Gardening Hubs, Will They Compete?

For the most part I moved my gardening topic hubs to my own sites, some still not re-published, yet. But for those still onsite only one has been moved to the home and garden niche site.

That has been disappointing.

Recently Hubpages instituted the addition of a small number of pages that can be submitted for review (the numbers are limited).

You can only submit one article every 60 days.

I chose to submit a garden article that had once been popular, but since it's been on Hubpages main site, has taken a drastic downturn in traffic.

An English Cottage Garden Isn't For Everybody

I haven't heard back from the editors yet.

Few Staff Members Vs Huge Backlog

The source of the lengthy time in pages moving to the niche sites may be due to the fact that it has proved a daunting job for the staff. They recently added more moderators/curators to facilitate editing and moving hubs to the new sites.

The pages that are desired for those are highly different from those that worked previously and this also may explain why older pages aren't accepted.

Can My Garden Pages Compete If They stay On Hubpages?

The question I ask myself is whether my articles compete for attention best while on Hubpages or when moved to my garden blog or website.

Google still penalizes Hubpages deeply. And that is th esource of woes for any writer who stayed the course, there.

Notice that my number of hubs dropped from over 216 to 145 (I have since written some new ones). That was quite a few articles to update, reformat, and publish!

Articles Moved To Ilona's Garden Journal

Garden Furniture For Outdoor Living

An Arboretum Can Save Time And Dollars

Cottage Garden Revival

Why Plant A Bulb Garden?

Firepit Conversations

Cottage Garden Accessories

Create A Child's Garden

Gourd Gardening

Scrapbook Garden Journal

Ornamental Trees Ideal For A Small Yard

Flowering Hanging Planters

Gifts For the Jolly Gardener

Mini Course In Landscaping 101

Flowers Of Monet's Giverny

Considered Raising Peafowl?

Posts On Ilona's Garden

Standout Front Yard Curb Appeal

Everything You Want To Know About Rock Gardening

Going Native In The Garden

Perennial Tulips For Long Lasting Beauty

Garden Hoes

Grilled Salmon With Herbes Provence

Hardy Prairie Plants

All Pink Garden Plan

There may be more coming....

since here are the articles still on Hubpages:

Hubpage Garden Articles

A Basic Guide To Essential Garden Tools For Beginners
Garden Journal Ideas: Keep An Important Landscaping Record
How Did I Live Without A Leaf Vacuum?
Bring All Season Color Into Your Garden For Gorgeous Effect
Birdbaths and Feeders Make Ornamental Garden Features For The Birds
The Top Perennial Flower Garden Books
Saxon Holt, Garden Photographer Extraordinaire
Homesteader Heirloom Apples and Real Cider
Dirt Cheap Garden Ideas
Fairy Sized Specie Tulips, Tulip Wildlings
Follow 3 Easy Steps For Spring Flowering Bulbs

The trouble is that I get almost 0 views daily on many of them. For instance, the Specie tulip page gets only about 7 in a month. That makes it a candidate for moving to my own website. I may not get alot more views, but it adds to the overall value of my own website.

If a page moves onto the niche site, Dengarden, the story is different.
The one page that moved, 10 Best Perennials receives 190 visits a day on average.

So far, the niche sites compete, but I am not competitive enough to be stationed on them to any great degree.

The focus going forward is to write more for my own web properties, since they were badly neglected over the years I participated on Squidoo/Hubpages.

Hubpages Hobble Along

Working online

The newest thing at Hubpages was the introduction of "Niche sites". Separated into new sites that center on a group of related topics, this has worked out for the site to something of an improvement so far, at least Google is friendlier to them than the main site.

For me, it has worked out middling well. Probably middling because they greatly slowed the inclusion of hubs, and after having only four moved from the more than 140 I have on the site. For those with more of their pages moved the results are likely much better.

The income improved a great deal after the niche sites were begun. Which wasn't hard, considering the hubs were down to pennies before the switch.

Sites Moved

Based on traffic numbers, only the most popular sites tended to be moved (after editors were through).

Of mine these are the ones that were chosen from the main site:

• Stunning Silver Hair
• Flattering  Summer Fashions For Over Fifty 
• 10 Best Perennials For Your Garden

Tightening Control

Along with the niche sites, rules were implemented and strictly enforced. All in the hopes of enticing Google to more kindly view them, I've understood from the forum discussions.

Cutting away the Amazon modules has been high priority.

Submitting to editing by unknown persons is another. While it is stated that writers have a choice whether to abide by the changes to their articles, the reality is that punishment is severe enough that it is a right in word only, not reality. Banishment from the niche sites or "un-featuring" altogether.

The Main Site

Most of my writing remains on the main site, which struggle to get any traffic whatsoever for individual articles. Not that the site structure helps. It is very hard to find anything except the front page featured stuff.

Promises are made to to include more pages within the niche sites, but it is slow going for many like me. Some of the more senior members of Hubpages report many of their pages moved, but I notice the forums have quieted to almost a whisper about the changes. 

New Work?

The conditions are not conducive to new work, but I wrote a few when I had time (My work has switched to improving my own sites, and moving rejected (repeatedly unfeatured) articles to them.

Of the new articles I wrote,

• Best British Detective Shows
• Best Female Centric Detective Shows
• Hungarian Pysanky

only the "Best Female British Detective Shows" made it to one of the new sites.

Most people on the site are "wait and see", but many are writing new articles. 

I spend most of my time there tending my older work, trying to learn about what works for online writing and reading in the forum.

I won't put lion shares of time in, as I did at Squidoo , until it appears to be worthwhile in terms of income. Income, because links are frowned upon, and it does not benefit my work elsewhere. I also do not find the community to be as satisfying as Squidoo. Perhaps I do not understand the culture of it, yet.

That is the report on the Hubpage experience to date. Stay tuned for future reports.

A Second Hubpages Account

I started at Hubpages just briefly before it absorbed the Squidoo enterprise. By default I found myself with two accounts.

This was by no means an unusual thing at either Squidoo or Hubpages, since writers for various reasons would have multiple ID's on these sites. I, however, found it cumbersome.

My List Of Cons For Having Multiple Accounts

I have personal list of "Cons" to argue against the idea:

1. It takes a certain amount of pages, written and featured, to earn enough money for a payout. This was true even before the ad amounts took a permanent dive for everyone.
2. Community participation is counted in profile ranking and it is frowned upon to use more than one for forum participation. This is more of an inconvenience than anything else.
3. I didn't divide topics clearly between profiles. This was result of not foreseeing the merger of Hubpages and Squidoo. Later, pages could not be transferred between the two without consequences.
4. It is just plain inefficient and became more so as Hubpages implemented changes in a fast and furious way.

Why It May Have Once Been A Good Idea

When writers wanted a particular niche domination, I suppose the separated accounts might have made sense, but in today's HP, the matter is moot. All pages are subsumed into the profile of the main site and now divied up into the new niche sites they are developing. A writers identity makes no difference in Google under this system. (As far as I can tell...)

Going Forward

In promoting and linking to pages I have tended to ignore the first, somewhat abandoned, Hubpages account; and now I think I should list those pages on my page list, here.

Since so many of the articles had to be moved to my personal sites, I will probably do this eventually with all those on the duplicate profile. They are languishing in this small profile that never really got off the ground (although I think their writing is better, and they adhere more closely to what HP advocates).

The primary account I have is "Ilonagarden", the first, though secondary in participation, is "Ilona1".

I will list the second accounts pages on my Page in this site, today.

Yay Or Nay

I think in today's HP environment it is bad advice to open more than one account. It is debatable whether the one will be useful going forward. It is a losing proposition to try to get into the niche accounts at this time, although it is early days on these huge changes to how the site functions.

Time is better spent developing your own site at this time.

I hope this review and advice is helpful to you if you are considering working on Hubpages, joining, or trying to decide what to do with your own multiple accounts.

After A Long Hiatus, New Hubs

Hungarian Embroidery

I took an enforced, very long, hiatus on Hubpages in the past year. With all their changes, the many, many articles that slipped into un-featured status, along with numerous ones that had been actually in violation, I had my work cut out for me.

It had gotten to the place where I didn't feel I could confidently write there.

I had no idea what the standards were. I stopped writing, worked and reworked pages just trying to get them "featured" (acceptable and searchable on the site).

The New "HubPro" Edits

Then I ran into trouble with their new fangled "editing". That made me angry, as someone jimmied with my most popular and lucrative (in terms of Amazon sales) Hub. Well, she (unknown editor) fixed my wagon... as soon as I returned the page to pre-edited state she unfeatured it- permanently.

I ended up writing my own edits and updates (I was appalled at what had happened to it as I tried to "please" the powers that be on Hubpages). Rewrote substantial parts because I couldn't let it stay in the horrible shape it had deteriorated into, caused I suppose with all the "updating". This consists of moving modules out of sequence and there were unknown changes that were out of character for me.

It almost seemed like someone rewrote inside the content, someone with a poor grasp of the English language. But then I thought that I was being paranoid, and that somehow there was another explanation for the poor writing.

Even though it was a piece I had worked on quite a bit over a long period of time ( that tends to "work out" the typos and mistakes).

All that, along with the determination to try to understand their criteria, brought a complete cessation to new writing.

I spent huge amounts of time reading their tips and advice in their blog and on the forums (mostly the forums). I remained very uncertain about what was finally acceptable.

Until now.

I felt I could write and get featured so I tentatively wrote one hub on Hungarian Embroidery, generally, and another focusing on the region of Kalocsa. But until the site changes are in place, again I must try to work on my own sites and move articles off of Hubpages.

Here are my two new Hubs:

The New Hubs

• Folklore Fantasia: Bright And Bold Hungarian Embroidery
• Embroidery Of Kalocsa

The good news is those two hubs were well received and featured. So far. I feel good about them as articles.


Pass the nuts, please.

Hubpage: Every Day Is A Struggle

A struggle to raise the profile number that keeps falling, to keep the hubs featured, to transfer writing from their format to a blog. Every. Single. Day.

 Every once in awhile the site gives me a request to know if I will recommend Hubpages to others. I ignore it. "Not now", is the answer I would have to give. I wouldn't do this to my friends.

The income is pennies and the workload has become almost unreasonable. My own nature is to tackle unreasonable tasks just to see if I can overcome the challenge of it... but not recommend it to others. 

Hubpages Has Become One Big Struggle

In trying to jump through the many hoops which do not seem to be enumerated for members of the site, I have ceased the actual writing.

I think I would feel better if I could write something and have it be acceptable enough to be featured. 

Part of the problem is what is used to evaluate the hubs. Mturk hires and robots, neither of which are good with the use of the English language it seems.

To be fair, when reworking my removed material I have had to rewrite some of it for my own satisfaction and standards. I edit regularly anyway, so that is part of my process and not something I am complaining about.

But There are strange things that seem to happen with my writing at the site. I don't like the edits that others make, and the system seems to promote nonsensical moving around of the various capsules. 

This Is A Rant

I don't mean to... but really so much is awry at Hubpages at the moment. And I am a bit weary of the struggle.

On the bright side.... it forced me to start working more on my writing and on building my own sites. That process had started with Squidoo.

For example sake I will list a couple of the Hubs that are totally unfeatured (have an empty circle next to them), followed by those unfeatured for lack of traffic, and a list of my top five featured hubs.

UnFeatured Top 5

1. Wedding Flowers For Each Month
2. Arabian Nights Halloween Costumes
3. Woodland Christmas Decor
4. Jamie Lee Curtis Good Looks
5. Helen Mirren's Style

UnFeatured For Low Traffic Top 5

1. Grandma Moses' Holiday Paintings
2. Costumes For The Christmas Play
3. Decorating Ideas For Christmas
4. The Cutest Christmas Teddy Bears
5. Irish Claddagh Gifts

Featured Top 5

1. Silver Fox Hair Styles
2. Middle Eastern Tattoos
3. Flattering Summer Fashions for Women Over Fifty
4. More Silver Fox Hairstyles
5. How To Write Thank You Notes

That should give you an idea of the different types of ratings I have in my Hubpage profile.

Some of these are topics I would not have written about, but prompts and contests on Squidoo inspired them. Some came from writing ideas ( like lots of articles that completely explore one niche).

I believe many more of my hubs will become unfeatured if I touch them (updates). Updates trigger the quality process. If they have Amazon capsules ( sometimes even one will cause a problem), or the topic is not liked... which is the situation with some that I permanently moved.

My plan is to completely reduce the number of hubs that keep on having problems and eventually replace them with newly written topics that are tailored for Hubpages liking ( for however long that lasts) just to see if I can do it. Sort of a "crack the code" challenge.

In the meantime, a lot of work ahead in trying to salvage the many hours spent in producing content and interesting articles for Squidoo/Hubpage consumption.

Was It All for Naught?

No. I learned things that many pay good money to learn. I paid in effort and time, which would be required anyway (maybe not quite so much of it, however!)

And don't forget... I did earn some money along the way. It paid for my hosting and domain names for a couple years.

Now, the cheese has moved and I need to find where today's cheese is stashed.

The Big News For Squidoo and Hubpages

You probably heard it already:

 Squidoo Folds Doors, Hubpages Welcomes A Squatload of Squids

Yes, I went to my dashboard on Squidoo and found that they had announced "the good news."

Everything should be moved by October.

Lucky for me I had been trying out Hubpages and dipped my toe into the waters earlier last year. Now I must handle two different profiles since the changeover won't accomodate the lenses from Squidoo going into the present Hubs profile.

Yet, I am taking it in stride and created some new articles under my new profile, Ilonagarden on HubPages. I started this new blog to replace Ilona1Squidoo. That will remain as an archive.

My older profile will continue to be developed,Ilona1 on HubPages.

Welcome to the new world!

First hub up, an article about the marketing know-how learned from time spent on Squidoo