Time to get out of Hubpages?

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Gaizyposted 11 years ago
Having been with Hubpages for getting on two years now, and having penned 83 Hubs, I think it's time I threw the towel in. Over that time, I conscientiously stuck to all the rules and guidelines, and was rewarded by views gradually rising to around 350 per day with earnings around $25 per month. I thought this has some promise - It could indeed become a worthwhile source of income in time. Then for no apparent reason my views dropped overnight from 350 to barely 30 and my earnings this month so far are a little over $4. I thought at first this was just a blip, but it's been going on for weeks now, and is beginning to look permanent. So I think it's time to wave Hubpages goodbye. I can't see me investing another two years of sweat just to increase my earnings to $8. I'll let the Hubs lie fallow and see what happens, but unless it's something worthwhile, this will probably be the last thing I write for HP. Bye all.
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  Healthy Pursuitsposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I'm sorry to hear that, Gaizy - both that you've been hit and that you're leaving.
  
  Through several Google updates, I wasn't affected. However, in spite of putting a lot of effort into writing well and into formatting and following HP instructions, I was hit once by an update in mid-September. I had mostly recovered from that, but see that once again I've been hit.
  
  However, I don't know that moving to another site will do any good. I think Google is changing its tactics to make Google more money, and anyone who doesn't have a lot of it to give may just be left in the dust.
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  Gaizyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I wasn' t thinking of moving to another site, just stopping. At the moment, it just seems like a lot of work for nothing.
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  Shinkickerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I share your feeling Gaizy. I've written over 300 Hubs in 3 years and although my earnings have slowly risen they are nowhere near enough for the time and effort. So I've pulled back and don't write as often now.
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  CWanamakerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I think that this happens to everyone at one point or another. For me, there was a time where for 6 weeks I got hardly any views (around 100 per day compared to 400 per day previously). I stuck it out and one day my viewership came back. They came back suddenly and higher than before. Now my traffic is around 550 to 600 per day. This is just part of the ups and downs of Google and the Internet. I wouldn't recommend giving up just yet.
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  Blue Petal Mediaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  How do you get your views up to even 100 per day. I'm just getting in gear but would hate to be wasting my time. Any advice from those who've been doing this for some time? 100 seems like a good starting goal for me.
  Thanks
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  You can get them up to 100 by posting them anywhere but Hubpages, lol!
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  Blue Petal Mediaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Well, I guess I will just test my blogging chops here and then move on if it doesn't pick up. People have mentioned Squiddo and Wizzley... and I guess Google??? I'll look into all of these. Does anyone have advice on who pays well? Do people have an expectation that they can actually make a living blogging. What does it take to make $30,000 on Hub Pages? LOL! Is that even possible? I'm not sure that I've started with that in mind, but the knowledge that it is/isn't possible will be helpful. I will say one thing as a rebooted newbie... other sites look better than Hub Pages. After working on a post it is sad to see what the layout/ads look like. Maybe readers are discovering more visually appealing platforms (Squiddo, etc.) and abandoning ship (much like the bloggers seem to be)...
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  Bard of Elyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I don't know what it would take to make $30,000 here but I can make $30 in a month now which is pitiful when compared with what I was getting last year, although that was never more than $150 for a month.
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  Blue Petal Mediaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Thanks everyone, this is really helpful. Now I have some realistic goals to set! LOL!
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  Bard of Elyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I am glad to have been of some help, and by the way, as I said earlier today to Sparkster in agreement, HubPages is still the best site for making money online for me! You can imagine what my results are like elsewhere!
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Let's put this in perspective. You have 83 articles. If you'd sold those (e.g. on Constant Content) you would've been paid around $30 each, or $250. What have they earned you, in total, on HubPages so far? If you assume they go on earning only $4 per month, you'll get another $100 or so in the next two years. What's so bad about that?
  
  If you're thinking it's not a worthwhile return on investment - how long did it take you to write the articles? Remember, socialising in the forums, following, reading and commenting on other Hubs have nothing to do with earning income, they're just for fun: so you can't count that time in your equation. Just the time they took to write and revise, and any off-HubPages promotional efforts.
  
  On another note - I notice your titles often repeat the same words. Google's new algorithm hates that - it takes it as a sign of a spammer. That may be part of the reason for your loss of traffic. It wouldn't hurt to change your titles to remove repetition and see if that helps.
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  Ciaxposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Did you ever learn mathematics, Marisha Wright?
  
  1) HubPages (83 articles, $25 per month, 18 months) = $450
  
  2) Constant Content (83 articles, sold each article for $30) = $2490
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  jezebellaminaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  LOL! I think she meant going forward, earning $4 a month with no more work will earn another $100 or so by just letting them sit for a couple of years.
  
  Your math seems compelling at first glance, Ciax, but realistically:
  
  The problem with Constant Content is you can't assume you'll sell 100% of your articles, and they take SO much more work because they have to be flawless to be approved, (and you can't assume 100% of your submissions will be approved, even after reworking them). Then, for those that are approved, if they sit there for a few months waiting to be purchased, they're guaranteed to not be making anything during that time and they can't be published elsewhere. If you sell them all outright for full rights, congratulations! But then you have to produce another 83 articles to make another $2,490.
  
  Of course with HP, there's no guarantee that you'll get views either, but it is nice to think that my very first hub still has earning potential in 10 years, assuming HP is still going strong. That's why I wanted to start writing here - for the long term earning potential of a little hard work now.
  
  I agree that there are times when it doesn't seem worth it at all to put in so much work for so little return, but I try to keep in mind that the reason I started writing here wasn't to "get rich quick"...it was to get rich slowly I think of each hub as an investment that will grow over time. It may be pennies a day, but it's better to have those pennies slowly piling up than not at all. I'm not the kind of person to throw away a penny!
  
  Writing for HubPages isn't for everyone! But generally speaking it's a good idea to diversify and write for a few different venues. That way you can find the one that gives you the best results for your body of work. It's going to be different for everyone because there are so many factors in addition to the Google roller coaster that determine one's success.
  
  Gaizy, I would suggest taking a break from HubPages for now. Get started on another site like Squidoo and learn the ropes. If you like it and feel like your HP work would do better there, unpublish them here a few at a time and make sure you allow them ample time to be completely out of Google's cache - several weeks even - while you continue to write new material at the other site. When you are certain there's no sign of the unpublished hubs in Google's cache, publish them on the new site and let them grow!
  
  In the meantime, you may find that your HubPages traffic comes back. If not, you'll have an escape plan if you want it!
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  Ciaxposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I pointed out someone's error in doing a simple mathematical calculation. I didn't invent my personal explanation to twist facts. And there is surely difference between drinking water from a glass, and drinking water from a dropper (one drop a month).
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  jezebellaminaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I was only trying to add that (in my opinion) comparing HubPages to Constant Content isn't necessarily as straightforward as a mathematical calculation.
  
  Yes there is a HUGE difference - the point you state about drinking water from a glass and drinking water from a dropper is an excellent analogy, and actually the very point I was trying to make regarding how income from the 2 sites is so different. Very well said!
  
  If someone has the time to wait for the long term ROI from HubPages, it has potential to amass to more than one glass of water per article, but you get only a drop at a time. With CC, you exchange 1 article for 1 glass of water and that's it.
  
  For the writer who doesn't have another source of drinking water, HubPages is probably not the best basket for all the proverbial eggs. With CC, you have to work harder to get that full glass of water, but you may not even get a single drop for all your hard work. Since no source is guaranteed to provide a steady flow of water, it is best to diversify.
  
  They both have risks and rewards but aren't exactly an even comparison. I'm sorry you didn't find that my opinion added any value to this thread. Perhaps others will.
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  Ciaxposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Sorry if my wording was harsh. I understand that you are comparing the two sites. But it doesn't work in the end.
  
  Try it by telling people to work for $4 per month for 10 years, versus telling them to work for $2490 every six month (I am just assuming that it takes Gaizy 6 months to write 83 articles).
  
  I am not sure which one is more creative as well.
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  psycheskinnerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  The rational person will spend the majority of their time on the richest option. But the specific example given is rife with assumptions that would not apply to many people.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  OK, I know I made a stupid mistake. But the point is valid. How long do you really think Gaizy took to write 83 articles? Maybe he did it over a period of 6 months, but he didn't take 6 months to write them.
  
  Let's say he's a very slow writer and it took him half a day to write each one. So, 42 days. Now say those articles are going to earn $4 per month, without him having to lift a finger again. So he's not working or $4 a month, he's sitting back and being given $4 for doing nothing. That's the whole point of writing for passive income.
  
  The analogy of drinking water from a glass and drinking water from a dropper is great, but perhaps it's better to think of filling a glass from a flowing tap or from a dripping one: with the former, you'll fill the glass, turn the tap off and that's it; with the latter, the glass will still fill up eventually, but then it will overflow and go on overflowing.
  
  Over the last five years I've written around 160 articles here. In that time, they've earned me around $7,000. That's a lot more than they would've made if I'd sold them, even assuming I could've sold every single one at top price (which is unlikely). In that time I've made the odd tweak and update, but I don't pay much attention to my Hubs as a rule, so I think it's a good return for not much work.
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  Ciaxposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Not sure how long it will take Gaizy to fill his glass with the '$4 per month' equation.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  You're still missing the point. He doesn't have to fill it - it will fill all on its own, without his input (other than the occasional check to ensure his Hubs haven't idled). $4 for doing actual work is a pittance: $4 for doing nothing is pretty good, IMO.
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  Ciaxposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  If Gaizy gets $4 per month from HubPages, then it will fill all on its own, and after 622 months (that is 51 years) the total sum will be $2490.
  
  I guess Gaizy can wait for 51 years.
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  glockrposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Don't scoff at $4... in Reno that gets you three 24 oz. cans of Steel Reserve. Not a lot but enough to help stay relaxed for 3 days:) Oh, and I think it's a horrible idea to quit Hubpages just because traffic is down. I make far more money on Squidoo than I do on Hubpages and my traffic, LR, earnings, etc are way down over there too. I don't care, I do it for fun. If I was in it for the money I'd get a second job instead. More money but a lot less fun...
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  Ciaxposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Good to hear that you are rich enough to spend time on HubPages just for fun.
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  dannycarreyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I would like to know the opinion of HP people. What do they do to bring the traffic back. There's a lot of questions posted on forums about it and I didn't see any answer from the HP officials. Maybe at least some words of encouragement or be straight with us and tell us something like"ok the golden age is gone and you need to put some more work to get back where you were". Anything would be great!
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  glockrposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  The only real way to get traffic is to get the search engines to like you. That takes a lot of work. You could also cheat (google 'proxy traffic'). I'm not advocating that... you can see by my hub ranks I'm not getting much traffic by cheating or otherwise:)
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  BongSantosposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I understand what you're saying, and I can only sympathize with your plight. Yes, it can be frustrating, and surrender may be the only option to stop the bleeding.
  I'm here because I want to share my experiences and thoughts. If truth be told, making money has never been in my agenda. It will be nice though if I can make some money.
  I'm staying because the people I meet here are so incredibly good I cannot believe the likes of them exist. The friends I find here are my rewards. I couldn't ask more.
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  tommenposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Hi Gaizy! Sorry to hear that! I understand that you are disappointed and understand if you decide to throw in the towel.I have been a HP member for 4 years and only recently started to earn because I have learned how to do keyword research.Please, don´t quit - Keep going! It will pay!
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  2besureposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  By the way, I love your writing, you are good, real good. Good does not always equate with earnings. I suggest looking at the ads your articles produce. If there are no ads that relates to that hub, when people come to a hub, they are usually interested in, but if there are no ads related to that subject, they will not click. Maybe you should consider writing more mainstream subjects that will increase earnings.
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  gmwilliamsposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Totally concur, it seems that the hubs that have the most revenue are cooking/recipe hubs and computer/internet/technology hubs.
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Gaizy, Like you, I can't afford to "write for fun". Here's what I'm doing and it might work for you. Look at your hubs as your biggest visual aid for teaching. Here in the US we have vibrant community ed programs. I just decided to create a one-night 2 hour course in teaching parents and teachers how to use our software. From a glance at your hubs, you seem to be "an expert" in paranormal type interests. Brand yourself as that and you have a whole curriculum based on your writings on hubpages. Your curriculum is almost already designed. If you do take your articles off, you might want to think about ebooks/apps. The information I have on publishing children's ebooks applies to general ebook publication as well. If hubpages took off that "overly promotional" caveat, think of how dynamic that would be! Thank you for your question. It needed to be asked and the comments of so many people has greatly benefited ALL of us, including the hubpages executives as well, I would presume
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Dame Scribeposted 11 years ago
Wow, Gaizy I wouldn't recommend abandoning ship. Google is making changes and HP made some at the same time and tossed us around like a salad, yeah. I would suggest keeping at least, your current Hubs and maybe pick up writing at another site, to bulk up your adsense. Always good to diversify our portfolio
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  Gaizyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Thanks for the suggestions, but I seriously doubt that there is any worthwhile money to be made (for me) writing on the internet. It seems to be a long haul for little reward.
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  CWanamakerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Writing is indeed a lot of work and the payoff is usually small. However, as many great writers on HP have said, it just takes one good (and lucky) hub to change everything. You never really know what will take off. I wrote a hub about Edgar Allan Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado" expecting it to be hardly read. However, this couldn't be further from the truth as this one garners 6-8% of my daily views.
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  molometerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I have to agree with CWanamaker. It is almost impossible to know what hub will take off and start making you some money. Even with the best SEO tricks in the world. We can never truly anticipate what the search engines will do, as we are always basing or keyword research on 'past' searches.
  I have one hub that consistently gets 100 plus hits per day.(600+ daily at it's peak) It is titled. 'this site has insecure content' It is about the problems with Google chrome identifying insecure content on webpages.
  I wrote it as I had a problem with these same issues on one of my non hubpages websites. I had no idea that anyone else would be interested in it. I just put it out there for others with the same issues. So far it has had 24, 435 pageviews and yet the hubpages stats tell me that it only scores 1 star as economically unviable? What is with that.
  Obviously many people like reading it but according to the hubpages stats it is virtually worthless?
  I like others have mentioned here, am not on hubpages primarily 'for the money''. I could make more cash on webanswers for a lot less effort.
  I like many here are interested in writing and learning how to become better writers.
  I am not going to refuse the cash if offered but I would suggest if you want to make money. Find a real world job as the virtual world just doesn't do it for 99% of the people that try to make it work.
  I have also tried many of the sites mentioned here, Squidoo etc. They are all just the same in terms of earning potential.. Pointless.
  i know it is a hard thing to hear but real world jobs will always pay more money.
  I wouldn't take your hubs down just yet. See if they can be tweaked a bit. Don't be disheartened, view it as a learning exercise which may pay off in other aspects of your working life.
  As far as making money, we would be making more in a taiwanese trainer factory. Chin up.
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  pythian2posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I can relate. I've been with hubpages since May this year and written around 20 hubs, my earnings are less than $2 total.
  
  Rather than throwing in the towel I view hubpages as avwriting community.
  
  Set up your own blog(s) with affiliate marketing and Adsense - it's still a long haul to make a worth while return, but remain on hub pages to participate in the community.
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  Bard of Elyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Sadly this has been my experience too! I seem to do a tremendous amount of work for very little reward. However, I am keeping a lot of my hubs but have also moved a lot more to Wizzley.
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fpherj48posted 11 years ago
Hello and Good bye......I'm sorry I never met you. I have read all of the comments and concerns and feel badly for all the writers who have invested so much time and talent and hope, only to be disappointed.......I wish you much luck and hope that perhaps one day you will want to return...Take care....Peace!
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secularist10posted 11 years ago
There's several things at work here.

For one, we are all basically working for Google. Google is a private company and can change everything on a whim, making or breaking thousands of online writers at a time. It's a quite unstable and unreliable source of income when you think about it.

Sure, Google theoretically wants to deliver valuable content to their users, but that's irrelevant. How many times have we all searched Google for hours only to end frustrated, still lacking the information we were looking for?

The same principles apply with other ad networks that Hub Pages uses, although HP does normalize the returns to a degree it seems.

Secondly, we are relying on traffic from searchers. Google Trends shows that search traffic can change on a dime. It's also extremely volatile. Today, people are searching for prescription drugs. Tomorrow, they're searching for vacation ideas in Europe. The total volume of searches also changes massively over time.

Thirdly, we are relying on advertisers. Again, volatile and unreliable. Advertisers will bid what they will bid. It could be $1 per click, it could be $50, or it could be $300. Like any market, it could change on a dime. There is not any inherent rhyme or reason to it.

A theme or topic that is popular with searchers may not be profitable (and therefore popular) for advertisers, and a topic that is lucrative for advertisers may not be popular among searchers.

Finally, Gaizy, I see that almost half of your hubs are in the Religion and Philosophy category. As someone who writes a lot on those topics myself, I can tell you that it is not the most lucrative category.
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Squidoo traffic has surged - HP has plunged! So it is only partially due to the Google dance.
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  Dale Hydeposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  It is amazing how many HP puppets continue to point the finger at Google. Why, oh why, are other sites not showing the plunge? Come on people, it is as plain as day.
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  secularist10posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  There is no puppetry here. I didn't say HP was off the hook. But hell, Google is a tad more powerful than HP don't you think?
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Huntgoddessposted 11 years ago
Well, that's kind of sad. Sorry :-((

I never expected to make $$ --- and I haven't been disappointed! I guess it just depends on what you're looking for.
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ptosisposted 11 years ago
Should I go to Squidoo? More money there? Where's the money at?
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  You can try it - they have a weird payment system, which may mean it could take a while to get established. Check it out I guess.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Squidoo are just wierd. I have not yet got my mind round how they work.
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  Huntgoddessposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Yes, I did not like them either. They make no sense at all.
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  Sarra Garrettposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I've gone to Squidoo last week and I have a lot more traffic.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I am concerned with earnings not traffic.
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  Joseph041167posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  LOL!! Jimi Hendrix once wrote a song about "cross town traffic." LOL!! "I am concerned with earnings not traffic." LOL!!!
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Views that do not produce earnings are worthless.
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  sparksterposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Self promotion?
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prospectboyposted 11 years ago
I've noticed a drop in my views as well. I thought I was doing something getting around 100-150 daily, but I was wrong seeing that some of you was or is still doing 500 or more. I'm averaging around 60 views daily now. I'm going to stick it out with Hubpages. I never figured to make a lot of money on here, just viewed it as a hobby that I can earn spare money from. Good luck to you in whatever you decided to do.
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Wesley Meachamposted 11 years ago
Personally I would not completely abandon hubpages but I'm not sure that this is what you meant.

If you're going to take a break from writing it may be a good idea. However, don't delete anything. Leave it there. It may well recover.

I was reading an article on squidoo just now. I've an account there but I've yet to write anything there. The article I was reading compared the two sites in terms of how Google's Panda update effected them. Something I learned from this is that Squidoo actually went through before what HP seems to be going through now. In 2007 Squidoo got hit bad by Google but they implimented several changes and recovered. During the recent updates they had a few bumps but were not effected to the same degree as HP. The speculation about this is mostly that their previous experience prepaired them for the Panda updates.

I don't know if that is true or merely speculation but judging from the comments I've seen in the forums here I'm inclined to believe it.

I am NOT suggesting that you move to Squidoo, although that certainly is an option. I'm just saying wait it out and things may improve a bit.
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mperrottetposted 11 years ago
Sorry to see you decide to stop writing for HubPages. I checked out your work, and find it fascinating and so well written. I'm going to continue reading through what you've already written, and hope that you decide to write some more.
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BobbiRantposted 11 years ago
I hope you stay and write anyway. HP execs, like ALL other writing sites, are making money for themselves, rest assured of that fact. But writing here is mostly for fun and the great people I have met. If for money, well ya think HP cares? Nope! But creating your own web site is much more profitable and I don't always feel the need to contribute to this HP Empire either. I hope you will still write here and I do understand your frustration. HP is simply trying to be eHow, not working though!
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WhatTheHubposted 11 years ago
I actually took a break from HP for a while, and now trying to take a stab at it again. The one thing I am impressed about THIS revenue making site, compared to others, is that it has a sense of community. You feel like you'r making friends on this site.

There's some interactivity that keeps me motivated and coming back, and lay out of the site makes it easy to follow.
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2uesdayposted 11 years ago
Sounds like the time has come to look for new baskets to put eggs in; while leaving the ones here to see how they progress; which is probably a well thought out plan.
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Dolores Monetposted 11 years ago
I have been bounced around on here quite a bit and every time traffic slows, I become upset. Then, traffic creeps up again. In order to be successful with any online writing, you have to offer what people want to read. My sister once said - oh wow, you can just write about whatever you want, about what you think, etc. Nobody cares what I think.

When I google a subject, I am looking for information on a specific topic. The people who are very successful here have chosen topics that draw traffic. They offer well written concise info. (I am certainly not criticizing your work, I've never read it).
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Joseph041167posted 11 years ago
Please keep us posted on all of the developments. I am following this forum and learning from it. I would like to know if your sales and viewership picks back up, and how you do on these other sites that you switch and deversify to.
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AlexK2009posted 11 years ago
I have been wondering the same thing. I write on other sites but it feels like time to put HP on a back burner for a while and try something with my own website.

As people say, we are making money for Google and HP and while their interests and ours overlap, they definitely do not coincide and neither cann afford to really care about us unless we leave in droves.

It is a great place to write but unless it becomes a kind of informal Wkipiedia it will always tend to be a nickel and dime place for most of us. That is just inevitable statistics. Some will always make a lot.
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dhannyyaposted 11 years ago
Gaizy,

If you have experienced such a drop in traffic I think your hubs may be copied and put somewhere. I was affected in April penguin update and my traffic fell to almost zero. Later when I checked my hubs for plagiarism I found that one of my hubs is copied and put in some sites. When I unpublished that hub my traffic improved within an hour.
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  Huntgoddessposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  How do you check for plagiarism?
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  First of all if a hub has been copied and the genuine author chooses to unpublish their (original) version they are making a mistake. What they should be doing is filing a DMCA, and/or reporting this to Google if the site uses Adsense (although if the original author is feeling generous they could try contacting the plagiariser to demand they take it down, or if it is on a site that is also a content farm e.g. Squidoo, ehow, Xomba etc, they can contact the owners of the site and provide proof the article was first published by them elsewhere and ask them to make sure it is taken down.) Unpublishing your own original article simply allows the plagiariser more power, and effectively you have then 'given' your article to them as they now get all the traffic and you get none.
  
  To check if your article has been copied use the cut and paste feature to paste a few sentences of the text from your article into the Google search box. If it has been copied you will get search results for sites other than the one you have it published on. This now tells you which sites to go to in order to demand your article is immediately removed. Try a few different groups of sentences from the article before you relax, as sometimes the thief will reword certain sections slightly, or only copy a part of your article. Some use spinning software to reword the article as well.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I agree with misty. I plan on taking aggressive legal action towards anyone who Plagiarises the content on my website for instance. Not filing a DMCA notice, you are effectively telling people its ok to steal your content.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  exactly !
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  molometerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  There is also the issue of 'Google'. It is quick enough to tell us that we have duplicate content. Why then does it not see when someone has stolen our work?
  Seems to me that we have to protect ourselves as Misty has stated. Nail those sites that steal entire groups of hubs. How come Google doesn't spot this glaring error? What's up with that.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I suspect the problem is that Google actually don't mind duplicate content (providing it is not duplicated on the same website.) The duplicate content problem is one that content farms such as HP and Wizzley etc have an issue with because they want the traffic to that article to be exclusively theirs and not diluted by the articles being live on multiple sites. This is why it isn't actually Google that do anything about duplicate content and only act if you put in a complaint that you have found work of yours copied on another site, and then prove you own the content and published it first. You will notice it is always the website you write on that will tell you your work is a duplicate (not Google) and then leave you to resolve the problem through either Google or the website the copied content appears on.
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  molometerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Hi Cindy,
  
  It does seem rather odd that a few months ago the entire hubpages site was 'stolen' and put up somewhere else.
  Google as well as any other search engine know's exactly where content originates, as each URL is unique and is date and country stamped. Amongst many other indicators.
  
  If our stolen content is being used by another site. The winner is Google, as they do not have to pay you any revenue, even though your content is being viewed on another site.
  
  The thief site, may monetize our content in other ways or may have their own adsense account.
  The bottom line is that Google is still serving ads on our stolen content and they know it. They are still charging for ad placement.
  
  I am sure that Google could get all over this problem if they wanted too. I assume that it is such a minor issue that they haven't put any resources into it.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  From what I recall it turned out that the site was not a copy of HP and all its articles, but was a site that effectively shows the entire HP site, but with its own header etc added on. It was still HP we were seeing though, therefore the ads etc were still attributed to us, (I know there is a correct term for this type of site and it does not negatively affect us on HP in any way, but I need to check out the techie term for such a site). Bascially it was nothing to worry about. At the time everyone here panicked until the experts stepped in an explained it was no big deal and we were merely seeing HP through a different site and we were not personally losing anything because of it.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I have checked out the correct term for this with people who know far more than I do, and apparently those kind of sites are called 'Proxy Servers' or 'Proxy Browsers'. You are still viewing HP, so lose nothing and should not panic about it, in other words the site has NOT been completely stolen along with your earning potential. A very useful link on this is:
  
  http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/97314?p … ost2077611
  
  A quote from the thread in question that helps:
  
  "A proxy server is a website that lets you browse under a different IP address. The site that Barbara K found is not a site that scrapes content or anything like that. You can type any url into the search bar and it will take you to that webpage, for example, HubPages. The webpage you see on the screen is indeed hubpages, but the url in the address bar shows some weird encoding provided by the proxy server. It is completely harmless as Jason has said."
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  emilgen2011posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Copyscape...
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Rain Defenceposted 11 years ago
Why didn't you get that article taken off the other site rather then unpublish your own?
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  dhannyyaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  that hub was on a social issue. it was copied and put in several social networking sites and essay sites. I tried to contact those essay sites. they told they will remove..but google did not deindex it soon..moreover I found it difficult to contact several websites and facebook profiles for copying my content. though it was a hub with several views (before the hit) i decided to abandon it..and it solved my issues
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  DreamerMegposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Wikipedia copied the information from one of my sites and published it as their own! I wrote and complained and never even got the courtesy of a response from them. I changed my own text (it was about a local area) and later, they changed their text SLIGHTLY but there are still whole phrases in there that they copied directly from me. What really annoyed me was that their page came ahead of mine for searches for the local area. So I worked hard and got my amended page beating Wikipedia's results most of the time! EVIL GRIN.
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charliegrumplesposted 11 years ago
I haven't written here for a while and can't see me doing in the near future. I'll leave what Hubs I have but won't be doing anything else with them. Whilst I think there is certainly room for improvement with HPs responses, the main reason most of us have plumetted is Google. There seems little doubt now that getting a good ranking on google largely depends on paying for it with ever increasing chunks of their pages being used for paid ads.

I suspect that there will be a swing to Bing perhaps although that may take time. The general opinion on SEO blogs is that creating a site with lots of good quality articles at regular intervals is the way to go but I think the days of big bucks are truly over as far as adsense goes.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  If you have enough pages Adsense will make big money but remember you are at the end of the food chain and only get the crumbs,
  
  When I say enough pages I suspect I mean THOUSANDS.
  
  I think I am likely to retain Hub pages but only where I need their special features and cannot find them on another revenue sharing site. For a little while as an experiment I will be focussing on Triond and experts column.
  
  My Technical articles may remain here as the aim is to showcase my skills to clients not get money directly
  
  Hubpages is a great place but
  
  1) Earnings are pending too often.
  2) HP depends too much on Google traffic
  3) HP seems a little old fashioned and nanny link in some ways
  4) The system is not always reliable: Some of my hubs show broken links that are not broken, and this makes me distrust the rest of the system
  
  I think I will start experimenting with other places more.
  
  Pity, I was just getting used to HP
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  1) Earnings are pending too often.
  2) HP depends too much on Google traffic - That could change, they might find other means (actually, I thought they had Ebay and Amazon, not sure).
  
  3) HP seems a little old fashioned and nanny link in some ways (not sure what this even means)
  
  4) The system is not always reliable: Some of my hubs show broken links that are not broken, and this makes me distrust the rest of the system. Such is life, there will be bugs.
  
  But, it's always kind of good to spread things about a bit.
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ftclickposted 11 years ago
Sorry to see you go and understand the ROI thing. I have also let some domains go due to G00gle. Nobody here should depend entirely on Google for their traffic. They need a list of people to update, videos, and social media to keep that traffic constant and NOT rely on search "advertisement" engine
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Wait a min, you let your DOMAINS go, due to Google? Hm, wondering if you're better sticking to these revenue making sites, that way you're not paying monthly into a hosting service?
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Google is doing what is best for Google. Without content providers like us they would have nowhere to put their ads but if someone disables adsense then "there are plenty more where they came from"
  
  I have a feeling Google will probably survive but become much less dependent on advertising. That will affect us all here, especially if one day they get out of advertising entirely.
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  No one ever talks about Bing (which I see advertised a lot on TV), think they'll be the next "Google" when it comes to article writing? We can start using their "adsense" type ads?
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  No idea whether Bing will take over Google but I see more traffic from Bing recently.
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  Greekgeekposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Bing is Microsoft's old search engine, so it's not new, but they keep rejiggering and improving it trying to take a bite out of Google's market share.
  
  There's never much information on how to optimize for Bing. I've seen studies from a few years ago saying they give more weight to keywords in the title and near the top of the page, and may actually care about keywords in the summary, unlike Google, but like I said that was from a few years ago.
  
  Bing (or Microsoft) does have its own advertising unit, but since Google ads are all over the net, I expect Google has more advertisers signed on who are willing to pay more for ads -- which means mor monry to sites willing to display those ads. However, Hubpages does make money from other advertisers than Google, I think. Some HubAds appear to be non-Google ads.
  
  Unfortunately, on Hubpages, our problem isn't which advertising company is paying us, but how much traffic is coming to our pages to see those ads. So we come back to our Achilles' heel: search traffic.
  
  As long as Google is the search engine of choice for most web users, we're stuck depending on Google for search traffic. The only other alternatives we can try are to get much, much better at creating content of the kind loved and shared by social media. Or, of course, find alternate platforms where we earn more, whether that's other article publishing platforms, our own blogs and websites, print on demand sites like Zazzle and Cafepress, or -- here comes Google again -- creating Youtube videos.
  
  That's not an idle suggestion, by the way. A few silly cat videos and educational videos I made some years ago to complement some articles where I embedded them are now earning more in Adsense than the articles themselves are earning.
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Pearldiverposted 11 years ago
I'm finding it really hard to get any traffic to my Lance Armstrong hubs lately!
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  quicksandposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  And me, to my Neil Armstrong hubs!
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  emilgen2011posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Sorry to hear that my friend... this is (generalhowitzer, hehehe)... I hope it is okay to say this though, "success has many fathers, failures are orphans... But I hope you have other hubs to keep you going well...
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  Joseph041167posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  "like" button goes here.
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  Joseph041167posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  no, I meant up there by the Lance Armstrong and the Neil Armstrong comments put out by Pearldiver and Quicksand. it was funny. we have no like button here, so we have to actually comment. takes up too much time.
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tinamariemillerposted 11 years ago
I write for fun. The money is just a perk.
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  Gaizyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  That's great if you have the time and income to do it just for fun but for some of us every penny we earn online is needed just to make ends meet. I don't have the luxury of being able to spend time on something that is not contributing to my financial survival.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I know the feeling but i recommend you devote say 10% of your time to writing and publishing stuff you care about and enjoy writing about.
  
  Incidentally I find that less than half the time I spend on HP involves publishing new stuff while the rest is interaction with others and altering Hubs to make them more visible outside HP
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jacharlessposted 11 years ago
Please Don't Go...
remake: KWS | original: KC & the Sunshine Band
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flash167posted 11 years ago
I like to think of writing hubs as a hobby. It gives me a great place to share the things that I am interested in and sometimes get to meet others that have the same interest. If I make a little spending money while I'm at it, that's all the better!
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Dame Scribeposted 11 years ago
I don't think HP is meant to be used as a source of f/t income it's more of 'supplemental' income even if in the past, people were making a f/t living with proper use of all available tools, writing, amazon, ebay and kontera at the time. We just have to 'adapt' and change our perspective over all. A f/t income can be earned with 'spreading' out and writing then becomes a f/t job which is what writers do anyways , but least, a income is being generated. I have several projects going on so I don't look at HP as my only source of income.
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  kathleenkatposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I went into HubPages never expecint to make money. It's a great online community which offers an excellent opportunity to receive critique for my writing. I may make a few bucks here and there, but that's not why I'm here. That people expect to make money on here is astonishing to me; this isn't a job. It's amazing to hear of people making thousands of dollars...but this is an online community first, and a source of income second. Those people are the exception, not the rule. And even those high earners probably find it hard to "live off" of HP completely. Whose going to give a home loan or car loan to someone whose income is contingent completely on "clicks" of advertisements? It's not a consistent income, and is completely unpredictable. Even if you could, living off of HubPages is very high risk, if you ask me.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  You have a point damescribe. I want writing sites to provide a second income when I retire and I know that if I write enough this will happen
  
  To KathleenKat: Nowadays even a so called permanent job can vanish in an instant. You can lose it not through misbehaviour but because a suit somewhere wants to show they are tough and up their salary or leaving bonus. Writing this way is no more insecure than being an insurance salesman paid on commission which ends when a customer cancels a policy.
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gmwilliamsposted 11 years ago
Writing for HubPages is an excellent way to hone one's writing skills and to generally experiment with writing. With enough practice, hopefully, one is able to garner enough skills and confidence to either write professionally or get published. Writing for HubPages should be considered as a serious apprenticeship- to test one's writing waters so to speak.

HubPages is a wonderful place to be. One can write anything he/she wants and the community is wonderfully supportive. I suggest that you do not leave HubPages. This is such a great place to be.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Actually you cannot write anything you want: see the FAQ. If it is something Google will not like HP do not want you to publish it.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I was a published Author before I joined Hub pages. I had hoped the Adbased model would let me bypass publishers and remove some of the work of self publishing.
  
  I am pondering everything I read here and working out plans.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Can you clarify what you mean by that a bit more?
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I mean I had hoped that I would avoid the cycle of endless rejections and be able to control how my work was marketed. Self publishing involves a great deal of work marketing your stuff. Having had a maths textbook published which seemed popular but did not sell well I wondered if I could do better on my own.
  
  It turns out I misunderstood a couple of points. One being that advertisers will not bid for something that is popular but unrelated to them. Another that there is no such thing as evergreen content. It can turn to dead leaves as public tastes change.
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djdaniel150posted 11 years ago
Definitely sorry to hear about your misfortune, but unfortunately there are billions upon billions of web pages, articles, and other various content already streaming thru the search engines is really the issue. Just writing articles online to earn money doesn't cut it. You should consider sticking directly to a given topic and write only about that topic on your personal website. If you don't have a personal website, get one! Its worth it! One thing that people need to realize is that Google and the other search engines are only going to index so many pages from any given domain, and search results are generally random but matched. I don't see how anyone could possibly make a living on hub pages being as they time out your articles by setting them as "idle". This means your content is marked as "nofollow" and it is no longer indexed by search engines. But, if you own your own sight, then there aren't any "nofollow" links to worry about, and the content that search engines decide to index will most likely remain indexed for a long time! Think about it? You publish an article on hubpages, the article is popular, then a month from now it gets set as idle. Now the search engines will crawl hubpages and see the "nofollow" meta robots tag, and from here its all over. This makes no sense. Create content so we can take it down a week from now. Impossible to make money that way. I have websites on Google that I own and operate that consistently get traffic every day, year round. You need your own website to publish your content too, plain and simple. I hope things get better for you
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Everything you say makes sense. The other option is. if you are sure of the quality, delete and repost regularly or just make small changes to the hub.
  
  But I agree ones own website, with or without ads, is a better bet in the long run and then maybe use HP to drive traffic there
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Jennifer Madisonposted 11 years ago
I noticed a significant amount of traffic as well. I was really proud because my earnings were gradually rising and with every article I published, my traffic was increasing. Then, a couple of weeks ago, there was a crash and my traffic decreased by 50%. It is very disappointing and I felt like just when my hubs were flourishing, my hopes were shattered. I think this has something to do with Google Adsense, not sure though.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Hmm.... My traffic SEEMS to be recovering, but I trust nothing these days.
  There is still a long way to go to get where I was at the end of September.
  
  I was in the same state as you, organic growth in earning then KABOOM. At least 50% of traffic vanished.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  This has to do with articles being removed from the search engines. "idle" pages! You have to get content on actual search engines in order to get alot of traffic. Hubpages removes outdated content from search engines.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  The Idled hubs totalled 1-2% of my traffic before the slump. I notice that my best performing hubs also had a slump in traffic, at least 20%. The total traffic is recovering, I think but I will need a week or two more before I am sure.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Nothing to do with Google Adsense, everything to do with Google and how its search engine works.
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djdaniel150posted 11 years ago
The real problem lies in the fact that too many of you don't understand how the internet works! If you did, you wouldn't all be complaining of constant failure. Learning is the answer, that's what I did. Its the only proven way. If I need a website, I design it, then I design the content, then I perform SEO on it, how? Because I learned it! Success doesn't come without hard work. Yes, you are all trying to make money writing articles on the net, but you don't understand the underlying technology behind the webpages that contain those articles. If you did, then you certainly wouldn't be trying to make money on here.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  We would all, Iam sure, appreciate a hub expanding on this. No one here is worried about hard work but you seem to be saying we are misdirecting our efforts. HArd work is not a problem. Wasted work is.
  
  Please explain what you mean by " the underlying technology behind the webpages that contain those articles" Do you mean Servlets, JSP, Tomcat, Spring, Lucene, SOLR or something else?
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I mean HTML and CSS specifically, as they are the true underlying technology behind web pages. Everything else is merely a supplement. Infact, there is no standard programming languages, but HTML and CSS are infact standards recognized by both the W3C and ISO. Yes, I do think think that many people on here are misdirecting their efforts. I've been on here for a few days, and all I read is complain after complaint about how people are trying but can't seem to make any money on here. The whole "idle" pages thing makes it obvious there's not much value in writing an article to have it simply removed. Also, no one can remove my articles from my websites except for me. I think this place is great, but not for monetizing on. Google will only index so many pages at a time from this domain, just like any other. If you have your own domain, then everything that is accepted by search engines tends to stay there for a considerable amount of time. Usually forever in the case of Google. Anyway, its obvious theres alot of ignorance on here. People complaining about why they can't make money off of something they do not understand. Learning is the answer.
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psycheskinnerposted 11 years ago
I am having trouble seeing what you have learned that most of us don't already know?
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  As I stated, "people complaining about why they can't make money off of something they do not understand." In this sense, search engines, and the technology behind web design, mainly HTML and CSS. If you don't know about those 3 things, you will probably have a ruff time monetizing on the internet. You get twice as much coverage from your articles if they were posted to your own site. Sure, some would argue they tried that, and they failed. Just building a website doesn't get you organic search results, theres alot more involved.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I guess what I'm trying to say is that, instead of complaining, take the time to figure out why your ideas, business, articles, etc, are not working in your favor. Complaining about it does nothing.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Well had you said that in the forst place you would have been listened to more.
  
  My take:
  
  1. Each site has a different audience. What fails on HP may work elsewhere.
  2. There are a lot of reasons why an article might not work, and working out why takes time and error. It is like debugging code.
  3. Do you really think people here are just moaning? I think people are wondering why things seemto have gone wrong suddenly.
  
  If you can help people find WHY things are not working you will probably be very popular
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Well HTML is simple, even HTML5, and CSS is formatting formatting. I understand much HTML is generated for example from PHP, Python and SpringMVC to name a few frameworks. You also fail to mention JSP
  
  I read the article you write which referenced from your Hub and it gives no concrete examples or guidance.
  
  I hope you take this as my effort to help you, but you are coming across as arrogant and knowing nothing but HTML and CSS. Does this mean your work has been in User Experience??
  
  My problem has not been lack of technical knowledge, it is marketing.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  The best marketing is the search engines themselves. Organic search results are the only thing that really matters in the end. If your selling a product or service, then yes, you need additional marketing to make it happen. But, if your writing content for the web that is free, then there isn't too much of a need to advertise anywhere. Doesn't matter how simple or difficult HTML or CSS is. That was not the point of what I stated. The fact is they are what make up web pages to begin with, and web pages are indexed by search engines to return results to users. Think about it? In order for anyone to find content on the internet they must search or link to it. There is no other way. JSP is not a web page its an additional technology and nothing more. Most of it is entirely ignored when pages are indexed. Scripting is not good for web pages at all. It should be kept to a minimum. JSP creates "dynamic" web pages, bad news! Great for employing additional apps, features, etc, but does not make up the underlying technology of a web page. Google states this themselves. Static pages are the best, because that's what search engines index the best! JSP is not a standard and is totally proprietary. All scripting is proprietary. I'm not sure where you got the idea that JSP was a standard in the first place. Dynamic web pages dont index well, and thats exactly what JSP does. HTML is not generated from PHP, Python, or any other programming language. I generate HTML 12 hours a day in notepad, so that is not true with no programming at all. Embedding underlying page structure and content, including HTML in scripts = Epic Fail!
  Oh, and I know nothing about HTML or CSS? Then maybe you should click the link on my profile to my new website. I guess that whole website built itself right. The entire site was built with Windows notepad, and nothing more. But I know nothing about web design.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I have worked on applications where HTML was generated from PHP, mainly a webmail application. I have generated HTML in servlets. My understanding is that Django is a Python based framework for generating webapps, including HTML, and so is Ruby on Rails. Spring MVC does the same in Java. Among other things these tools generate HTML, mainly static pages.
  
  I said you come across as knowing nothing BUT HTML and CSS, as far as I recall. If the word "but" did not appear then I apologise for my typing skills.
  
  JSP is used by Enterprise clients. It is a cheap and cheerful way of connecting to the Back End. Like Javascript, JQuery and AJAX it can be used to create dynamic pages. I understand commercial clients like dynamic pages because they are a bit more secure. Yes JSP is not an ISO standard and I do not recall saying it was.
  
  I am sure you know about the creative and UX sides of web design. I admit I do not know how to create mouthwatering pages and sites. I would like to be able to create sites people want to visit but my experience has been middle tier and back end.
  
  I looked at your hub, as I said, and it was not plain to me how I could learn to use your methods.
  
  I should say that for clients I use whatever they use, and if that means scripting so be it. For my own projects HTML is usually enough and yes, I can, and often do write HTML with a text editor but prefer an editor that removes the drudgery. I want to spend one hour a day generating WebPages not 12.
  
  Look, instead of telling us we are all fools, which is what you seem to be saying, how about giving a bit more detail on stuff we do not know, like SEO that works?
  
  I understand your point about scripting, but surely the solution is to use the benefits of scripting and put your keywords in the static parts of a page.
  
  Now, before this gets acrimonious, let's rewind. Please accept that the people here know HTML and CSS, and please can we have some information on how WE can emulate your success. I read your long article and came away knowing less than when I started. I hope an second read will be more profitable.
  
  Be well.
  
  My remarks were and are intended to help you help others and yourself.
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  psycheskinnerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Yes, I know these things. I have coded websites, I have monetized websites. On what basis does this mean I can't critique what hub pages is doing? If anything it means I have a clearer basis for having an opinion.
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Right, and you'll probably have a "ruff" time as well, because you have to able spell they keywords correctly. lol. That is, of course, Google's spell check might self-correct for that, then you might be okay. ;-)
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UnnamedHaraldposted 11 years ago
One of my hubs (about Switzerland, for crying out loud) got linked from a popular site and I got like 5,000 views in a couple days on that hub alone. A week later, another popular sit linked and I got about 6,000 views. Believe me, that's a lot more than I've ever seen before. Then the payout... huh. The CPM for those days plummeted from $5+ to $2+. Just unlucky I guess. It had better be bad luck. Still, I'm hanging in there... and looking around.
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  So are you saying you're pleased with the 5 bucks you made off those 6,000 views?
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Thats like what, 10 cents a click. I get a dollar for every click. Advertisers bid for keywords, and anything related to IT is big bucks!
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  You get a dollar per click that is made in your Hubs here on Hubpages?
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  No, on my website.
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  psycheskinnerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  A $1 average is not difficult to get One specialist blog I have averages just over $2 a click. A large total from adding them together is more challenging.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Yeah, a dollar a click could make anyone rich too. $2.00 a click is great! I haven't seen anything over a $1.25 I don't think on my site. Theres only one thing that really bothers me with Adsense, you can only block 50 categories max. Look at the financial categories, theres way too many. We could get hit with them whether we wanted to or not.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I just finished reading your SEO article on PCTECHAUTHORITY.com. It is much more measured than your contributions here. It looks well researched. I did not know about Adsense's demand for a privacy policy and finding a sample is now on my to do list. Thanks for that. However I would like to attract advertisers directly on the sites I run so in the long run Adsense will, hopefully, be irrelevant.
  
  As to design, I like the large font size. The colours are not to my taste but not objectionable either. I did not look at all the HTML links in the tutorial section, so I do not know if you include the latest HTML5 features which I find clients demand nowadays.
  
  I am sorry if I ruffled your feathers, and hope the discussion becomes more productive.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Its all good Yeah, after working as a consultant for several years, the biggest complaint I received from consumers was that they couldn't read the tiny fonts on most web pages. People over the age of 50 seem to be able to read better at 1024x768 it seems, while that resolution actually makes it harder for me with 20/20 to read. Browsers like firefox also offer ways to zoom text and the overall screen, but at the cost of pages not displaying properly sometimes. Its best to just change the resolution I think and possibly the size of text overall. The colors on the site totally break the rules, but I was getting tired of every website I see looking exactly the same as the last. I think the links are great for people with visual impairments, such as color blindness, since they can tell the difference in contrast when hovering over a link. Why web designers don't take the visually impaired into consideration when designing just baffles me. The site was built with xhtml 1.0 transitional. HTML 5 has some great features, but also causes some headaches as well. XML based languages are still the best for the time being. XHTML5 is under works and will combine the strengths of XML with HTML 5 markup, while sticking to the strict requirments of XHTML. I didnt know about the privacy policy either until just a few months ago. Google has a million miles of documentation regarding Adsense and web master guidelines, its impossible to ingest it all. But I guess the privacy policy makes sense.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I find most fonts too small, even with my glasses on. I think part of it is the difference between backlit text and text read by reflected light. As someone with dodgy eyesight I too am puzzled why there is not more consideration for those with weak eyes: I know I spent ages trying to get the fonts on Eclipse right for me.
  
  no one has asked me about XHTML so far so it is towards the bottom of my research list.
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  psycheskinnerposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  My point is that earnings are price times frequency. High dollar clicks are generally obscure and low frequency.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  This is why luxury shops have high prices. An item might be on the shelves for a year so it has to pay the notional rent of shelf space plus make the store a profit.
  
  Little and often is generally better than a lot occasionally.
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  UnnamedHaraldposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  No, I don't believe I did say I was pleased,. I was disappointed. Bear in mind also that "views" don't equal "impressions". The views get analyzed by HubPages, throwing out the views that don't last long enough. This results in "impressions" and then HubPages gets 40%. Fair enough. Then the CPM is applied. The whole thing was an education. I am glad my hubs soared and I had a big bump (compared to normal) in earnings during those days. In future, those chickens will not be counted until I can see their beaks.
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Mark Johannposted 11 years ago
Appreciate you man, good psychiatrist. Well done. I am new in HP but I want to try harder to reach my goal.
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gmwilliamsposted 11 years ago
One just have to go to the learning videos and read how to draw more traffic to your hubs. I am doing that. It is a long process to earn a decent income on HubPages but it can be done. If one has social media such as facebook, pinterest, and linkedin, utilize those tools. Being a writer in the 21st century is far different from being one in previous centuries. HubPages is an excellent learning center for writers. One just have to be patient and learn as one goes!
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  The learning videos are good I'm sure, but Hubpages, like any other site relies on search engines to carry its content. It would make more sense to learn both about hubpages and Google's search engine. This is why:
  Hubpages does not determine what content gets indexed to the search engines. The search engines like Google will determine what is included in search results regardless of what this site or any other does. Also, as I've stated before, the "nofollow" attribute in pages on here is bad news for indexing. Whoever came up with that idea wasn't thinking to clearly. Hubpages claims that search engines only index "up to date content." this isn't true. There are pages on the internet that are 20 years old and reside in the same spot today as they did the day they hit the internet. In some cases older articles will carry more weight on the net than new ones, depending on what the content is about.
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fpherj48posted 11 years ago
Phew!! I read all the comments and it consumed a lot of time. I'm glad I took the time, though, because I gleaned a fairly good view at what some hubbers think and more importantly, how they view HP and Google....
I've been here a little less than a year and a half. I didn't join for the money and believe me, it's a good thing I didn't. The point for me however, is that I write because I love to and I read for the same reason. I have 24/7 opportunity to do both here and I'm happy with this. The people are an enormous plus. I've gotten to know and share with some very intelligent, talented and loving individuals.....they become as much friends as the people we love in our off-line life..
I feel as though HP has presented me with an education, while allowing me the opportunity to write and exchange thoughts & ideas with such fine people. Bottom line for me, is that I would love to be able to make some decent money here, but money is not the reason I stay with HP.
Of the many THOUSANDS of hubbers......I believe the reality is there is a small percentage of writers who "make their living" here.....another percentage who make fairly good money that supplements their main income.....and another percent who makes that "extra" spending cash. The BIG money makers are few and far between......(unless they are hiding out and remain silent about the money they make)
This tells me, writing for HubPages is pretty much like doing anything...anywhere......there is always the "few" who soar past others and make it to the top and stay there and make the big bucks.....there are the steady steppers in the middle and then there are the strugglers, who keep banging away and just don't seem to go very far. We make our own choices as to whether we stay or leave...keep writing or slow down...or just go elsewhere. It's also fairly accurate to say that those who RUN THE SHOW, make their money from what the little guy does.....so, yeah, HP and google.make "their" money and can take or leave those who don't bring them in the cash flow. This would explain why they don't spend much time or energy, answering our questions or responding to pleas. If you've ever worked for a major Corporation, this cannot come as a surprise.....The Money People in the big tower make the rules....and rule over the flock. That's just the way it is.
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GoldenThreadPressposted 11 years ago
I agree about the ups and downs of Google. Reminds me of the stock market--no pun intended. Sad that you would leave, but may I make a suggestion? I looked at your Hub Titles and they have a lot of periods, colons and dashes. I would shorten up each title, remove "mystery file..." and make sure that you have some reference to the title in your first paragraph. You might see a big return on your work. I have to do just that, not only here on HubPages but also on my own webpage. I have an SEO plugin that makes sure that what I use as a title is short, sweet and simple.

Just know that we all have edit, sometimes more often than not, but to stay on top of your game, you may be well-served to just tweak a few titles and you might get back the numbers you're looking for. Good Luck--Deb
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Billie Paglioloposted 11 years ago
I wish Hubpages would not require exclusivity. If our articles didn't have to be exclusive to hubpages, we could publish them here AND create ebooks for Kindle, Nook, etc., publish them from our websites, make them into Powerpoint Presentations and convert that to youtube "How to" videos. I think that would only benefit hubpages. If we had a youtube presentation with only portions of a how-to article and had a learn more here with a link to hub pages that would be powerful. With millions of viewers getting information in millions of ways, I really don't understand the exclusivity part. I have lots of other work that I'd love to post on hubpages, but can't. I DO mention my hubpages in other articles and link back to here and if I blog about something related, I link back from my blog. Am I missing something? I just releasing hubpages from exclusivity would be dynamic.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  HubPages doesn't want you publishing the same article elsewhere online. That doesn't prevent you using Hub content in ebooks - in fact, many Hubbers do. Your idea of posting a "teaser" on Youtube and linking back to HubPages is fine, too.
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Rain Defenceposted 11 years ago
It's because google penalises duplicate content. Complain to google not hubpages.
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Oh. I Google penalized duplicate content on the same page. Thanks for the info
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  oops - I meant "I THOUGHT Google....
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GoldenThreadPressposted 11 years ago
Billie Pagliolo: From my meager understanding of SEO, isn't diversifying important? If you have a YouTube video, there's space to link to HP and your website. If you have an eBook and you have it published elsewhere, write up a review and post it on HP, with links back to your site. You are creating links and back links without duplicating content, but still getting the word out and actually vamping up your readership at the same time. Not a bad deal. But, I do agree, HP is just following protocol and Google's the one to query.--Deb
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Thanks, Deb. I've been trying to do that. I was wishing, though, that I could take some essays that I published on mypeacecity.com and slap them into a Hub. Of course, they're just literature, but still. I do understand what you mean. On another issue: the concept of being "too promotional" seems to be a downside of hubpages. I've created games on my website and we sell software. If I want to review my own software or in the case of one program, illustrate how to use it, I can't. I sell diddly nothing anyway, but would like to promote what I've created. As it is, I've got 3 blogs and my website and hubpages and I'm going a little bit crazy. But I accept what has to be regarding hubpages and am grateful for the chance just to get more writing out there. I do love the statistical reporting and that in and of itself keeps me coming back.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  HubPages make a lot of things easy which are much less easy on other sites, including Blogspot, and is a good place to try things out.
  
  However some of HP's terms and rules are restrictive: No adult content with a very tight interpretation, nothing overly promotional, etc etc. A lot of political correctness. This may be tending to make it a bland place where nothing offends but sells much less than it could. I do not want HP flooded with nasty stuff, but sometimes I feel the only thing that makes money here is hubs telling people how to make money here.
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  love your last line! My concern is with the "overly promotional". If I could promote the educational content on my site, it would benefit me and hubpage visitors. In a way, it ties down the economy. If I saw your article on hubpages about how to make jewelry, for example, I might love to click to your online store and 1. help you out and 2. just find something out there that isn't every other place. Networking within our community could be dynamic. We all have this kind of warm feeling for fellow hubbers - we could have our own little economic city here.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I think you're misunderstanding the "overly promotional" rule. The rule states you can have no more than two links to the same website in a Hub. That can be any website: your own online store, Wikipedia, your own blog, a friend's blog, anything, provided it is relevant to the subject of the Hub.
  
  So, for instance, I can have a link to my belly dance website on every belly dance Hub I write. If I had 200 Hubs on belly dance and nothing else, I could have a link to my belly dance website on every single one of them, and it would be fine. But I can't put a single link in those Hubs to a blog on car repair, for instance.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Why did I have an image of a site with pictures of belly dancers dancing on cars while a smiling mechanic is changing the tyres.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Actually, the rules I read stated not only "over promotional", but you can't use hubpages solely for promotional purposes. Which means you cannot have links to the same website in every hub. Infact, Hubpages already axed one of my hubs saying it was too personal and the link I provided wasn't relevant to the article, which it was. Its their way of managing too many outgoing links. They seem to just randomly flag any post that has a link for that matter, and then make up an excuse as to why it is not acceptable.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  That's an old rule which was deleted some time ago (last year, I think). You can have links to the same website in every Hub - however, the link must be related in each case - and that's where people fall over, because HubPages' definition of "related" is tight. It really does have to be on the same topic, and not on some other subject that's vaguely connected.
  
  If it was too personal, I'm surprised they even mentioned the link - being too personal is enough reason all on its own. Or did you get one of those standard emails mentioning all the possible reasons, not all of which would apply to your Hub?
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  It was a while back. I can't remember, but when I wanted to copy the article recently from my list to put on my own website to be instructive, I couldn't find it. So to answer your question, I really don't know what they sent me when it was deleted.
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  Marisa Wrightposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  The post you quoted was replying to djdaniel150. He said his Hub had been unpublished for being too personal AND for having a link.
  
  Yours was probably unpublished for being too much like a press release or advertorial.
  
  I'm also confused by you saying it had disappeared - because HubPages only unpublishes, it doesn't delete, as far as I'm aware.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  HP never delete Hubs, they only unpublish them, so if has completely gone from your list you must have opted to delete the unpublished hub yourself at some point in time. Even if an entire account/user is banned from Hubpages their hubs remain unpublished on HP until the author chooses to delete them (usually after they have moved them elsewhere).
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  Billie Paglioloposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Ah... I'll look again. Thank you "Misty..."
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sereseusposted 11 years ago
I think all have bad times.But please do not think about quitting.I hope that your traffic comes back up.
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Xenonlitposted 11 years ago
I say no. Work on improving the existing articles and add a new one every now and then. Hub Pages will try to make some kind of income, but will have to come up with a better business model than Google based penny views. Helium, Open Salon, Hub Pages... these are all considered blogging sites and are not the best for references or sample articles.

These sites are fantastic for learning how to write, get help, be part of some kind of community and do SEO, but if the real SEO players are losing, then it's time to tend the existing crops and expand the audience by working in different environments.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Much agreed! Its best not to put all your eggs in one basket for sure. For one, not all ads are created equal. If you have a website, and the ads that show up are related to your content (such as an html tutorial, and the ad is for an html book) then you are making money for sure. The problem with hubpages is that the ads are mostly low quality. The ads I see alot are for books from authors on amazon that no one has ever heard of. Too many link ads on hubpages too. Low quality ads = low revenue. I've read post after post over the last few days on here of how people make maybe 10 cents a click if they're lucky. Pointless in my opinion. You want high bidding ads on your site, not low quality ads that are marketing products and services that people are not familiar with. I make more from one click on my site than most people make from 10 clicks on hub pages. Its just that, a place to write great articles and communicate with others, not necessarily a great place to monetize. Google just isnt going to return high quality ads for a website that embraces a multitude of far reaching subjects. Sites with a theme make more.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Do you mean sites or pages?
  
  My writing covers Programming, History, Politics, the Paranormal and a few other topics.
  
  You seem to be implying I need one site for each topic, not a separate page. which is not a good idea at present. Back to my thinking chair
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  xenolit.
  
  Yes we do need a better business based model. And the food chain is too long.
  Advertiser pays Google/Ebay/Amazon a dollar. They pay 50c to HP, and HP pays us 30c.
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GiancarloLorenzoposted 11 years ago
I can understand your frustration, but here's where I have a problem. Instead of worrying so much about making money, how about just doing it for fun? I know this sounds cliche as hell, but I write articles on here because I love to write. I'm trying to hone my skills enough to maybe write a book someday. Making money on hubpages is just a bonus. I have to say I'm one of the lucky ones so far because I've gotten a lot of views in a short period of time, but that didn't come without hard work in advertising my work on twitter, facebook, google+, etc.. The most important thing out of it is I've been having fun while also putting in hard work. Just about every hub I make is a flagship hub or close to it. Those are the ones where you can get a great google ranking and your views shoot up. Most of my views have come from two hubs because they both went viral. But I have other hubs too that get a healthy amount of views and are close to viral because they are flagship hubs.

I write what I love to talk about, and that's sports. I'm willing to do the research required to bolster my hubs and give my hub a chance to have a high google ranking that way people can see my work. I'm not as concerned about how much I'm making as I am of people seeing my work and enjoying it. I'm more happy that I can get my thoughts and tips out there that people will enjoy, rather than taking pleasure in racking in the dough.
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Gaizyposted 11 years ago
Yes lots of people say they just do it because they love it or "just for fun", and good luck to them. It must be great to have the time and money to do it just as a hobby. If I ever find myself with such resources in the future, I may come back and do just that. But right now, the country is in recession I am broke and have to devote every spare moment to making ends meet - And that isn't going to happen here.
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  Amanda Severnposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I've always enjoyed your hubs, Gaizy, and would be really sad to see them removed from here. I also have experienced ups and downs in traffic, and consequently I have written very little on here for well over a year, although I do reply to any comments that are left, and I occassionally make a few tweaks here and there. Like Marisa. I do regard Hubpages as a reasonable way to earn a passive income. I generally get a payout every two or three months, and I allow it to accumulate in Paypal until I need it. I'm not depending on it, but I'm glad it's there. Perhaps your traffic will recover over the winter, as that's the time when people hunker down, and start trawling the net for nuggets of info, and good stories. I generally find the winter better than the summer. Meanwhile, perhaps you could compile some of your excellent spooky stories into an ebook, and publish it on Amazon? Anyway, good luck with whatever you decide to do.
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  GiancarloLorenzoposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Gaizy, I'm actually flat broke and don't have a job. My parents are basically paying for me a place to stay, but they won't be for much longer unless I get a job. You may think you have it bad, but others have it just as bad or worse. I could be on the streets a month or two from now, so it's not all good for me. I need the money from hubpages too, but I write to get away from the troubles in my life, not just for money. I write because I love doing it and it makes me feel better about myself as a person. Whether or not I make money doesn't concern me. I'm only interested in my voice being heard and readers enjoying my thoughts and views about all things sports-related.
  
  If I had any type of money, my hubs would be a lot more impressive than they are, but they aren't, because I don't possess a phone that take pictures, I don't have the equipment required to make youtube videos like I want, and I don't have the money to buy video games so I can give not only tips about fantasy football, baseball, or basketball, but tips on how to play certain video games. I've always been a great gamer, and I believe I can help people become better gamers, but I can't help anybody at the time because I have no money to keep up to date with all the new games. Do you realize how badly I want to buy Assassins Creed 3 or NBA 2K13 so I can play them and write hubs about them? Do you know how badly I want to take my own pictures to put in hubs like a lot of others here do with their hubs? But I can't, because I'm broke and can't afford anything at the moment. So everything isn't all that great for me.
  
  The only thing great about my life right now is my writing.
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  BongSantosposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  What can I say? As an outsider who happened to look in, I'm so taken by your honesty and candor. My hats off to you! Yes, money isn't everything, but it makes life so much easier. I hope you find something soonest.
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gmwilliamsposted 11 years ago
Gaizy, keep the faith, keep on keeping on.........writing. What YOU have is a GIFT, please do not squander it. YOUR GIFTS are always of use. Write, write, write and the monies will follow........Trust me!
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  Gaizyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I did, and they didn't.
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cristianneacsuposted 11 years ago
Seems a lot of comments here so why not make a comment, right?

In my humble opinion I write because I found pleasure to write then because maybe is financial useful, exactly in this order.

Don't go away, must be a reason for all this comments, almost all said the same, here is cool and interesting so you don't really want to go.

Your hubs are amazing, keep going.

Thank you,

Christian Paul, WMJ CEO
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lrc7815posted 11 years ago
Gaizy, I don't really have a right to even comment since I've only been on HP for about 5 months but, I am going to. I looked at your profile because I wanted to see how much better you were at writing than me. My thought was that if you were amazing, I didn't have a chance at making any money on HP. But, I'm going to be honest. I didn't even read your hubs. I stopped when I glanced at your profile and saw that you have been here four years and are only following 28 people.

I started out making pennies each month and then I started interacting with other hubbers. I now have 173 followers and I'm following 203. I can tell you that my success here (as minimal as it is) is due to the relationships I've built with other writers who have shared and promoted my hubs on their own. Granted, it takes a little time but I can't place a dollar value on the relationships I've made. Not only have they promoted my hubs but I've grown as a writer from their encouragement and challenges.

Like so many other things I've learned in life, I think you get out of HP what you put into it. I figure that if I wasn't spending that time building these relationships, I'd be somewhere else writing and having the same problem. So, I'm sticking to HP like glue and I'm going to keep building relationships, sharing the hubs of these amazing writers, and enjoying whatever sucess comes from it. Best of luck to you!
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  As the old saying goes, "it's not always what you know, but who you know." I believe this really holds true. For example, lets say you have 2 computer programmers, one works with and communicates with 50 other programmers, while the other one has always worked alone. Which one will be more knowledgeable about programming? Which one is more likely to be successful?
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mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years ago
How many people you follow will not make much impact at all on earnings, not least because Hubbers don't click on adverts, and even based on impressions they only form a minuscule part of your earnings. If things aren't working out here on HP (as many hubbers are finding in recent times), then move your hubs elsewhere, or stop writing here and write elsewhere, or both, (up to you). I write on my own site, used to write here, have articles on Wizzley, This is Freelance and Xobba, plus I am now starting to write informational ebooks. I was forced into this situation by gradually watching what was a pretty good part time income here about a year ago, gradually drop bit by bit until it was back to being a pittance, and the traffic showed the same dismal decline. Basically I believe now that HP is never going to recover and is in a continuing decline that I have watched happen over my 4+ years here. To continue to have faith in HP's recovery seems to be a pipe dream, and I truly believe it is time we all looked for pastures new, even if we leave our existing content here until the final day the site is live, (use Firefox's Scrapbook 'add on' to back up your hubs though, just in case you end up wanting to publish them elsewhere if this site vanishes suddenly).
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  They can't recover! They made really bad decisions, unintentionally, but really bad! Those decisions influenced their rankings with search engines in a negative manner.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Basically yes, they did, and they still seem to be constantly panicking and floundering around making yet more changes that don't work. The Quantcast stats for this year compared to a writing site such as Squidoo are alarming, and show that whilst Squidoo is growing in traffic, HP is dropping overall, and looks very unhealthy. I posted the graphs on another thread but cannot remember which right now, but the graphs are easy to find on Quantcast, just remember to select 'Global Traffic' to get the full picture.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Great information misty! This is something all the writers can use. Nice to have something to compare against, even as much as I can't stand math.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Don't worry, I hate any form of maths, but this info is provided in basic graphs where you can see the levels dropping or rising clearly. Take a look, it is alarming, but also enlightening.
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Hang in there - don't drop this basket. But have plenty of others.
  Google told HP they had too much poor quality stuff and that it is tainting everything. I think HP is using hub hopping to rate every hub for quality 1-9. They want to follow Squidoo's model of only having the best ones indexed.
  I think they will get a lot tougher with idling hubs using an threshold - say ZZZ for hubs with a score below 3. They are trying to predict Google's quality rating and thereby increase the overall quality of the pages indexed. They may move to tougher scores say only allowing indexing of pages rated 5 and above in the future. This combined with better tests on new hubs could improve overall quality and lift rankings. This could work - just as it has on Squidoo - meanwhile HP has subs and some subs are doing much better than others, so there is a chance of being in charge of you own destiny.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  All HP had to do was index the good content and leave it there. Thats it! They screwed themselves by de-indexing content, over and over again. Dumb!
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  So how do they know which of the 1 million pages are 'good'. They let everything in and had no effective crap filter. Now they are paying the price.
  They are trying to fix it by doing as you say - indexing the good and de-indexing the bad. So they need to rate each page and then define the threshold between good and bad, as well as de-indexing pages that get no traffic. In the future, as the quality of stuff improves, they may lift the threshold higher - that's the advantage of having every page rated 1-9. I don't necessarily agree with them, but I think that is what they are trying to do. I personally think they should focus on traffic - let the users decide what they like and vote with their clicks.
  This is all pure guesswork on my part as HP hasn't stated their plans.
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I have a huge problem with the fact they are now paying an outside site to 'rate' our hubs, when it is well known most of the users of that site will rush through as many ratings as they can based on the 5c per article rated and give each an average rating whilst barely reading it. Other hubbers who are former members of that site admit that is how the members work there, and that many of the members there only have English as a second language anyway. What on earth qualifies a third party site full of people after earning a few easy bucks to rate hubs here on HP? It makes no sense at all in my opinion and only professionals should be paid for this kind of work.
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  kathleenkatposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Because Hubpages has enough money to pay professionals?
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Well they should have based on the financial backers they have and the 40% they take off our hub incomes and have done for some years now. Otherwise what you are saying is that it is much better to let people rate our hubs who are no better than the average person in the street, and in fact worse, because they are not even reading the articles properly and are simply rushing through as many as possible in order to make a quick buck, which basically means nothing in terms of an accurate rating. Several staff members seem to have left in recent weeks, which should at least free up some monies to pay proper proof readers as opposed to a site which is well known for being full of desperate people willing to race through reviews to earn a few dollars an hour!! They could invest that money in paying a small team of respected hubbers to rate hubs instead of amateur and desperate outsiders!
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I agree. I think the whole concept of trying to predict how Google will rank the 'quality' of a page (which only contributes 20%) to the page rank anyway is Flawed. But as I suggested on another post, it can be done objectively by using Grammarly plus a formula that includes number of words, number and quality of images, image text etc. Paul E contends that the human and mTurk ratings, are meant to refine their own objective formula.
  In my opinion there is no good data to prove that better quality pages get more traffic. In fact there is good evidence of the opposite - just do a search for 'beef curry recipes hubpages" or any other search with 'hubpages" added at the end to filter for pages on HP. Often the simple shorter pages out rank the 'big mommas' in the SERPS
  The proof is in the pudding - TRAFFIC is the answer to everything. If it gets sustained traffic users like it - 'quality is irrelevant, really, above a minimum'
  Incidentally, page load time may be a factor in SERP position - look way down at the bottom of the page - see page load time displayed!!!
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Personally I am beginning to think the whole system is crazy and majorly flawed. If a good article can rate below one with less words, less info and because of a page load time, it is seriously time to look at writing ebooks etc, (at least until Google shoot themselves so many times in the foot that they bleed to death and Bing or another search engine take over). HP will keep making changes, Google hate HP and will ignore those changes (not least because they are too little too late), and I predict that within the next 12-18 months HP will go under and all the 'yay team' brigade will be left scratching their heads wondering what happened.
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  There is no good data to prove that better quality pages get more traffic? Your lost! Plain and simple. Predict page rank? If you understand web design, and you produce good content to go along with it, then there is no reason to predict anything because you understand how it all works, so you can make your pages climb very high in search results. I don't have any of the page ranks issues everyone is whining about, Its because no one here seems to understand how the internet works! Don't spend too much time looking at statistics, they are worthless. People should spend more time understanding internet technology. Statistics mean nothing. I don't use them at all when creating content or designing websites. Technology drives the web, not statistics! Oh, and about quality? Google looks at the quality of your code, content, domain information, the quality of links pointing back to your site, etc. One thing that everyone failed to pay attention too was the fact that Google has also put great emphasis on original content! They aren't just referring to the content you put in your pages, they are also referring to code! Original coding is considered original content. Lets face it, almost every site on the internet today is made with a content management system. There's nothing original about using the same code that everyone else does to produce their pages. Using content management systems creates duplicate coding! When it comes to websites, sites that have original content, including original code, have much higher value than a site made from a program or template, not just in the eyes of search engines, but monetarily as well. One more thing everyone seems to be in the dark about, the entire web is mainly made up of HTML and CSS, everything else doesnt matter to search engines at all. Adding a million scripts to your pages in any form actually counts against you. Search engines index HTML and CSS, and largely don't care about any other code. They have no care in the world for your PHP, Flash, etc. If you know HTML and CSS and you pay attention what search engines are telling us is acceptable and what is not, then theres no need to to do voodoo predictions. I predict nothing, because I know, and knowing is half the battle! lol
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  What's the other half?
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  So you're saying using the world known "Wordpress" system alone, though with original content and written articles....will be a SEO hinderance?
  
  Do we have to go back to coding our own websites like we did in the 90's with Notepad? (That's how I did my first site, lol!)
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  WhatTheHubposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  DJ, I was wondering why when I clicked you website, DJ, that it looked like a non-Wordpress , blogger, etc. That you just uploaded your HTML pages and that's it. And that's the site you're using to get adsense clicks?
  
  If that's true, then we need to go back to the 90's way of web design. lol (not making fun of you, but's kind of ironic).
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  Bard of Elyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  This reminds me of a terrible music site called slicethepie where you can earn money rating songs and being a talent scout to find the next big thing. it is said. The site pays a real pittance and encourages you to rate and comment fast in an effort to get more money and make it up the hierarchy of reviewers with a scale of earnings available. I had a go on there both as a listener hoping to make some money and as an artist with my songs posted. I soon gave up in disgust and quickly realised the majority of reviewers are basing their views on current chart music, rap etc and if legendary singer-songwriters like Neil Young, Leonard Cohen or Bob Dylan had their songs posted on there they would get terrible ratings and comments. It is not about quality of song-writing at all.
  
  Slicethepie review comments are often written by people who cannot spell or use correct English grammar, and it is obvious that many of them don't even listen to the songs properly.
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  sparksterposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Slicethepie was awesome when it first started and I actually made a few thousands pounds on there not just by reviewing music but also by investing in contracts then selling them on the exchange.
  
  Unfortunately, ever since the day the site started it has been increasingly going down-hill. Now they pay pennies to anybody from anywhere with no prerequisites, including people who can't even speak English! Now it's virtually impossible to earn money at STP and like you said Bard, the ratings are terribly inaccurate. I tried uploading one of my tracks at different times of the day and week and the rating varied from between 3.2 and 7.2!
  
  I am currently making more money here at Hubpages than I can on any other site at the moment and believe me I've tried all of them! I have other writer accounts on other websites, blogs, my own websites, sites that I sell services on, etc but none of them bring in anywhere near as much income as I make from Hubpages (although it couldn't be considered a full time, or even part time, wage).
  
  I really am very surprised by how little success you have had here Bard, considering the amount of work you have published, how many followers you have, how active you are, etc - it's mind boggling!
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  Bard of Elyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Thanks for backing up my opinion of slicethepie, Sparkster! You were lucky getting in there early and making on it. Looks like I arrived when it had gone downhill. I certainly never got my slice, not even crumbs!
  
  It is "mind-boggling" in a very depressing way when I consider all the long hours I have spent for over 4 years on this site and others to make a pittance of an income! It has been a very depressing and frustrating experience. However, much as I may be moaning about this site, I make nothing from some others and am still waiting for my first money from Wizzley where I am now investing most of my efforts. Very sadly I would have to agree that HubPages is still the best site for my online earnings! It is a good job I am an optimist!
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  sparksterposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I guess I really was lucky with Slicethepie, at the time it just so happened that I was looking for something exactly like it. Had I found it later I probably would have never been so impressed with (initially).
  
  There is one other thing that I have had a small amount of success with. I don't know if you've tried already but I did sign up with freelance sites like e-lance, freelancer, etc and also a few micro-job websites like MyCheapJobs, JobsFor10, etc and started offering freelance work, partly as a writer, partly as a musician, etc. I haven't made any significant amount of money from doing this but it has opened up another source of income to add to the income I already make.
  
  Maybe you could try something like this?
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  Bard of Elyposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I signed up with some of those but never spent much time on them apart from o-Desk that I have done quite a lot of work from but not much that is paid well, and nothing recently. A lot I have turned down on there as an insult to my intelligence and ability! Employers on o-Desk often cannot even write English properly themselves and offer insane amounts! It has all made me very cynical as well as at the same time being an optimist.
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  sparksterposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I know what you mean. The problem isn't so much that online work is hard to find but that people expect to get that work done for peanuts, so in order to find work the workers have to accept ridiculous small amounts of money for their effort.
  
  Ciao is another website that I use regularly to write consumer reviews, I'm not sure if this is UK only or not. I don't make a great deal of money there but it depends on how many people read and rate your reviews.
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  HOPE Springs Eternal
  Quantcast Data 1 Sept till 27 Oct - Page Views
  
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  djdaniel150posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  I guess we could use statistics to show how dumb a particular SEO team is. So I was wrong, I guess statistics do count. 1st graders could optimize Hubpages better than their current SEO, just by spitting on the screen.
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  AlexK2009posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  What this graph looks line is a gradual decline, followed by a big drop on 27th September and then a slow recovery. The recovery is best seen with the glasses of hope.
  
  I am thinking it is time to back away a bit from HP and diversify revenue streams etc, always a good idea.
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Sherry Hewinsposted 11 years ago
I seem to remember seeing a question posted in the Q&A. The person said their ratings failed to pass on mechanical turk. The person was surprised as they had an educational background in English. People who hop hubs here on Hubpages are not held to any standard. So which is worse?
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  mistyhorizon2003posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Not sure where you read that, but personally I feel a 'selected' group of hubbers would be more appropriate than the MTurk group as there are loads of people on there that have managed to get 'approved' (and possibly by getting other people to pass the qualification tests for them before handing them back the accounts to earn from). It is like a 15 year old getting a 4 year old to vet their writing skills. No-one is seriously checking out those doing the ratings and clearly these people are not often very good at what they do, or bothered about whether they do a good job of it. It might actually be better to follow the Wizzley model of a staff member judging the first 10-20 articles of a new writer, and then deciding they can be trusted and no longer require anything other than the occasional random check.
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  janderson99posted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Maybe staff should answer?
  But my understanding is that the assessors on Mturk and on HP are evaluated by how their ratings compare with HP staff ratings for the same hub. So you have to do it like they do it to pass.
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Sherry Hewinsposted 11 years ago
Her is the link to that question. http://goldenthreadpress.hubpages.com/q … -the-grade
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chamonixfirstposted 11 years ago
I have only 3 hubs under my beginners hubbers belt but i really enjoy it here and will continue to write. I never really got into this for the money its more of a past time and a very friendly one at that, happy hubbing everyone :-)
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  Escobanaposted 11 years agoin reply to this
  Good for you! I applaud you for being here in the first place to have fun:-) Just wrote my Hub on the first year on Hubpages and I didn't see a penny.
  
  But I got so rich in another way. It's not all about the money folks! Please keep on writing and enjoy Hubpages for everything else.
  
  The community, the questions and answers to get some inspiration, the friends you will make along the way.
  
  Happy Hubbing to you too:-)
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berojgaarnewsposted 11 years ago
Sir Write the good Article and See about your SEO Quality Depends on the Article Quality the Ad Will Run on that only the Revenue will be Generated.
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BloodRedPenposted 11 years ago
I came to Hubpages over three years ago (with no delusions). Writing for search engine content is not a get rich quick or get rich at all proposition. An old adage comes to mind (and I will clean it up) - A certain smelly thing runs downhill. And it's not money from Google. Writing in the traditional sense (Putting pen to paper) has made a comfortable life for my family and myself. "So" My advice is Use the Hubages community as your inspiration not your income.
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