I've rejected a few sites as I deemed that their quality or design is not up to standard or not professional enough. Sometimes, when I think back, I'm not sure if I was alittle too stringent especially since some of these sites are very new and perhaps needed some time to build up. What do you guys think? I am not talking about crappy sites full of adsense, spam, etc, but rather sites that maybe lack content or had really lousy design. What would you guys have done? Some sharing would be good for everyone to learn
I tend to reject sites for the following reasons: 1. Did not follow directions 2. Bad links 3. No content 4. Re-directs to another site 5. Wrong category If we have time, we tend to correct little things, like number 6, mis-spellings, descriptions, etc..
Very interesting. You will reject sites with no content? How do you define no content? Wrong category - why don't you just change them to the right category instead of rejecting them? Corrections - do you correct it automatically or do you seek permission first? cause they may not like the corrections....
No content as in, Under Construction, ie., there is NO content yet... Default Server Pages, sites that have NOTHING but adsense, ie., landing pages with NO content... Like I said, for the most part, we handle number 6 manually.. I should have clarified.. This is for paid listings.. The ones that do not pay initially get rejected. WE correct manually if it is spelling/grammar, or a messed up URL. You'd be surprised how many people mis-spell their own domain names/sites. If we need input from the submitter, we will contact them. Also, everyone gets a confirmation email when the submission is entered, so if there is something they do not like, all they have to do is email us and we will fix it for them manually, same day!
Depending on the severity of the infraction I'll either... 1) Ban the site/submitter. 2) Delete the entry, with or without an explanation. 3) Delete the entry, give an explanation of why, and invite them to try again when the issue has been been corrected. 4) Make minor corrections, with or without explanations. Of course, there are items which are simply accepted, so no actions are required there.
Some more details below... 1) Yes, once banned, they are banned until they contact me and convince me to change my mind. For example, one or two SEO firms have been submitting low quality sites in the wrong categories every night... so they are banned and I have less deleting to do. 3) Basically, if a site is submitted to the directory and it appears to be quality or approrpiate, but it still has signs of being empty or under construction, I'll invite them to add it back later. I understand what it is like to be starting out and want some promotion, but I've got to consider the user experience and get quality sites only. 4) If I move them to the right category, I often tell them, so they don't go looking and think they were deleted/rejected. I'm sure I could do better with respect to communicating, but there is a limit to how much crap entries you can manage every day and still retain the patience needed to hold everyones hand. Anyway, I think you are over thinking things a little bit. Just imagine you were on the other end and keep people informed to the degree you yourself would like, keeping in mind there will be time constraints. Then, automate as much as possible...
Often you will get borderline submissions, that are not quite good enough to list, but nearly there. What I sometimes do is put a note next to the submission, and check back in a month. If there's no new content in that time, no changes to the design, or whatever else it is that was a problem, then it gets rejected. I do this less and less often. What you will find with practice is that the borderline sites are also the ones least likely to get any kind of updates, and most of the time your first impression was the right one.
this is an interesting practice. unfortunately, think many of our directories guarantee a review within 2 days or less. So cannot really give it a month. Besides, think most submitters will not be too happy to see their $$$ spent with no results..... but i agree with you on the initial impression part
We reject most sites under 10 pages and Blogs less than 6 months old. The reasoning is that most of very small sites are doorway pages, or disposable sites created for spam. Of course we do make exceptions for "Mom and Pop" sites that are just getting their first sites. For blogs there should be a minimum number of posts on a regular basis. Even at 1 a week there should be 24 posts. Many people start free blogs and abandon them it is just not worth the effort. If you look at a site and it just does not "feel" right then you are better off rejecting them. There are billions of sites out there ... and you can't list them all.
I tend to reject those sites which are not submitted to right categories and if those sites have jonly about 5 pages there is no harm in rejecting them
how abt a site that say, sells domain subscription services with only 1-2 pages in the site? basically, it allows users to search for domain names, and purchase them if desired..... would u accept it?
I've rejected a lot of sites for keyword stuffing. I even placed some tips in the auto-mail as keyword stuffing was obviously such a huge problem and many of the sites were ok otherwise. The site owner may not always know what description/title is being used if they're hiring a third party to do the submissions. Sometimes, if a site is very good, I'll take the time to correct some spelling/grammar errors or keyword stuffing in the title/description, and place them in the correct category (even make one for them) but I don't do it for every site as I'm not making money from it. If a service has only a few pages I research it a bit before deciding if it's reputable or a scam. In the case of some "domain sellers" I just looked for a sedo link (plus the general lack of text and just a list of domains showed a lack of professionalism). I found a few submissions were pretending to be other companies such as major Chinese manufacturers.
I reject crap sites or spamy submissions ..... I look at the site if it's doesn't look as a crap r full wit adsense and with content it's accepted
I'm also leaning towards having minimum page numbers, post counts, and so on. If a forum doesn't have at least X amount of members, with X posts between them, then I reject it. I expect less in the way of content from an ecommerce site than a pure content one, but there's still a number I have in mind as an absolute minimum. I'm not going to say what those numbers are on a public forum, because I think it encourages people to create a lot of sites that are just good enough to get in most directories if there's seen to be some sort of consensus on this matter.
I agree ... there are other factors that I will not make public ... and of course there are exceptions to the rules. But forums are another one of those tricky ones. I like to see at least 100-150 posts by a number of different people. It often depends on how popular the topic. It is funny how the eye can detect spam without actually pointing a finger at a something specific ... but then again, after looking at several thousand sites you develop a routine for quick evaluations. If there is any doubt I lean toward rejection ... Its not like it is the end of the world ... they will find more directories ... and I will get more submissions!
so in my example above on the domain name purchase site, wld u reject it? say it does not have any adsense....
Personally I would need to investigate further ... I don't usually accept doorway pages, or affiliates. It is highly unlikely this is site would be taken seriously, domain names are a very competitive field. Without seeing the site sounds like a throw away doorway page --- I probably would reject it.