Approval Discrepancy

I just redid my ads and had something interesting happen. Of the four ads one was denied approval with this notice "Avoid characters used only to grab attention (for example starting or ending ads with *, !, |, etc.)" The ads are formatted much like the link you see in my signature using the @ symbol. All four of them have it, but only one was denied. There are no other symbols in there. My concern is I'm not sure if catching that one ad was the mistake, or if not catching the other three was the mistake. The use of the @ symbol isn't to grab attention, it's more to keep the length down while still making sense.

If someone would clarify this I'd appreciate it. If the ads are too long, or if that symbol has to go that's fine, I'll make whatever changes are necessary. Thanks.

 

Please re-submit all ads without the @ symbol.

Write "at" if you want to.

Several people review ads, so one picked it up, the other reviewer/s missed it.

 

Fair enough. I'll take care of it right now.

 

I think you should concentrate your anchor text on keywords that people will really search, not your URL. If you do that you will be diluting the keyword value to the other words.

 

I agree to a point, but there is also something else to consider: clicks. I've learned that with the keyphrase "Online Shopping" there's some real tough competition out there. For whatever reason that keyphrase is the biggest by a long shot, especially if you factor in the solo "Shopping" keyword. If you go to google and put in that key phrase, you'll get more results than you know what to do with. Most of them prominently display the words "Online Shopping" prominently, and not much else. I've found it effective to try to set myself apart in that sea of closely matching links. Trust me, it works. Besides, the name of my store is unique and people tend to remember it. That's hard to do if they don't see it!

 

I suggest you try to compete on some less compedative terms as well. You could pick 20 products or categories out and use the coop to promote them.

e.g. the competition for "Cargo Pants" is probably weaker. And if I was going to buy cargo pants online, that's what I would search for, not one of millions of online shopping sites that may or may not stock them. Even if I had purchased a product from you before, I would want to do a straight product search on google first to have a look at what is out there before I thought, hey, maybe that place where I got a pink handbag sells cargo pants too.

 

So; how many people know you as marilen? Truly?
How many more people never heard of marilen and would never even think about typing in marilen? Never heard of marilen?

If *I* can do well for a tough area; you can. Don't sell yourself short.

And; even without your domain name in the title; it will still come up in a search