Hubpages Owners PLEASE Consider This....

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   ryankettposted 13 years ago

   The analytics report for the last calender month shows that my traffic comes from the following countries.
   
   United States 45%
   United Kingdom 13%
   Canada 6%
   Australia 4%
   
   Those countries all share a similar characteristic. Not that they are primarily English speaking. They all have an Amazon website, and they all have an Affiliate scheme.
   
   When building a Wordpress site there is a plugin called Amazon Localizer (or similar) which will switch Amazon products to the surfers local site. They use one simple capsule, just like you.
   
   23% of my perfectly valid traffic is a dead lead when it comes to Amazon, simply because of a failure or unwillingess of this site to implement a simple bit of script. You are clearly looking to increase revenues through innovation, your title tuner is fantastic and has already worked for me, but a much greater potential can surely be seen here? These could be warm leads over night.
   
   That is potentially 50% more Amazon clicks, and potentially more than 50% more sales. My last four sales hubs have attempted to sell:
   
   MacBook Pro Laptop Coolers
   Christmas Presents For Puppies
   Laptop Coolers
   Accessories For Laptops
   
   Well guess what? Australians, Brits, Canadians, they all buy this stuff too... and almost every one of the items that I promote is available on Amazon.co.uk, Amazon.ca, and Amazon.au
   
   These are big big markets, with plenty of disposable income. The GDP per capita of each of these countries:
   
   United States: $46400
   Australia: $38800
   Canada: $38400
   United Kingdom: $35200
   
   Each of those countries celebrates Christmas at the same time each year.
   
   This has been brought up before, most recently by ThisIsOli, it is possible for you to write one piece of code (or pay somebody to write the code) and potentially significantly increase your revenues and the revenues of hubbers.
   
   It can be done, it is already done on a wide scale. I cannot see any reason why a corporate enterprise would hold back on quite possibly the easiest market penetration in the history of global business?
   
   The content is already there, the traffic is already there, why cant we get the sales? It needs no additional capsules.
   
   A UK buyer will not buy from Amazon.com, it takes 3 weeks for your items to arrive, a UK credit card charges for currency conversion, and most electrical items and media items are not compatible due to power differences and regionalised DVDs, CDs, Blu-Rays, etc etc. Same applies to Australia.
   
   All of the other revenue sharing sites are fighting over the SAME united states traffic.
   
   I am desperate for 134707 of my currently useless monthly impressions to be fully utilised for the good of my earnings and the good of your earnings. I know that this traffic has money to spend, you are not letting them spend it.
   
   I would be very grateful for a response in due course.

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2. 0

   ryankettposted 13 years ago

   You can read it now.

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3. 65

   ns1209posted 13 years ago

   I agree completely with Ryan especially about the UK - so large a percent of the readers come from the UK it seems stupid to just get rid of one affiliate scheme and be left with one decent one!
   
   This traffic on Amazon hubs is next to useless at the moment!

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      ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      By my calculations 55% of my total traffic is useless for Amazon.com.
      
      Probably more like 49%, seeing as Canadians can buy from Amazon.com. Although Canadians have told me that the exchange rates no longer make this more cost effective than buying from Amazon.ca.
      
      So if 55% of traffic is currently useless for Amazon.com, the site could implement a change which sees just 32% of the traffic useless for Amazon affiliates. That is not a change to be smirked at.
      
      I just cannot fathom why this change, which has been suggested before, has been overlooked without response in favour of other much less significant updates - like a photo gallery.

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   waynetposted 13 years ago

   So simple, Hubpages engineers...please please please sort it out, in your own time thank you!

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5. 89

   WryLiltposted 13 years ago

   I agree for two reasons:
   
   1. I have seen three different people with Amazon UK affiliate accounts ask in the last few months about using them.
   
   2. I tried to buy an electronic item on Amazon.com and it turns out that anything with a warranty can't be sent to my country. So of course I said "Screw this, I'm going to Ebay, where they'll actually sell me stuff I want to buy."

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   Mikeydoesposted 13 years ago

   Ryan is all about making everyone money, he deserves a raise!

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   TNBposted 13 years ago

   But then you will have to sign up for an associate ID with each of these local sites.

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      waynetposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Whoa you're right....awesome, won't take long!
      
      And why don't they do the same for Ebay too, localized partner sites for geo targeted countries!
      
      First Amazon, then the world!

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   2. 0

      ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Something which take about 10 minutes in total. Anybody who is not prepared to spend 10 minutes to open up earnings possibilities is not cut out for this game. I get over 20000 page views per day, in fact 27000 in the past 24 hours.
      
      If 3510+ of my normal daily visitors are coming from the UK, then I want to sell to them. A 60 second registration form is no barrier to that.

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8. 75

   Eaglekiwiposted 13 years ago

   Ryan just a little bit (well alot) off topic for a minute, I was just wondering why Ive made nothing from Amazon yet, seems like Ive had reasonable traffic on an off ,and no-ones ever clicked or bought anything via Amazon adverts.
   Considering Ive been on here for 18 mths ,does that seem strange to you?
   Like I said ,just wondering and thanks for letting me interupt.
   Good luck with your writing endeavours

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      WryLiltposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Have you had ANY clicks?
      
      If not, are your affiliates set up correctly?
      
      If you HAVE had clicks, how many have you had? It took me about 100 clicks to get my first Amazon sale.
      
      And do you write product hubs or informational hubs with Amazon adverts?
      
      You'll get a lot more Amazon sales off product hubs.

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   2. 0

      ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Are your Amazon reports showing any clicks? If they are, then I guess that your just not selling enough - you need to up front.
      
      If its not showing ANY clicks at all, then it may not be set up right?
      
      And, where the HELL have you been lady? I was thinking about you recently! We used to have good banter!

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         Eaglekiwiposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Hahahaha @ you need to up front" I could always rely on you to ride my ass- in the most delightful way of course.
         
         Lets just say Im positioning myself, isnt that what the top marketers say ,an all that jazz.
         
         Im pretty sure its set up right ,because they email me each month to tell me Ive earned 'nothing' but ok now both you and Wry have said the same thing.
         Im burning dinner here ( just like old times) and yes so good to see you again too my friend

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9. 75

   Eaglekiwiposted 13 years ago

   Hi Wry
   
   Yes yes and yes ,but I must recheck all of them things,I just get nervous tweeking things. I tend to get overzealous lol
   
   Thanks for taking the time to leave some feedback

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   1. 89

      WryLiltposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      You're welcome.
      
      You need quite a bit of traffic to start getting sales...
      
      I sold 33 items last month with about 60 sales hubs.
      
      Maybe write some more sales hubs? I wrote 30 sales hubs in 30 days and that really upped my amazon sales.

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    IzzyMposted 13 years ago

    Signing up for an affiliate is easy. I already have an Amazon.co.uk affiliate but nowhere to sell their products.
    Might I point out too that amazon.co.uk effectively service the whole of Europe too. There are many native English speakers in Europe who buy their online products here simply because local language Amazon do not offer their site in English. Thinking here of amazon.de or amazon.fr
    I think this is not only a great idea of Ryan's, it is one that really should have been implemented already if it really is that easy to set up.

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       WryLiltposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       I have seen people mentioning that they leave can leave a hyperlink with the affiliate code saying something like "Click here to visit the Amazon UK site for some great deals." etc

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       1. 0

          ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          I have seriously considered that, in fact this thread is a last ditch attempt to persuade the powers that be to get this done properly.
          
          I don't utilise any of my 2 affiliate links in about 95%+ of my hubs, and linking to the UK Amazon is something that I would seriously consider moving towards next.

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          IzzyMposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Yeah I tried that once, but no-one clicked on the link
          They want a nice photo capsule to click on..

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11. 59

    paradigmsearchposted 13 years ago

    "Hubpages Owners PLEASE Consider This...."
    
    WOW! This is a major one HP! Get It Done!

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12. 0

    ryankettposted 13 years ago

    Should I get a pay rise for this
    
    I want 61% of impressions!

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    1. 59

       paradigmsearchposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       
       
       Yes!

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13. 61

    Ohmaposted 13 years ago

    Being in the U.S. it will not impact me much but if it can be set up and help our European Hubbers I think it should certainly be implemented.

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    1. 0

       ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       So how much of your traffic comes from the UK?
       
       What does your Analytics say? Because my British readers read the same articles as my American readers.
       
       It will benefit anybody with British traffic, which is sure to be all hubbers of any nationality or geographic location - including you.
       
       The UK has three times the population of New York state, like I said.... its a big market, and the population are big internet surfers and big internet shoppers.
       
       If you can sell stuff to UK and US readers through the same single Amazon capsule, then how can you not benefit? At least potentially? Your American visitors see the $ price, the UK visitors see the £ price, it is that simple. If the UK site doesn't stock the product, the UK visitors still see the $ price.

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          Ohmaposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Right now about 2% but I could if I had the opportunity gear more for that market.

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       thisisoliposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       It would increase your earnings jsut as much as european hubbers, you can join the UK amazon associates program just as europeans can join the US amazon associates program.

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    waynetposted 13 years ago

    I think it might be worth emailing this to Larry or Mr Deeds directly!!!....they might be knee deep in site code to peruse the forums!!

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       ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       What are the email addresses for Paul Deeds and Paul Edmondson? I will ping it across to them both.

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          waynetposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          Not sure....the hubpage email might do though....  team@hubpages.com

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          Maddie Ruudposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          I'll shoot it Deeds' way right now and save you the trouble.

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             ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

             Thanks, thats great Maddie
             
             Somewhere deep in my hotmail folders I do have his email address, you probably just saved me 15 minutes!

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                ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                Well, perhaps 60 seconds... I forgot about the contact option

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15. 85

    fritteritterposted 13 years ago

    Definitely a good idea for those who use search terms to power their Amazon widgets. For situations where you actually need to list specific products by ASIN, those ASIN numbers will generally be invalid on other Amazon marketplaces.
    
    The primary hurdle to add this feature is to identify what country the user is from in a way that will work at HubPages' scale. The task certainly cannot be underestimated, there is no automatic way to know from which country a web visitor hails, and frequent mistakes due to simplified detection would be bad. What works fine at the scale of a personal blog may be inappropriate for a site as large as HubPages.
    
    I am not sure there is any way to handle the ASIN differences without allowing one more specific query per item which would be too much overhead. If you use the Amazon widget with more than one product referenced by ASIN you're probably out of luck.

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    thisisoliposted 13 years ago

    I'm in full support of this, and mentioned it when I was down at the HPHQ.
    
    It is possible for keywords, however you would not be able to use the item picker, since Amazon uses differnt ASIN id's for each country.
    
    Keep an eye on the Amazon Link Localizer by the way, I had it leading a large number of visitors to dead links at one point (because it did not pull out the correct asin id's)

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17. 67

    lrohnerposted 13 years ago

    Hey Ryan, Great idea and I agree with you completely.
    
    Question...what I find really, really curious is the difference between your stats and mine. I know you're over in the UK and I'm in the US, but Hubpages is a dot-com so it shouldn't make a difference. A full 70% of my traffic is from the US and 8% from Canada. I only get a total of 12% from Australia/NZ/UK. Your visitors must be really, really scattered around the globe, no?

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       ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       Nope, although it may be my tendancy to write in British-English rather than American-English I may rank for English terms, not American. Probably the slang too, as well as the big 'Z' overdose

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          Bill Manningposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          There's a site I have that I'd just love to get much more UK traffic from. Not going to name it, but let's just say you Brits are more open minded to it. 
          
          However I just can't seem to get much UK traffic. Want to write some hot British text for me?

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             ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

             All you need Bill is a literate Brit to skim through your articles and change the AmericaniZms to AmericaniSms!
             
             In other words, getting somebody to write your articles is much more expensive than getting somebody to skim read and tweak them
             
             You need a British person* to edit not write, it would seriously take perhaps 5 mins max per article.
             
             So instead of getting somebody to spend an hour to write an article, they could edit 10-12 per hour!
             
             * A literate British person that is, not just any British person.

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                Bill Manningposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                Ahh yes, I see. Even whole names can have different meanings. Like in the UK, people who want to meet up just for fun use "contact sites".
                
                Whereas in the US they still use the term "dating service". I better not put anymore examples here.

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    CASE1WORKERposted 13 years ago

    I do agree. Not necessarily for sales although if someone would like to buy something..... but really for the reader experience. Imagine you are reading a good hub about the proverbial dingbats and you want one. There is one available , it is in the size and the colour that you want and is also biodegradable.There is a lovely photo of it on the hub and you want it... instead of just clicking the link you have to open up another tab and find amazon uk and then get depressed when you find out that the colour is not available in uk.. bad times!!

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    Bard of Elyposted 13 years ago

    This is a really great suggestion by Ryankett with which I agree too! I have found I hardly ever make anything from Amazon adds although eBay works for me.

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    Kangaroo_Jaseposted 13 years ago

    Ryan mentioned about UK numbers being three times NY state, but this is for those who want it in black and white. Work out your percentages over these numbers.
    
    Population estimated from Oct 7th 2010
    
    USA - 310 million
    UK - 62 million
    European Union (Excludes UK) - 440 million
    Canada - 34 million
    Australia - 22 million
    New Zealand - 4 million
    
    Consider that the internet has about 68% to 94% market penetration of these populations.....

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       Eaglekiwiposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Cool stats, much appreciated not bad for an Aussie boy. Ta.

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21. 0

    ryankettposted 12 years ago

    Further to this post, no reply yet
    
    Anyway, I understand that a localizer is only ever effective when using a keyword to display products.
    
    I have been thinking a little deeper about this, and think that I may have a solution.
    
    And that is for the hubber to be able to manually enter the ASIN/ISBN/URL for both the US and UK product (and the CA, AUS, NZ products if you want to go that far), and a system whereas it will display the product relevant to the viewer.
    
    E.g. a European or Irish shopper will see UK product/price, an American will see US price etc.
    
    So we manually insert URL for product, and all the code needs to do is figure out where the IP address is coming from. It then disregards the non-relevant ASIN/ISBN from the non-relevant fields and displays the geographically most suitable product (well the product will be the same of course, but the listing/price). If people only insert the ASIN for a US product, then this will still be the only one displayed for other regions. Perhaps we should all have to insert a US ASIN by default, in order to protect the sites existing revenues?
    
    I have no idea how this would be implemented, or how to write the code, but surely this is a possibility?
    
    I suspect that I may be wasting my time!

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    kephriraposted 12 years ago

    Hubpages really should do this. Whatever investment it needed for the programming would surely be paid back pdq.

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23. 65

    ns1209posted 12 years ago

    Any further news on this as it really needs to be done - I want to be able to sell football products to my UK readers!
    
    Seriously though, everyone would benefit and make more money as a result of this.

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       ryankettposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       Yes I followed up with an email to Paul Deeds.
       
       To summarise in my own little way..........
       
       He basically said that they have been considering taking steps to enable Amazon for other countries for a while.
       
       It is possible but it is complex and no quick job, they hope to having some changes in place with Amazon pre-holidays.
       
       Personally, I am happy enough with that answer. Even after Xmas would be fine with me
       
       EDIT: Sorry, didn't see Maddies response.

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    Maddie Ruudposted 12 years ago

    It's on our to-do list, guys.  We're waiting on a call with some Amazon people.  Not sure when it will be done, but rest assured it's on our radar.

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    ns1209posted 12 years ago

    Thanks for the reply!

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26. 60

    CYBERSUPEposted 12 years ago

    Hi Ryankett, I want to thank you very much for taking up alot of your time to educate we hubbers that are not very knowledgeable about the business end of HubPages. Ryankett, hope the right ear is comming along just fine.

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    1. 0

       ryankettposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       My ear is fine, thank you.
       
       I still have a dressing inside the ear canal, but that will be taken out Tuesday.
       
       No pain or discomfort anymore though, and it has definitely improved my hearing even with an ear full of bandage stuff.
       
       I find out on Tuesday how much my hearing has improved

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    Whitney05posted 12 years ago

    How would you differentiate a hub with amazon capsules for each location?

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       ryankettposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       That is the problem that they need to overcome.
       
       Well, the problem is that the ASIN number for a US product would not be the same for the identical product in the UK.
       
       So, basically it would only work when we use a keyword to select products rather than specific handpicked items. Unless the guys at Hubpages can pull a masterstroke and come up with a bit of genius somewhere.
       
       Even if geographical changes are not possible, I would still like the option to display and promote UK items when writing for the UK consumer.
       
       Maybe it would also be possible to insert the ASIN of both the UK and US product in each capsule, with the US product displayed for US and Canadian visitors (determined by IP) and the UK product displayed for visitors from the UK and Europe.
       
       That last option is my preferred route, maybe, just maybe, Hubpages are building something just like that and thus this explains the delays. Who knows.

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          ThomasEposted 12 years agoin reply to this

          Part of the delay is probably caused by negotiation between amazon.co.uk; hubpages would have to have a partnership agreement with them because they would need to access the Amazon.co.uk API, and given the size of hubpages this is potentially nontrivial at Amazon.co.uk's end.

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             thisisoliposted 12 years agoin reply to this

             The big issue is that the smae products on different Amazon Country sites have different ID's. I mentioned this to Hubpages when I was down in SF earlier last year!

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                ThomasEposted 12 years agoin reply to this

                It depends, thisisoli. If you want an all singing all dancing solution, then yes it is difficult.
                
                I just want to be able to use Amazon UK
                
                In a practical sense, you could get 85% of the benefit - the ability to earn money right now - by simply providing an Amazon UK capsule, where you enter the UK amazon ASIN manually.
                
                It's not elegant, but 90% of the solution is there, you just have to write code that shows the UK amazon for sites with UK and european IP addresses.

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    Uzdawiposted 12 years ago

    Are there any updates on this?

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29. STAFF

    Paul Edmondsonposted 12 years ago

    We are working with Amazon on this and I expect we will have a solution this year (I hope).
    
    With all the ideas and we love them, can you send us some engineering resumes as well:)

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       andyozposted 12 years agoin reply to this

       That's great news!  I've not been here long but have already noticed that about 30% of my readers are from the UK, so this would be a big help to me.

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    EBAY_SOURCERERposted 12 years ago

    I just discovered this problem with Amazon.co.uk ads not being listed and I have been using my Amazon.co.uk Affiliate Id for a while now. I also could not publish an article because I had 4 links to Amazon in the text; 2 to co.uk and 2 to.com. Now if HB has no affilliation with the Amazon.co.uk side of business...why should they include the co.uk links into the limits for text links. I have 5 or 6 to wikipedia and 5 or6  to another article site they get passed for publication...why take away my right to lead people to the Amazon.Co.uk site. They will still have their 40% of the impressions with their pub numbers. I don't see where it is any conflict if I can manually do what they cannot through script.

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    Notrumposted 12 years ago

    I agree.

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