Internet Marketer Speaks Out: SEO Linkvine Sucks…
May 15, 2010 by Big Internet Marketing
Filed under Product Reviews
I am becoming very upset with the hype and dress-up in the internet marketing world… especially when marketers I respect, such as Brad Callen, come out with turkeys such as SEOLinkVine.
Brad has had some great stuff over the years, such as Keyword Elite and KE2.0, Seo Elite, and a few more. Naturally, I expect this to be a good product as well.
Sadly, despite all my experience as a marketer, who can see through the hype of a sales page (because I am trained to create buzz and hype myself – but ALWAYS ethically in something I believe in), I really fell for this piece of junk. I mean, I took the bait… hook, line and sinker.
After making an effort with SEO LinkVine for a week or so, I requested a refund. And in the comments page, here’s how I motivated my refund request.
“Very SLOW. The application often hangs when switching between article viewing and article editing.
Also, too reliant on external input for success (i.e., your content must be “approved” manually by other webmasters). A week into the service I still had 28 pending requests for publishing. Sorry, but that’s just not my way of working. Software and services are supposed to speed things up… not slow them down.
I had exceptional quality content I had HAND written, and HAND coded the respin parameters to ensure readability, as well as uniqueness, yet still had articles turned down. The ToS states no reason has to be given, and you don’t know where your content goes (to protect privacy… which is BS, because one need only take a unique, unspun sequence from the article, and search for it in “” to see where it’s posted).
The spinner itself is abysmal. I have never worked with such an awful spinner. It finds very little to spin, and then suggests words that are for the most part entirely irrelevant. I have personally spent HOURS HAND CODING all my spinning, to ensure a good article… evidence the fact that that I have article uniqueness ranging from 64% to 72% – ALL preserving exceptional readability and flow.
Very disappointing. Slow, clunky, too reliant on outsiders, and the spinner is god awful. A real turkey.”
Now, I wonder what Brad would say about it. Actually, come to think of it… personally, I really don’t care. I don’t need SEOLinkVine. It’d have been handy, sure, if it lived up to the hype promised on the sales page. But I do just fine without.
So after a disappointing (and seriously overpriced) run with IMEye, from two otherwise brilliant marketers, now it’s the turn of Brad Callen and SEO LinkVine.
And I just don’t get it. As more and more people turn to the Internet to make money online, you’d figure “gurus” would make the effort to step up their game, creating
better and better products.
Alas, it seems they want to take the easy way out, create a turkey, and say, “Happy Thanksgiving” to newbies who don’t know any better. Kinda proves how much more polluted the (online marketing) world is becoming, with every passing day.
My advice? Don’t believe the hype. Always exercise due diligence. Look past the big numbers. Think how this can benefit you in YOUR context and in YOUR application of the product.
Lastly, don’t forget… it’s YOUR money, and who has the money makes the rules. Get that refund, if the product stinks.
-Josh Harris
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Hi Josh, thanks a lot – I sort of saw the writing on the wall for this one and didn’t bother getting it, but it’s good to know that I got it right this time. Only reason I was tempted was because I got a mail from George Jones (I think) whose other stuff has seemed worthwhile. As you indicate, it seems there is an inner circle of guys who have made it who are ganging up to rook the newbies. My only regret is that I have just started a blog at clickbankrefunds.com to target these folks, but you are exposing their shortcomings so much better (don’t bother looking, only one post so far).
I did of course buy Miracle Traffic Bot and CB Predators and wish I hadn’t -cancelled my subscriptions and will probably get refunds. If you’re looking for a good spinner that also signs up, confirms and submits to hundreds of article directories, you should definitely take a look at Article Marketing Robot by Vince Severson (and I deliberately don’t give my afflink so you know I’m not just spamming you). My article about traffic-annihilator is sitting above the t-a vendors own home page thanks to an article blast a few days ago. And I have always been able to maintain readability and coherence of the articles, even when spinning 500 unique versions (look for any article by Mark Goodmane to see).
Anyway, enough rambling – Good job, look forward to your next commentary.
Fortunately I never paid a dime because I signed up to receive content on one of my blog sites. It’s a shame you and I didn’t cross paths, because I was chomping at the bit to get good original content.
Out of the first 10 articles I received, I had to reject all 10 because they were about 2% unique. Oddly enough, SLV showed the articles as 70% – 84% unique. My favorite was an article where the only thing that was different from the original article (which I found on 4 other sites) was the word “teeth” was replaced with “tooth.” So I hope my readers were not disappointed that they never got to read about how, “Everyone loves to show their bright white tooth when they smile…” article.
So put me down in the “SEO Link Vine” sucks category.