Zeal and Google ads

[James]

Just uncovered this discussion between two Zeal editors about my site!

Looks like they're not clear themselves if Google Ads constitutes "commercial".

I'm not going to remove Google Ads, I'll see what their decision is first. If they reject I will attempt a post to point out that loads of sites already in Zeal have Google Ads and see what they say.

This is the perfect category for my site - fingers crossed.

http://www.zeal.com/users/feedback.jhtml?u...sortProperties= (http://www.zeal.com/users/feedback.jhtml?uid=24658&bid=2222458&type=&mid=128911&cid=&wid=&view=discussion&sortProperties=)

[Tom]

Very interesting. They rejected me as 'commercial' and I took this to be my Google ads. Maybe it was the CDs I sell. The number is way down on what it used to be and I have no idea why. Maybe I have satisfied 90% of world demand!

[David]

But Tom you are listed in Zeal, in fact you have 9 listings there in total, the first one posted in June 2000 by Looksmart. I'd say you were doing pretty well. Did you edit the listings yourself?

[Tom]

Thanks, I did not know that! Only one of the entries was entered by me - they let it slip through. The trouble with 7 of the 9 is that they are to unimportant pages.

By the way, I have a competitor gardens-guide.com (http://gardens-guide.com/). They seem to have put up the site as a means of advertising their gardens tours. But they have done a better job than me in obtaining consistent information on the gardens they list and, more to the point, in persuading garden owners to give them return links. I guess they put a secretary on the job of phoning each garden. Since I am almost a non-user of the telephone I have never done this. Maybe I should put an Indian call centre on the job! I certainly need to keep an eye on them.

BTW again, yesterday's bombs had a dire effect on my traffic. Maybe the Chinese float of the renminbi also had an effect. Sounds far-fetched but American consumer confidence is thought to have been hit.

[James]

Zeal have decided that I have "too many" Google ads and I guess I'll be rejected.

http://www.zeal.com/users/feedback.jhtml?u...sortProperties= (http://www.zeal.com/users/feedback.jhtml?uid=24658&bid=2222458&type=&mid=128911&cid=&wid=&view=discussion&sortProperties=)

This just furthers my disillusionment with Zeal. Their rules are unclear, and they are slow to respond to submissions. I appreciate the directory is edited by humans which is good, but what checks do they have to monitor sites in the future for breaking their rules? I could remove the Google ads, get listed, and put them back on. I bet they never check again!

:angry:

[James]

Despite that last post they approved me!

http://www.zeal.com/category/manage.jhtml?cid=1152151

Just dmoz to crack now.