Squidoo gets the Google Slap and Cracks Down

[Linda Buquet]

Have been reading lots about the Squidoo crackdown on spam.
As it always happens after the spammers find a hole and start abusing the system,
it makes it harder for honest marketers to even use ethical marketing.

They have already implemented many new spam control measures that could impact you even if you are not a spammer. Among other things - no more iframes and also if you have a new lens you need to have more than 3 modules (not including the introduction) or it will not appear to be publicly published, even if it has been.

If you have a new Squidoo Lens or are considering one - read these posts.

"The lab has been investigating the recent drop in ranking for Squidoo lenses in Google?s search engine results. It appears that as of the 7th of July nearly all Squidoo lenses have dropped in ranking in the Google search engines. There is a lot of speculation in various forums at present (including Squidoo?s own SquidU forum) but the reasons are uncertain."
Source: Squidoo Slap!!

"Squidoo is growing by leaps and bounds, and with success also comes trouble. Spamming is a hot topic right now, and I just wanted to post a quick note to let everyone know what we?re doing to cope with the problem."
Source: SquidBlog ? An update on spam (including iframes)http://www.squidoo.com/blog/?p=155

"In last week?s post I mentioned that we?re embarking on an exciting, proactive approach to combating spam at Squidoo. We?ve learned two things in the last ten days or so: First, that spammers will flock when they find a hole they can exploit, and second that our users and others are incredibly helpful in finding the holes and working with us to plug them.

At the heart of our new efforts are six new structural changes that we?ll be focusing on over the next week or two..."
Source: SquidBlog ? Fighting Spam, part II

 

[ayushpant]

Good one Linda. I was considering to use Squidoo as a way to promote couple of my websites. I will see how this story develops further before I invest my time and energy into Squidoo.

 

[ayushpant]

I read what SquidBlog had to say about fighting spam. I like the Step 2 i.e humans reviewing each and every lens. But, at the same time I wonder that it will result in significant delays unless Squidoo has tons of people working on reviewing lenses.

Also, with the Google Slap Squidoo just suffered, I can only wonder if its really worth it to create a Squidoo lens. Its really strange that one moment you are on top, and the next moment you are no where. Too bad, Squidoo had to suffer from the wrath of the mighty Google.

Lets wait and watch for now I guess.

 

[Linda Buquet]

I read on another blog that a guy that had lots of legit lens kept seeing them disappear. He thought he was toast. They they gradually came back live so he surmised something triggered the auto algo, then after a human reviewed they were revived.

I also don't know how bad the Google slap was
or if it was just a temporary algo oops.
So I'd do more research before discounting the option.

I read that HubPages had to tighten up too.
Durned spammers and porn peddlers ruin it for everyone!

I think there is still value in both though, but on the net the good stuff
doesnt last forever. Blogger was a gold mine at 1st too.

 

[ayushpant]

Blogger was a gold mine at 1st too.

This is so true!!!! Wordpress came along and is way better than blogger. I see so many wannabes on Blogger (same goes for the free wordpress too) who have no idea what they are doing and just spamming people unknowingly or knowingly.

I am sure that very often you come across people on social sites like orkut who'd just type in their blog address on your scrapbook asking you to visit and are either trying to make money off of google adsense or some affiliate offer.

What they don't realize is that blogger or free wordpress is not taken seriously anymore. And ofcourse, thee are better ways to market your website.

 

[Teli]

It's no surprise that this happened. Every good thing that comes along is laid to waste by spammers and it ruins it for everyone.

As for the human review, I believe the lense only receives a human review if one of the computer algos gets tripped so it shouldn't take long to create a lense (as long as you don't set off any alarms).

Just checked my lenses and they're just fine. Of course, my lenses do contain helpful information and aren't spammy in the least. LOL Basically, you can still use Squidoo to market your website or blog, you just need to be smart about it.

~ Teli

 

[its_me_shaners]

Squidoo getting spanked for spam?

If you have bought the latest Blogging to bank book, you'll know that rob benwell uses Suidoo to drive traffic to his blog, Well the gig "apparently is up" turns out the lots of Blackhatters have *****ed things up for squidoo.
And google is now apprently de-indexing the squidoo pages for abuse and spam, too bad really because up until now it was working like a charm.
This comes from tech crunch.

The reports indicate that some Squidoo pages have seen a 75% drop in traffic, and in other cases have either been removed from high ranking positions on Google, or removed all together.​

Read the whole story here : Google Acting Against Squidoo Due To Spam

 

[Linda Buquet]

Ya I saw the Tech Crunch article because I saw a TRACKBACK.
They linked to my blog post in their story.

WHOOHOO love it when I get a link from a PR8 site!
Check out all the other trackbacks form people that picked up the story!
Some are direct pickups, but most of them are other blogs that syndicate
Techcrunch and picked up my link because it was in the TechCrunch article.

SORRY - little sidebar on the wonders of the blogosphere and how one little blog entry can go a little viral.

Back on topic, if I get time later this week I want to try to do a little more research on this. If you guys pick up any other news on this, please add it below.

 

[AffiliateGuild]

Squidoo Lens and Spam

Hmmm, I've been reading a lot about Squidoo lately.
I guess we'll just always see the Internet as this ever changing
thing that's driven really ... by the spammers, and the crackers,
and the hackers. Geez, they sound like lunch food!

Thanks for keeping us posted on the events as they unfold.

 

[its_me_shaners]

THis maybe sort of along the lines of this post, as it concerns spammers andh Black Hatters. ChrisG Has a post on the topic of no-follow for comments
Comment Spammers the End of Do-Follow Movement? @ chrisg.com
Im in an unsual position because a good friend of mine is a black hatter splogger, spammer and hacker. And to boot hes a govt It security specialist. our govt employs hackers too funny.
He is what I define as an internet Anarchist. For them its a system to game and the bigger ones can direct traffic PR at will. Which is part and parcel of the game they play. I asked him about squidoo and the SE's heres what he said. (i'll summarize it, because he said something i think is very true- even for a spammer)
In his words "if the dumb*** webmasters new what they were doing and gave a **** about the products and people they were serving then this sort of thing wouldnt happen, add to that the fact that google has share holders to please and allows this to happen makes you wonder"
Just a little insight into the convoluted brain of a spammer

 

[Linda Buquet]

If you are a member of Squidoo you probably got this email from Seth.
In case you didnt see it....

FYI check out the list of 100 dream topics below. Could be some good niche ideas.

This is the first time I've been able to send a thank you letter to 70,000 people at the same time, and despite the mass nature of it, I hope you can understand how sincere I am in writing to you.

Since we went live with Squidoo just over a year ago, we (okay YOU) have done some amazing things:
* We've built more than 100,000 helpful pages, pages that make it easy for people to learn about new stuff online.
* We've raised a bunch of money for charity. We've built a school in Cambodia, funded scholarships for inner-city kids and done research on juvenile diabetes.
* We've built a community of really cool, extremely smart people who spend most of their time helping each other.

I couldn't be more proud of it.

Last week, a few dozen spammers exploited Squidoo and drove the rest of the Web crazy. They spammed tens of thousands of blogs and built thousands of worthless lenses, violating our Terms of Service with reckless abandon. One spammer in La Paz, Bolivia built more than 400 lenses in one day on exactly the same topic. Sheesh.

Since then, search traffic to Squidoo was also impacted, as was our ability to post on blog comments or some social networking sites.

Here's the great news: thanks to terrific work by Gil, Corey and Megan, we've eliminated the tools that bad actors used to damage the rest of us. We've also added a squadron of people who hand review lenses, and we?ve made it easier for you (and anyone else) to report spam.

I'm confident that as the web sees that the problem is solved, we'll be back on track, and searchers online will continue to discover your good lenses.

In the meantime, the very best thing we can do is what we've always done: build great lenses (by hand) and promote them (by hand) to people who want to hear about them.

Thanks again for the great work, for the enthusiasm and for your desire to help.

Seth and the SquidTeam


P.S. Feel like building a new lens? Here's a list Megan and I put together of 100 dream topics.

A Thousand Splendid Suns
Adrianna Costa
Akon
All Natural Vintage Oolong Tea
Authority
Back to Black, by Amy Winehouse
Bebo
Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans
Bon Jovi
Can Stress Turn Your Hair White?
Canon Digital Rebel XTi
Canon PowerShot A550
Canon PowerShot Pro Series
Carrie Fisher
Christopher Hitchens (Author)
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
Cloverfield
Conn Iggulden
Copyblogger
Crash
Cynthia Nixon
Dailymotion
Daniel Radcliffe
Descargar
Die Hard
E.T.
Easy Tiger, Ryan Adams
Eat, Pray, Love
Facebook
Fergie
Film-Noir
Flip Video Camcorder
Fred Claus
Galilea Montijo
Garry Marshall
Get Smart With Steve Carell
Guitar Hero T-Shirts
Hairspray, the Movie
Hannah Montana
Hot Fuzz
Hotel Rwanda
Hoteldipity
I Know Who Killed Me
Icky Thump
Instant Karma: The Amnesty International Campaign to Save Darfur
Is My Boyfriend Making Me Fat?
John Krasinski
Khaled Hosseini
Kim Catrall
License to Wed
Lifehacker
Little Miss Sunshine
Live Earth
Mallu
Maroon 5
Michael Bay
Michael Patrick King
Mr. and Mrs. Smith
My favorite Whole Foods foods
My Mother is Driving me to Drink!
Naruto
Nikon D40 6.1MP Digital SLR Camera
Noelia video
Our Love to Admire, by Interpol
Pamela Anderson
Paris Hilton
Photobucket
Problogger
Ratatouille
Rihanna
Rocky
Ron Paul
Sellendipity
Serendipity 3 Frrrozen Hot Chocolate, Yum!
Shakira
Sicko
Skyblog
So You Think You Can Dance
The 4-Hour Workweek
The 5-Factor Diet
The Dangerous Book for Boys
The Diana Chronicles
The Host
The Huffington Post
The Martha's Vineyard Diet Detox
The Simpsons, the movie
The Truth About My No or Low Carb Diet
Tina Brown
Traveling Wilburys
Truthiness
Unlock Your Creativity
Untitled JJ Abrams movie
Vitter
Water for Elephants
What is the Craziest thing you Have Ever Done in a Car
Yahoomail
Zeitgeist, by The Smashing Pumpkins
10 Places to See in Canada Before You Die
10 Places to See in the UK Before You Die
10 Places to See in the US Before You Die

 

[John Guanzon]

I don't think it is all that big of a deal, basically all they did was take away the ability to use iframes, plus Google rankings were hurt a bit.

The drop in lens rank is due to a change in the alg most likely due to the amount of lenses that were dropped and removed in one fell swoop.

It is still a very viable form of advertising and a great Google ranking tool. The best thing to do is adapt to the new structure and continue promoting and building them while continuing to make the best of it.

 

[its_me_shaners]

What I also think about this is that this is a growing pain for squidoo. Maybe its the real birth of squidoo. Seriously I can only imagine what kind of traffic Squidoo has gotten after Google eats squidoo sushi and gets indigestion | make money blogging

I'll bet people are arriving on Squidoo's door step looking for a great sushi feast now. I wonder if anyone has approached Seth about the traffic as a result of this. It always seems in IM that bad news is the ugly cousin of success.
Lynda do you have an in with seth and maybe get some thoughts or even a traffic result from all the buzz?

 

[Linda Buquet]

That graphic is TOO funny!

I saw the heading in my feed reader but had not clicked over to see it.
They linked to my blog about it too.

SIDEBAR BLOGGING TIP: You just never know what will go viral. I thought about writing this story. Then decided not to and tried to find something better to talk about that day. Struck out, so came back to this story. Sometimes the stories that I think are going to be really popular don't make a splash and the ones that I dont even think will be that popular go crazy.

So are 2 possible lessons for you all to learn from this...

1) Either Linda's hot news radar is broken
OR
2) Blog about everything you can come up with and something will stick!

Take your pick!

 

[its_me_shaners]

LOL glad you like it lynda. I saw the picture of the sushi, while multi-tasking while I was reading earnersblog, while I was reading a lego instruction manual while I was having my hookers breakfast (Phew I'm exhausted just thinking about multi tasking), and thought Oh man that's just priceless, so I blinged it up with the squidoo image. and posted away.
hangs head in shame, WHAT YOU DONT RECOGNIZE MY TRACKBACK
Always happy to send link loving THE BEST AFFILIATE FORUM on the net today!!