Avoid eHow Article Deletion

Anyone active in the eHow community undoubtedly noticed that today there was another round of article sweeps (some call this eHow purging). Basically eHow goes through some of the How To's on the site and removes ones that don't conform to it's terms of use or make some other violations.

I personally lost a handful of articles, although nothing high earning so that was good. And while I don't have backups of the ones that were removed, I don't doubt that at least most of them probably had it coming.

Here are my thoughts on how to avoid eHow article deletion based on the most common mistakes that I have seen eHow members make (myself included). These principles should be applied both to new eHows you are writing as well as existing articles to ensure they don't get removed.

1. Make sure your article is truly a How To- It's not uncommon to think of a great topic for an article in general and then try to cram it into a how to format. eHow considers these "informational" articles rather than How To tutorials and will remove them. Make sure that your eHows follow a step by step procedure. To be safe, I always like to start steps with words such as "First", "Next", "Now", "After", etc....basically words that imply an order or time.
2. Good grammar- This one is a no brainer but probably everyone is guilty of submitting articles without truly proofreading it.
3. Avoid overly obvious topics- Anyone reading this site may notice a potential contradiction here as recently I preached about not overlooking easy/obvious eHows. But if you read closely I note that I don't advocate articles such as "How To Tell What Time It Is" or "How To Know If You Have To Go #2". Remember: you want to write about things that people are likely to search for on the internet (Google). If it's overly obvious, people will probably not search for it.
4. Avoid repeat topics- Unless your article is significantly different, don't write a "How To Stay Out of Debt" or "How To Lose Weight". Even if it is a new take on it, it still is at high risk removal.

I agree with those who think that when done right, these eHow purges serve everyone well. By maintaining the quality of the site they maintain eHow's Google authority. Additionally, if eHow becomes known as a spammy, garbage site people will learn not to click on eHow search results even if they do show up.

I look at it this way: Worst case I lose a number of articles that shouldn't have been on the site in the first place. I know some people have lost their highest earning article which really sucks, but look at it this way: At least you made some money with an article that should never have been on the site in the first place. Unless of course eHow wasn't justified in removing that particular article...and we'll leave it at that.

Captain eHowie Mandel