So which is it, HP? 100 or 300?

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   Ramkitten2000posted 9 years ago

   Perhaps it's been there, but I just noticed a warning in a blue box in the upper right-hand corner in edit mode, saying that my hub may be unfeatured because I have fewer than 300 words per Amazon capsule.
   
   Last I heard, 100 words per Amazon capsule was the minimum required ratio, though all of my hubs have more than that. Three hundred, though--many do not.
   
   So, which is it? 100 or 300? If it's 300 now, I guess I'll have to add a lot of rambling blah-blah to my hubs.

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      LongTimeMotherposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Seems remarkably unfair to jump from 100 to 300. I suspect many hubbers would no longer bother editing hubs to update them.

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         TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

         I think that what they really are telling her is that her word count overall is too little for the number of ads she has on her hub.  You can get away with the minimum if your overall count is high, but if not, your ads look spammy, which is not what the team wants to see.
         
         In the article I reviewed, the ads are for the same product, just in different flavors.  What's the point.  One ad would be plenty and would meet the basic QAP requirements.

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            Ramkitten2000posted 9 years agoin reply to this

            TimeTraveler...
            
            Thank you ... but I did not request that you or anyone else choose a random hub of mine for critique or analysis. That particular hub (and others like it) was created way back when in response to a Squidoo challenge and I could really care less about it ... though it actually earned more than its fair share of income. I am and always have been much more concerned with my hubs on topics I care about, like Search & Rescue and backcountry recreation and safety.
            
            However, what I posted about originally was the required minimum word count per Amazon module and the apparent, unannounced change. I'm not sure how that was interpreted to mean I wanted a random critique. As a matter of fact, I'm not having an issue with the hub you randomly selected. I just happened to notice that warning on an entirely different hub, so I questioned the rule.
            
            Oh, and I'm happy for you that you have never had an issue here. Impressive.

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               TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

               Sorry that you feel like I stepped on your toes.  I was simply trying to help you out with some constructive criticism so that more of your hubs would not become unfeatured.  Apparently you don't do well with constructive criticism, so I promise not to offer assistance to you in the future.

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      TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

      I would email the team to make sure, but the last I heard it was 100.  Please let us know what you find out.

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         SheilaMilneposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         It's definitely 300 now.  I have a couple of hubs that have the warning, but so far only a warning. Mine will thankfully be easy enough to fix. They are book hubs so I can substitute some photos of the books in question for some of the Amazon ads.

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            TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

            Nuts!  I knew nothing about this and even though I have very few ads, I created all of them with the 100 word limit in mind.  I wonder if they will be grandfathered until we do updates?  Anybody know about this?  When was this announced?

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               SheilaMilneposted 9 years agoin reply to this

               It hasn't been announced, as far as I know.  I don't think anyone knows any details - yet.

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      TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

      This is a direct quote from the learning center, so I do not understand why people are getting those warnings.
      
      Every Product Needs 100 Words of Original Text
      
      In order to maintain a standard of high quality, HubPages requires that every Hub contain a minimum of 100 words per Amazon or eBay product, e.g., if you have three related Amazon products in your Hub, you need at least 300 original words (the more original content, the better). Hubs that fall below this threshold will be moderated and need to be updated before they can be republished.

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         Mark Ewbieposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         

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            NateB11posted 9 years agoin reply to this

            Lol

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         SheilaMilneposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         You see it when you are editing the hub.

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            Marisa Wrightposted 9 years agoin reply to this

            I think TT2's point is, the Learning Centre is still saying nothing about this.

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         calculus-geometryposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         The very next paragraph says
         
         NOTE: Adding 100 words per product capsule is a bare minimum for your Hub to escape moderation, and a Hub that only meets the minimum requirements is unlikely to pass Boot Camp. Keep in mind that a truly high-quality article will contain a much higher ratio of original text and information to products.
         
         so the learning center's verbiage is consistent with the warning people are now seeing.  100 words is only enough to avoid moderation but not nearly enough to be featured.
         
         http://hubpages.com/learningcenter/crea … d_22670857

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            TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

            This may be why I have not had a problem.  Although some of the few ads I have are just above the minimum "per capsule", the text on my articles is always more than 1000 words and some go closer to 2,000.
            
            
            Also, I have wondered how they do this count when you widen the ads for mobile because at that point, they appear between two different capsules.  Any thoughts?

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      tsmogposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      Thank you for bringing that to my attention. I went and checked my hub. I didn't see what you shared. I did make  discovery I had not noticed before with links. Something new . . . I dun'no, but follows along with the OP.
      
      I noticed:
      
      Style Tip
      
      [?]
      We noticed you have a number of links grouped together. To keep your Hub Featured, please incorporate useful, relevant links into the sentence structure of your Hub or, if you would like to link to your own Hubs, group them using the Grouping feature.
      
      Both yours and this one seems to be related to a crawl.
      
      Sharing is I used the Link Capsule for additional reading related to the Hub Topic at the end of the article. I also made a linked Table of Contents. My pondering gives cause to if the Link Capsule is being phased out? And, what weight is given to the internal Hub links with quality assessment via a crawl. I am heeding "To keep your Hub Featured". (Shrugs Shoulders ??)

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      TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

      I see what the problem is.  I looked at your hub about Zevia and did a word count.  You only have 744 words, but you have five ads showing...far too many for that number of words.  I suspect that if you drop three or four of them, the warning will disappear.  Just a guess, but I think it's spot on.
      
      If you are not using one of the online character and word counters, you can't really know how many words are in your hub or in any capsule.  Always check this to protect yourself.

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   Marisa Wrightposted 9 years ago

   When did this change occur?   I'm glad it did, because I've suspected that HubPages wasn't sticking to its own rules - at least they're being honest now. A bit rude not to announce it though.

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      SheilaMilneposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      I only noticed it today.  Yes, there should have been an announcement.

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   Mark Ewbieposted 9 years ago

   Well I was thinking of leaving my few sales pages here until AFTER Xmas.
   
   Interesting timing.
   
   Whoops!
   
   These new Amazon shopping ads are rather better than the HubPages version any how...
   
   https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/gp … /main.html

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   Jodahposted 9 years ago

   Just noticed the same thing when checking why a bunch of my hubs were de-featured and doing some updates. A warning at the top saying they are in danger of being no longer featured because there are not 300 words per ad. This is something HP usually announces, but not this time. Sneaky little HubPages. I do welcome it, but would still be nice to get a warning.

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      Jean Bakulaposted 9 years agoin reply to this

      They always mess around with this right before the holiday season. I'm not even going to bother using Amazon capsules anymore, I never made any money on it anyway.

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   Ramkitten2000posted 9 years ago

   Thanks for your responses. I don't know if I posted this where HP will see it and maybe respond, but I'll try sending an email to the team to ask.
   
   If 300 is the new minimum requirement, I'd have appreciated an advance heads-up before I tried to edit hubs. I've been going round and round with MTurk since they've been unfeatured time and again once edited ... although they'd been edited since the LAST new minimum requirement and passed just fine.
   
   Also, some kind of icon next to hubs that no longer meet the minimum required ratio would be very helpful.

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   sockiiposted 9 years ago

   Well I see the last few art tutorials I had left here dropping like flies to this new change and falling into unfeatured status...just got payout so whereas I was going to leave them here until after Christmas, I suppose I can thank HubPages for speeding along my deletion and relocation!

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      TIMETRAVELER2posted 9 years agoin reply to this

      I checked your article on creating a classical oil painting.  Good wordage...1955 words, but ten ads, some of which are very closely placed.
      
      That's a lot of advertising for just that many words, especially the way you have placed some of them.  I'm not surprised the team took action.
      
      The most I ever place on any article regardless of length is 3, and that is stretching it.

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         Jean Bakulaposted 9 years agoin reply to this

         Also, we used to be able to put two products in an Amazon capsule. It could be my mistake, but I can add only one item now. I am just going to stop adding the capsules, it's always been a time waster for me. HP was supposed to work out a better percentage for us, but never did. Plus, if your hub is showing products related to the hub, but not so obvious the reader has to actually think about it, they say it's not applicable to your hub topic.

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