Written on July 3rd, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 01:07 am by Darren Rowse
Reflections on Sources of Traffic
In the last week I had a post which has been on a real journey.
It’s a post on how to photograph fireworks that I’ve mentioned already when I spoke last week about Using Digg to Improve your Content but a post that since this time has continued to evolve. I hope you’ll forgive me for sharing a few more reflections upon my experience with it.
The post was posted a week ago in anticipation of 4 July celebrations and as I mentioned in my previous post on the topic it got picked up by Lifehacker, Digg and then Boing Boing.
What followed after these link ups have been a number of other waves of traffic as a number of other sites linked up including Wonkette, Wired and more recently one of Yahoo’s Tech Blogs by Christopher Null.
So after a week of links from some pretty amazing sites I’ve found myself today amazed by the big differences in the types of traffic that they have sent. Here’s a few observations:
Digg - sent a lot of traffic very very quickly. The first hour the post made it to the front page it sent 8000 visitors. The hours that followed saw this number decreases each hour afterwards. Over the day it must have sent around 30,000 visitors. AdSense earnings that day were definately up but despite traffic being 10 times higher than normal earnings were only a bit over double the normal level. The other benefit of being Dugg that day was that I had 200 people sign up for my newsletter. Lastly there have been a few secondary links on blogs from digg readers.
Lifehacker - in comparison to Digg, Lifehacker sent a lot less traffic. I don’t have the exact numbers but the amount of traffic they sent was probably under 1000 visitors in the 24 hours after their link. The difference was that this traffic came at quite an even rank and lasted a couple of days. The other difference was that the Lifehacker link seem to trigger both the Digging but also a lot of other sites linking up (I know of about 30 other blogs that linked up and credited Lifehacker as being the source of the idea).
Boing Boing - sent quite a lot of traffic over a three day period (as it slipped down the page it sent less as you’d expect). The earnings didn’t seem to increase much at all from this traffic and I didn’t get many signups in my newsletter the day it happened. The traffic seemed to visit and then leave pretty quickly. There were a handful of secondary links though from this link up.
Wonkette - the link was reasonably obscure so there wasn’t much traffic at all (I was a bit surprised about how little actually).
Christopher Null’s Yahoo Blog - this one was the real surprise of the week. The traffic over the last 36 hours from this link has been very large (it’s around the same as what Digg sent - ie 30,000+). The difference to Digg though is that this traffic is doing two things. Firstly they are signing up for the newsletter (today I had 1000 new subscribers!) and secondly they are clicking ads (they’re clicking ads 4 to 5 times as often as Digg traffic did). As far as I can see there are few (if any) secondary links coming from this traffic.
Of course it’s not as easy as just saying that a particular site’s traffic does certain things - it does depend on what type of link it is or what the blogger writes - but it does illustrate some of the differences between sources of traffic and how they can be useful for achieving different goals.
Another quick observation is that different sources of traffic SEEM to be having an impact upon the click values I’m getting on AdSense. I can’t really prove this as I don’t do this type of tracking - but there have been significant differences in click values from day to day on that blog this past week. This could be to do with the source of traffic but it could also be to do with the day of the week.
Lastly - this who experience has also amazed me as to the power that a single post can have to drive traffic and how a series of links feeding one another can keep it going for a length of time. While my DPS blog has had quite a bit of interest in it’s ten week life, this one post has taken it to a new level.
Fun times.
Written on July 2nd, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 09:07 am by Darren Rowse
A Day in the Life of a Blogger - Vidcast
Yesterday I got a new toy - an iSight webcam.What follows is a little video I made with it describing ‘a day in the life of me’.
It’s nothing to serious and not the best quality video I’ve ever made (it was a little dark in the room) - but it was a fun way to spend a lazy Saturday evening.
PS: The music is Chemical Brothers - Setting Sun from the albumn Dig Your Own Hole (aff)
Written on July 2nd, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 01:07 am by Darren Rowse
Accidental Entrepreneurs - Turning Hobbies into Businesses
I used to read articles like this one on Accidental Tech Entrepreneurs Turn Their Hobbies Into Livelihoods and think it could never happen to me but as time goes on I’m finding more and more people that the article could be about - people making a living (and some a fortune) from using technology to do entrepreneurial things that they truly love.
The article covers the stories of blogger Heather Armstrong from Dooce, Mena and Ben Trott from Six Apart, Joshua Schachter from del.icio.us, Kevin Rose from Digg and Tom Davis from Zoot.
The article attempts to identify some of the common features of the stories as follows:
- They all have IT backgrounds
- They all were in the right place at the right time with the right product/service
- They have supportive people around them (life and business partners)
- They all faced a moment of truth and had to stake their financial futures on their new venutes
- They all are a little obsessed
Great article to have in mind as I go to bed tonight.
Written on July 1st, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 09:07 pm by Darren Rowse
Cartoon Blogger Sells His Wares
Andrertoons Cartoon Blog shows us another way of monetizing a blog - by selling cartoons. See Mark’s post on it here.
Written on July 1st, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 09:07 am by Darren Rowse
PayPerPost - Paying Bloggers to Post - First Impressions
A number of readers have emailed me about a new opportunity for bloggers to make money in a system called PayPerPost (the first to let me know was Brem).
The short of it is that they sign up advertisers who want bloggers to write about their product, service or company and then pay bloggers to do that.
This is how they pitch it:
To Advertisers:
“PayPerPost is an automated system that allows you to promote your Web site, product, service or company through the PayPerPost network of bloggers. Advertise on blogs to create buzz, build traffic, gain link backs for search engine ranking, syndicate content and much more. You provide the topic, our network of bloggers create the stories and post them on their individual blogs.”
To Bloggers:
“Get Paid to Blog. You’ve been writing about Web sites, products, services and companies you love for years and you have yet to benefit from all the sales and traffic you have helped generate. That’s about to change. With PayPerPost™ advertisers are willing to pay you to post on topics. Search through a list of topics, make a blog posting, get your content approved, and get paid. It’s that simple.”
When I was sent links to this site by readers warning bells started to go off for me for a number of reasons:
1. while in their ‘get started page’ they do say that you shouldn’t accept opportunities to advertise if you don’t own the product or if you can’t be honest about it - I can see this system being open to abuse and shallow or dodgy reviews being made of products simply to fulfill the requirements to be paid.
2. I don’t see any mention of needing to write a disclaimer that you’re being ‘paid to post’ (something I think needs to be disclosed when you’re accepting payment to write about a product). Where’s the transparency that the blogosphere was built upon?
3. there doesn’t seem to be any quality control - ie PayPerPost say just to post what you want to say and then let them know about it so that they can access the post to see if it fits requirements set out by advertisers.
4. They seem to be pimping an article written in Business Week to legitimize themselves. Unfortunately the article in question didn’t paint them in a positive light.
Ok - I should say that I don’t mind the idea of sponsored posts or being paid to write things about a company - but I’d want to ensure that that type of post was transparent and that the post added some value to the reader’s experience.
While I don’t know anything apart from what is on their site, PayPerPost leaves me feeling a little uneasy and I’d recommend caution to bloggers.
Update - it looks like I’m not alone with my concerns - TechCrunch shares them and has an interesting discussion in their comments section on the topic.
Other posts on PayPerPost include:
- PayperPost–Please Crash & Burn @ Naked Conversations
- Pay Per Post isn’t Evil - It’s a Failure @ Post Bubble
- PayPerPost Will Taint us @ Publishing 2.0
- Paid to Blog - Mountain or Molehill? @ Inkblots
- PayPerPost Stupid and Evil @ Jason Calacanis
Update II - hyku blog has an interesting post pointing out that PayPerPost looks like it’s just the new name for a previous product - the BlogStar Network which has rebranded/relaunched. BlogStar was announced back in 2005 as a project of MindComet and always seemed a little like it was going down the ‘pay per post’ type direction. Here’s a quote from their announcement press release:
“Unlike blog ad networks or search programs, BlogStar focuses specifically on integrating content directly into blogs. BlogStar Network allows marketers to go beyond simple advertising and leverage the network’s relationship with bloggers themselves. The network creates opportunities for product reviews, testimonials and focus group testing.”
Also check out this post that Duncan (then at Blog Herald) wrote about BlogStar approaching him to write a post mentioning a site in return for $10.
Interestingly I’ve written previously about BlogStar and wasn’t too impressed with their approach after a bit of digging last time either.
Written on July 1st, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 04:07 am by Darren Rowse
Launching a Blog - What Type of Posts Are Best?
I had an email earlier today from a reader who asked an interesting question that got me thinking.
He’s just started a new blog and was asking what type of posts he should put up first? He had decided upon a niche or focus for the blog and his first hunch seemed to be to write a long post that covered pretty much the whole niche with lots of tips on many aspects of it (it’s hard to describe it without giving away his niche - a good one).
The alternative was to write lots of smaller posts focussing upon the different aspects of the niche.
My reactions to his question were a little mixed as I thought through the pros and cons of either approach. I’m still pondering the question and thought I’d do a little thinking out loud:
The Good things about good long ‘uber-posts’:
- they demonstrate you have a knowledge of the niche
- they show you have something to say of worth (expertise even)
- they can be useful in defining your blog’s niche/topic
The Bad things about long ‘uber-posts’:
- they could overwhelm new readers
- they could leave you with little to say later
- they confuse search engines who seem to like posts with clearly defined one topic subject matter
The Good things about shorter more focussed posts:
- they will do better in search engines
- they work with the short attention span that many web users have
- linked together well they can still convey your expertise and knowledge
- they can leave readers thirsting for more
- they are easier to sustain over a long period of time
The Bad things about shorter more focussed posts:
- they can feel a little ‘bitsy’ or ‘light on’
I’m sure there are other things to say about either approach in the early days of a blog.
For me as I think about the blogs I’ve launched in the last few years I would say that either approach can work well as long as you are aware of the consequences. My own approach in launching my latest blog has been to tackle focussed problems/topics within the wider niche rather than the whole niche in a post. The posts still end up being quite sizable but they are well defined (I usually start with a problem or need that the reader would have and find solutions/tips/answers for it) so as not to ramble.
The benefit of this is that if I were to do a longer uber-post that covered every aspect of my overall niche that I might feel like I was just going over the same stuff later on or that I’d have nothing left to say.
The other thing I’d advise in the early days of a blog is that you do need to establish credibility and a grasp of your topic. People want to know that you have some idea of what you’re talking about and that coming back to your blog or subscribing to your feed will enhance their life in some way. So your content does need to have substance to it (long or short).
I guess it partly comes down to the topic of the blog and how wide it is as well as the personality and writing style of the blogger.
What do you think?
Written on July 1st, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 12:07 am by Darren Rowse
Baptist Minister Interviews Adult Webmaster about Blogging….
One of the aspects of blogging that I love is that it opens up opportunities to connect with people of all walks of life, interests, backgrounds and experiences. In the last year and a half of blogging here at enternetusers I’ve come into contact with a lot of readers - many of whom have shared their experiences with me. One of these people is ‘Steve’ (not his real name).
Steve emailed me quite a few months back after I’d had a particularly rough few days of blogging - having been pretty viciously attacked as a result of some things I’d written that had been misunderstood. Steve wrote to me to encourage me to hang in there keep on blogging and shared some of his own story of being a webmaster.
The interesting thing was that despite Steve knowing I was a Baptist Minister (I haven’t mentioned that for a while so it could be a shock for some of you) he told me the story of how he’d publishing and making a living from Adult content for a number of years and how he’d recently gotten into mainstream publishing - particularly via blogging.
To be honest - Steve’s involved in an area of the web that I’m not fond of and which I have some ethical problems with - however he’s also a guy that I’ve come to value as a fellow blogger and human being. He’s been incredibly supportive of me and this blog (he’s a regular reader) and has even taught me a thing or two about blogging.
This week I asked him if he’d be willing to be interviewed on enternetusers - to share some of what he’s learnt about online publishing. This interview doesn’t contain any links to anything Steve publishes (adult or mainstream) and I publish it because while I may not agree with some of what Steve does I do think he’s got some interesting lessons to share and I’m constantly asked by readers of this blog to feature other readers opinions (something Steve has a few of). I’m also fascinated by his story and refocussing towards mainstream publishing. Here’s my interview (warning: it is quite long):
Darren: thanks for agreeing to be interviewed Steve
Steve: No problem Darren. Before I answer the questions I should point out that my wife and I are very much a partnership in everything we do on the Net so you will often see that I talk about ‘we’ rather than just me. For any of the many other adult webmasters that frequent Darren’s blog you may know us as The Other Steve and Marie. For everyone else you will just have to trust me when I tell you that my nickname made a lot of sense at the time I chose it.
Darren: How did you get into web publishing?
Steve: In 1996 we bought a new computer and connected to the Net for the first time. For a little while surfing the Net was great, there were lots of things to do and see but it was only a few weeks before we wanted to build a website.
We started with Geocities and taught ourselves to write HTML - in Notepad. I started a site that looked at trains while Marie was more interested in building something useful like a site that supported women who found themselves in a certain situation. My site is long gone while Marie’s site is still there and will soon be undergoing yet another revamp.
And that was our first shaky start on the Net
Darren: What got you into adult content?
Steve: Three escorts got us into adult content in 1998 - it’s all they’re fault :). Now I know that many of your readers have a very poor view of sex workers but most of that is from a very undeserved bit of stereotyping. Those three ladies asked us to design a website for them and we did. They paid us more promptly than some mainstream people have paid us; they were honest and didn’t muck us about at all.
From that point we began to have quite a bit of contact with various people in the adult offline industry and over time we met more people in that industry that I would trust with my life than in any other industry I have ever worked in.
So Darren, as your readers read this, I hope they’ll throw out their stereotyping and start looking at individuals as individuals. They may not like what sex workers do but that doesn’t make a sex worker any less of a person.
Anyway I’ll get off my soapbox now and tell you that from that small beginning we gradually drifted into full-time adult webmastering from mid 2001 and we are still involved in the adult online industry today.
Darren: Why have you branched out into mainstream publishing?
Steve: Would you believe because we have found adult to be boring? It’s true, I’ve now seen so many bare bums and boobs that I just don’t look anymore. We wanted a challenge and so we came back to mainstream to see if the skills we had learned in adult would make us a decent living here in mainstream.
And as it turned out we did have the skills but a little business that Marie also started in 2001 has now gone over the tipping point and we are so busy keeping our mainstream and adult customers happy that we hardly have time to do much web design and marketing work for ourselves anymore.
Darren: What attracted you to blogging?
Steve: For Marie it was a chance to share important things with women who are afflicted with a very debilitating disease but for me it was a bit different. I’ve always been a bit of a self-opinionated bugger as other adult webmasters who know me will tell you so blogging gave me a voice in mainstream to talk about important things that effect your business and mine too..
You see, there are a lot of principles that we learned over in adult that apply in mainstream because it all comes down to the fact that, on both sides of the fence, we are all operating small businesses. And the principles that apply to small business in the bricks and mortar world also apply in cyberspace.
For 20 years in the real world I had a lot to do with small businesses and I saw many fail because they got the fundamentals wrong. Many people get the fundamentals wrong in cyberspace too and their businesses will ultimately fail so you will see Marie often talking about business principles in a daily column she writes for adult webmasters.
Darren: What do you think bloggers could learn from the adult industry?
Steve: Any blogger who has a blog roll and thinks that their blog roll is a key to success has a huge amount to learn from the adult industry. I agree with one guy I see here who describes blog rolls as being incestuous - they are because you just keep on recycling the same old tired traffic that’s never going to buy anything you want to sell them.
Instead you need to get out and get fresh traffic to your blogs. Break your back to get your blog into the front pages of search engine results pages, buy traffic, advertise your blog on the back of your car, get your URL up on a billboard - do whatever it takes but get traffic from outside the blog loop otherwise you’re just wasting your time and playing at being a blogger.
And you need to realize that this is all about making money. If you’re reading enternetusers and you’re not interested in making money then you’re just fooling yourself (I did have a stronger term there but Marie reminded me I should try and be polite).
Whether you want to make money from your blog or because of your blog it’s all the same. You need to work relentlessly towards your goal. That may not sit well with a lot of people but that is one thing I have learn
Written on June 30th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 10:06 pm by Darren Rowse
Speedlinking - 30 June 2006
- If you’re in the UK and have a business blog (or know of any) Mark White would like to hear from you as he’s creating a resource to put the Spotlight on UK Business Blogs.
- Performancing are looking for Beta testing partners in their new Ad Network
- WeblogHits has posted a post titled 7 easy steps to a pimped out money making Wordpress Blog
Written on June 30th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 09:06 pm by Darren Rowse
Google Page Rank Update Rolling Out
It looks like Google is rolling out a page rank update if the discussions in forums are anything to go by.
Here are a couple of the discussion threads:
What is Page Rank and what does it mean (if anything?) Check out this post I wrote as an introduction to Google Page Rank.
Remember these updates take a day or three to roll out but there are tools around for checking future page rank like this one.
Written on June 30th, surf Active Apparel website 1cecilia392 zone.at 04:06 pm by Darren Rowse
Some European Countries Considering applying VAT to Online Earnings
Jen posts some concerning news for European bloggers trying to make money online. The short of it is that some European countries are considering making publishers pay VAT (similar to sales tax) on AdSense and other online earnings and that this could see them paying up to 83% of their earnings in tax. That would cripple many online publishers. Here’s part of Jen’s post:
‘Normally, European countries only charge VAT on earnings where VAT is charged. However, some European countries are considering charging VAT to publishers on their AdSense earnings, meaning some publishers could be paying up to 83% tax on their AdSense earnings. The same would also apply to affiliate earnings as well. And from a business perspective, losing 83% of your AdSense income to tax would not make it worthwhile for many publishers to continue using the AdSense program. And especially those using PPC to promote their affiliate programs or AdSense earnings could discover that their break even point of aquiring traffic is suddenly much different than previously thought….’
There’s lots of confusion around this and it’ll be one to watch!
Read Jen’s post at Some EU countries may charge VAT on AdSense & affiliate earnings
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