What makes a good Hub? Can we have some more engagement please?
HubPage veterans should know
By now some of the old-timers and seasoned veteran Hubbers should know what makes a good Hub but for the newbies it must be a real struggle with which I can fully sympathise! For team Hubpages are having enough problems themselves trying to get this website to how it once was so surely we shouldn't be too hard on them?
Engagement - what does this mean?
Time and time again my Hubs have been unfeatured because they no longer have the engagement factor needed. What this means is that you need your viewers (if you can hopefully get any) engaging with the context of your Hub. You need comments, Likes, people responding to polls.
So add a poll. Ask some simple questions about the subject of your Hub. Don’t be afraid to get the ball rolling by answering this yourself. Just remember you need that engagement and without it the HubPage ‘Powers-that-Be’ will find fault with what you posted. It needs to get the public reacting and contributing!
Quality
Quality is another very important factor of making a good Hub and not a mediocre one that deserves to be unfeatured and unpublished. After all, the poor quality Hubs are pulling the entire site down. Google is not happy with poor quality and we all need to keep in its good books, as does HubPages. This is what the Panda Update was created for. Google wants the best quality websites ranking high in search results. No spammy rubbish or copied and pasted advertising blurbs, no articles in Pigeon English please!
Quality is not defined by the amount of hours you spent researching or writing. Quality is not what you would need to pass an exam at University. Quality is defined by whether it gets the high traffic or fails miserably. After all what advertiser wants their ads posted alongside an article that nobody reads?
Word Count
You have no doubt heard it said that you need to post a lot of words. No 400 characters like at Bubblews here. At HubPages don’t even bother posting a new Hub unless it has around 800 or more words. Think again about the quality. Who wants to read some short quickly written waffle? That’s right, no one, even if it may appear the other way at Bubblews.
You see, the sort of people you want reading your Hubs you want to spend time there. If you are very lucky they might just click on the small number of ads and links you are now allowed. That means a win for you and a win for HubPages! It is easy enough to get a lot of words written – I am already up to 580 with this!
Inappropriate content
This is quite simple: we don’t want any swear words, pictures of people without their clothes on or anything encouraging people to do naughty things. This is the World Police State also known as the New World Order so get used to it!
And don’t rock the boat. We want stuff that the mainstream media and science approves. Nothing too outlandish or out of the box, please!
Photos
Of course you need photos to draw attention to your article, and not just any old photo but the best. However, when I say the best I mean they must be correctly attributed and sourced. No stealing allowed here!
If you haven’t got your own photos I suggest having a look in Wikipedia for Public Domain ones. There is no argument then. And remember this is the New World Order Police State we are living in and everything is controlled and monitored. Taking an image someone else created will simply not be tolerated. You wouldn’t like it if someone stole yours now would you?
Videos
Videos help bring a Hub to life. They create engagement. People watch them! There are thousands on YouTube and if you can’t find some to add to your Hub then you are not going to get anywhere here and are better off with a day job!
Videos have become a very important part of modern culture. So much so that the Buggles had a hit with their song Video Killed The Radio Star.
Buggles - Video killed the radio star 1979
Engagement poll
Have you had a Hub unfeatured because of lack of Engagement?
Tenerife
Polls
Polls are like simple surveys. They ask a question and find out what the public thinks. They help create the all-important engagement. They are very easy to add and very easy to word with a question. You can even choose Yes or No answers.
Maps
Maps are provided like so many wonders by Google. We can find just about any location in the world. Just type in a street name and Google will find it.
This is useful information because your readers may want to visit somewhere they have just been reading about. Maps help create engagement. People can use them and may appreciate this. They may even post a comment thanking you if you are very lucky!
Modules
No one enjoys reading a long block of text so HubPages have given us the ability of breaking our Hubs up into modules. We have text boxes and videos, photos, maps and polls. We need to think about using visual imagery as eye-candy and making our Hubs as pleasing visually as they are otherwise.
Tweaking
Don’t despair if your Hubs have been Unfeatured, or Idled as it was once known, and don’t give up if your best work is Unpublished. Perhaps you do not understand why but those behind HubPages surely know about these matters and are doing what they have to do to try to get this site back to its “Glory Days.”
Tweaking is easy. Just add some new photos or videos, change some words here and there, create a new title. And always remember what you need to do is engage your reader.
Well, that is over 900 words and I am done for now. Good luck and Happy Hubbing!
PS I am going to add copyright by using the HubPages Display Options tool for doing so. HubPages think of everything for us!
© 2013 Steve Andrews