We are delighted to announce some innovative new features, along with some changes to the existing way Article Ranks works. You can view the full details of this announcement below.

First and foremost wed like to bring up concerns that a few of you have mentioned about publishing numbers. There are a few reasons why publishing numbers seem to have been dwindling for certain users, including:

• Removal of the All Categories selection. As most of you are probably aware, we removed said feature a few months back. This was to decrease category spam and in turn increase the integrity of our network. What a lot of members were doing in the past was to submit their articles to the All Category, which immediately published their article in 10-20 subcategories. As you may have guessed, this resulted in spam and as such we had to remove this. However, some users are currently complaining and only submitting their article to one sub category. Articles should be crafted in such a way as to fit into multiple sub categories (which is free).
• The spin percentage of some users articles was (and still is) very low. If, for example, youre only spinning your article up to 150% then it wont be placed on higher quality sites, and overall will be published a lot less. In light of this we have now given our users the ability to increase the spin percentage on an article anywhere up to 300% (we recommend spinning your article somewhere between 200-300%).

Now thats been covered, lets discuss our exiting new features and changes to the existing platform!

To start off with, weve invested thousands of dollars in adding 500+ new high PR sites into our network. This is on top of our current users adding between 50-100 new sites a day. This will result in even better publishing rates and higher exposure than previously. Our network now currently boasts more sites than ever before!

Secondly, weve been tweaking the publishing algorithm. Among other small changes, our system will now publish to more places, faster and more efficiently - again increasing publish numbers.

Next weve overhauled our membership plans. These changes have been made not only to discourage dishonest people coming in and spamming us for a month on a low priced plan, but also so certain users dont slow down publishing rates for others resulting in accounts (specifically smaller ones) being treated more fairly. An overview of the new plans (please see our plans page for more info):

• Starter Plan (free). You can build links in up to 5 domains per live articles.
• Monthly member ($39). This plan allows you to build links into 5 domains per live articles. On top of this you have access to features such as social linking, xgen linking, email publication etc.
• Pro member ($89). On top of above features, this plan gives you the ability to submit to 3 top level categories, submission of spun updates to Twitter and Facebook accounts (mentioned in more detail below), priority distributions, and unlimited domains per live articles.

Perhaps our most exciting new feature is new the Twitter and Facebook integration. As you may know, Google are now looking at social signals as part of their ranking algorithm. Therefore it is most beneficial - in SEO terms - to utilize this fact to the best of your ability hence this update! Your spun updates will be submitted to multiple Twitter and Facebook accounts, not only increasing your rankings but also increasing traffic.

Now, we know these are some big changes to the system and the way our pricing works, but we have tried to make a plan to fit the needs of every person. As an example, the free plan would be for people that are not submitting articles on a regular basis and perhaps are just getting into Internet Marketing. The Monthly member ($39) plan would be more of a starter package, with more features than the free plan whilst also giving you a little taste of the Pro package. The Pro plan is for business and individuals with multiple sites that have decided to take Internet Marketing seriously. Now, we know this may not ride well with those of you that believe we are contradicting our price freeze guarantee however, let me just reiterate that it was just that - a Price freeze guarantee. Now, dont get us wrong were not trying to squeeze every last penny out of our members. Youve got to realize that Article Ranks has been growing rapidly over the last year and as such our overheads have dramatically increased including but not limited to employing new staff to help moderate the network and improving our existing infrastructure. This cannot unfortunately be done for free, however we believe Article Ranks is still very competitively priced for the service we offer.

On a side note, our sister site SEOTops.com now offers a complete link building solution. They offer to write, spin and publish articles for you not only to Article Ranks, but to multiple other networks (both open and private), as well other services such as press release syndication. You can see full overview of plans here: http://www.seotops.com/link-packages/