Entrepreneur's Journal: Does your business need a Wikipedia page?

Hi guys.

I'm an administrator at Wikipedia. One of the things we do is police the site for people who are promoting themselves. Pleased do not promote yourself there. We have strict anti-spam policies, and delete advertisements on sight; a little bit of reflection will indicate to you why this is so (we are an encyclopedia, not a free web host or promotion service.) In addition, and most important for writing a new article, we have a conflict of interest policy (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Conflict_of_interest) -- please do not violate it. Writing about yourself or your company is perhaps the most obvious example of a conflict of interest violation. However we welcome you to write about someone *else's* company. If your own is truly notable and encyclopedic, someone *else* will write about it.

In order to write an article about a company at Wikipedia, you need to adhere strictly to neutral point of view (no "we have the best business model and are rapidly becoming the most admired company ever to ...."); you need to provide reliable sources for what you write (no blogs; no hearsay; established news sources only please); and the key policy is *verifiability* for what you write. Therefore your company must be *notable* -- since if it is an obscure startup with no coverage in reliable sources, it will not pass our verifiability policy. Please wait until you have got some coverage in mainstream, well-known sources.

I have a pro-corporate bias, since I work for a good company and am a happy capitalist, and I welcome well-written articles about companies. But if I spot an advertisement that blatantly violates our policies I will delete it on sight.

Best regards,
R.

"Keep in mind that a Wikipedia page can help improve your website's search engine rank"

Where did you read that crap? Outbound links don't pass any link value. RESEARCH, PEOPLE, RESEARCH.

Wikipedia has specific guidelines on what companies should have articles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(organizations_and_companies)

I set up my company (I'm a successful abstract artist) name on Wikipedia "durkART": it got deleted. Someone deleted, said it was biographic in nature and Wikipedia isn't a self promotional site.

Wiki is still a flawed system. It renders too many risks as a new business owner. Users beware! The article is certainly correct in saying you need to police your page as much as possible.

Warning idiot groups such as P.E.T.A. can use these sites to attack legitimate business, by digging up old story and unproven gosip. (First one lies then three others swear to it.
They do the same thing to your google listings and google won't stop thm either, even when presented with court documents proving the animal wacko's case was thrown out of court

Great article, will sign up with them and promote my business. SEO and Web 2.0 are definitely important criteria for promoting your business. I promoted 6figuresandmore.com and haveittodayray.com and have had great success. No free lunch, not MLM, must enjoy the Internet and you can earn 6 figuresandmore. Wikipedia, will increase my stay at home business for baby boomers only more.

From what students are telling me is that teachers are telling them not to use Wikipedia for its inaccuracies, they will not get any credit for reports or as sources of information. So why would any one want to use this web site. I guess its because people today believe in anything they have no standards, stick with the Encyclopedia Britannica, its a well establish source of information that only intelligent people would use as an source of information.

my name is william, my company Dal Research Enterprises, Inc. (DRE) owns two web sites which now on the NET. They are: "Bulliesbeware.com" which tries to have solve bulling and shooting problems in the United States. A urgent solution is needed. We solicit like minded people to joint and support us to fight these deases. Our other web site is: "e-worldpeace.com" which pursuits for world peace among world humanity. We welcome all of you who like our SITES to joint and support us for these noble causes. These are our Sites but also your Sites as well; if you are for justice and for world peace. Please visit our SITES, thanks.

Tom,

Nice concise article. Wikipedia can be a great source for
information. Particularly if you check where the info. came from.
(ex. medical information contributed by the Mayo Clinic)

I personally have contributed to numerous articles and plan on doing
so in the future. My site, http://www.skin-and-scalp-treatment.com/ relates to
numerous topics there. By putting a link to my site as a contributor,
the readers can check to see if my site backs up what I have
contributed.

Now, as for Icheb's statement that outbound links don't improve your
search engine rankings, I'd have to say, "what are you talking
about?"

Incoming links from a major site particularly on a page which
directly pertains to your topics and niche is one of the best
possible SEO methods.

The more sites that link to yours, particularly ones related to
yours, show the SE that you are an authority in your field.

It's one of the reasons this article caught my eye to begin with.

Thanks Tom,
Zac

I would love to have my website on Wikipedia! How would I go about
getting it on there? http://www.BonesClothes.com
Any help would be great.
Eddie

Of course I know about "no-follow" tags. There are numerous ways to get "value" rating from the SEs. It would take me way too long to explain it to you here. Suffice it to say, Wiki shows up as one of the many links to my sites on G, Y, L, and A, just to mention the main ones. Not to mention, free traffic from Wiki, if done right, is very targeted traffic. If readers click on your link, they are obviously interested in what you have told them already. It's just a matter of overdelivering on what you told them to begin with. Do you see where I'm coming from?

Best wishes,
Zac
P.S. If your really interested in more information, contact my at: http://www.skin-and-scalp-treatment.com/

Icheb,

You like that word, don't you? Like Norman from "On Golden Pond" said, that's a good word:)

Anyway, really, if all outbound links have that attribute, then why do all of the big SE have reports for hundreds of links to my sites?

Wikepedia and numerous other avenues are great places to have links that promote our sites. But the key is to have valuable information on your site, otherwise your links will be irrelevant.

Now, since you seem to be very passionate about this subject, I can let you in on a couple of secrets.
But you'll have to contact me on one of my sites for that.

Here's one I just started building:
http://www.pickerstickers.com/

Best wishes,
Zac

IF you were as educated as you try to seem, you would have the vocabulary to express yourself instead of resorting to vulgar "fill" words that advertise that you are frustrated. You were on "the same page" but did not accurately express your thoughts in coherant communication, and you could have asked pertinent questions to find out what "Hawkins" was calmly trying to say to you, BUT YOU WERE NOT INTERESTED IN "LISTENING".