mail, mainly domain registrars, but thats it. I know others with their whois public and never heard of any one having problems. I really dont understand people being so worried about it. It's been said "many" times, if your so worried about some one finding out about your adult sites, you should'nt be in this business...

I've had my whois up on my mainstream sites for 10 years and my porn sites for 2 years. The worst that I ever got was a little spam snail mail.

As for this whole post, it kind of falls in the category of LL owners know what their doing and will adapt accordingly as they see fit. If as a submitter you find one or two LL's have egregious rules there's this little bit of magic you can do...you don't submit to them.

[Greenguy]

Originally Posted by Carrie

Well, hopefully the lack of response by LL owners means they're mulling over some of the ideas, lol.

I'd reply, but it might be better to address these issues one at a time - otherwise, there's gonna be 20 huge posts like MrYum's & no one will be able to follow the trend of the thread & it's questions.

I would not be upset if you started 10 different threads covering these questions/problems

[Linkster]

The only thing I can really recommend first - although I guess separate threads would be advantageous - is to do a quick search of the board for previous threads on the same subjects as every one of your points has been discussed in great detail by both submitters and LL owners numerous times here.

To re-emphasize one common answer though, that most LL owners and experienced submitters will always agree on, is that individual sites and submitters always have lots of options and there is always the choice to submit or not.

Trying to change a proven business model would be better accomplished by running ones own business (link list in this case) and trying different approaches until you are happy with your own model. You might find that some assumptions made in the original post are clearly just wrong, but that information would only be available to those that have tried, failed, succeeded and then will build their own biz to continue succeeding.

[tigermom]

Carrie, I started doing FS 3 months ago. Here's my advice to anyone starting FS - join GG&J and read, read, read. Then post some.

Many of the rules you refered to can be quite flexible... you just need to know which ones, how and with which LL. For example, recips don't have to be those 200 pixel wide buttons. I do only customized recips now and have no problem getting accepted anywhere. Same for sponsor content. 80% of my FS are based on sponsor content, and it's usually not even solo girl content. I learnt from this board to avoid certain sponsors that are over exposed, and I browse existing FS in major LL's for a the niche I'm going for to see which sponsors my be "out there" too often. Also, I try to find sponsor content that is either not watermarked, or has a relatively small watermark.

It took me a while to figure out some things, but reading here and asking questions and asking for reviews for my first sites has taught me so much... I now have little problem getting my sites listed everywhere. I just try to work with the rules... rather than get frustrated over them

Nice to see you here btw :waves:!

[Xeno]

There are some good points mentioned along with some replies but I can easily say that changing the business model of how LL's have run their sites for the last 8 years is a difficult task at large...however, I can also say that it's not impossible. I would love to take each point presented as well but then as GG said, it would end up being many replies like MrYum's...lol...I think mine would end up taking a full page length.

I know with 69toplinks, I've done some things slightly different and although I've been extremely busy with web design for the past 6 weeks or so, I am "finally" getting back to updating the complete directory and will address some things -- which I've already known about from before. Don't let it be said I don't listen to the end user or webmaster communities

But to totally revamp the world of LL and link directories, it won't happen over night. There is another part to all this as well....there are the issues that also involves sponsors and how they do their business which also needs some updating...but thats a whole different topic for the future oh...and lets not forget free gallery site makers...again, that can be saved for another topic thread...

[Greenguy]

Not that MrYum did anything wrong, but another 10-12 posts like that would just make this thread one big clusterfuck.

Carrie seems like a late posted as far as my time zone, so maybe I'll wake up tomorrow morning to 10 new threads

[MrYum]

Originally Posted by Greenguy

Not that MrYum did anything wrong, but another 10-12 posts like that would just make this thread one big clusterfuck.

Carrie seems like a late posted as far as my time zone, so maybe I'll wake up tomorrow morning to 10 new threads

Thanks Greenie...didn't think (duh) about the potential for clusterfuckedness when I posted with all the quotes |badidea|

Good to know ya didn't have the big red button warmed up for me though