Written on April 30th, 2007 at 08:04 am by David Shawver
Is Technorati Being Gamed - Do They Care? - Does it Matter?
One of the questions I’ve been asked quite a bit lately is what I think about the increasingly common practice of swapping Technorati Favorites in order to climb the Technorati Most Favorited Top 100.
To be honest, it’s not really an issue that I’ve given much thought to (although I’m increasingly being asked by bloggers to swap with them - something I don’t get into) - and one that I don’t really think is massively important - however as I repeatedly am asked about this tactic to increase a blog’s profile I thought I should give it a little attention.
PS: as I’m writing this I’ve just received an email from someone who is developing a service (site) to organize and formalize the technorati favorite swapping process - it seems a mini industry is rising up around the practice.
In this post I’m going to explore the following questions:
- Does the Technorati Top 100 Most Favorited Blog List Drive Traffic?
- Does it Increase Profile?
- Does it give Egos a Boost?
- Does Technorati Care?
- So What’s the Point of Technorati Favorites and Why Do I promote it?
- So What do I think about swapping Favorites to Climb the Top 100 Most Favorited Blogs List?
- What do I think about the Top 100 Most Favorited Blogs List?
At the end of the post I’d love to get your thoughts and opinion on it.
Does the Technorati Top 100 Most Favorited Blog List Drive Traffic?
Let me start by looking at the main motivation that many seem to have in seeking to climb the Top 100 Favorites list at Technorati - traffic.
As of today, this blog is the 3rd most favorited blog on the list. I should say up front that this is not as a result of swapping favorites - but simply because for the last few months I’ve used the button that Technorati provide to bloggers to encourage people to add enternetusers as a favorite.
So does being #3 on this list drive thousands of visitors to enternetusers?
A quick visit to my stats packages shows that in the scheme of things it’s hardly caused a blip on my traffic radar. Technorati does drive a few hundred readers per month to this blog - but not a single visitor came directly from that the Top 100 Favorites page.
A few visitors do arrive from my profile page which is also linked to from the Top 100 Favorited Blogs page - but this is no more than a handful of readers per day (5-10).
Does it Increase Profile?
Another possible benefit of being on such a list is that it has the potential to increase your profile and help you with getting mainstream media attention and/or advertisers for your blog.
This is harder to measure - but I’m afraid to say that I’m not aware of any circumstance where any reporter or advertiser approached me as a result of seeing me as #3 on the Most Favorited list. Technorati’s Most Linked to Top 100 has helped a little with profile and but the Favorites list doesn’t seem to have the same credibility attached to it (and it’s no wonder if it’s so easily manipulated).
Does it give Egos a Boost?
Hmmm - another difficult one to measure - I can only answer for myself by saying - a little.
It’s always nice to be included in a list and to be in the company of blogs like others featured in the list.
However it’s a somewhat empty achievement to be honest. While I appreciate my readers going to the trouble of marking me a favorite - it’s a list that I suspect will always be skewed in favor of blogs about blogging, web 2.0 and the web because it’s on a site whose users are largely bloggers who are more inclined to read such blogs.
Of course keep in mind that favorite swapping schemes will also boost the egos of the other person who does them too and that those that are benefiting most from them are those at the top of the swapping pyramids who get loads of favorites while those they swap with get only a handful.
Does Technorati Care?
I’ve tried in the last few weeks to get a comment from Technorati on this by emailing both their support team and Dave Sifry himself. I’m yet to hear anything back from either approach.
I can only guess that they do seem to care about Favorites (as they link to the feature prominently but that they don’t really seem to care how bloggers are using it.
So What’s the Point of Technorati Favorites and Why Do I promote it?
If you read the page that Technorati has on the Favorites concept you’ll catch a glimpse of why they want their users to use this feature:
“Favorites is a feature that lets you keep track of your favorite blogs.”
The whole point behind the ability to mark blog as a Favorite was that it would help you keep track of what that blog was writing about when you went to Technorati’s home page (which, when you’re logged in displays the latest posts from your favorites). The point was to help blog readers keep abreast of what was going on on blogs that were their ‘favorites’.
As I read it, the Top 100 Favorited Blog list was a byproduct of a useful feature for Technorati users and from what I see going on at the moment between some bloggers, the list has become a distraction from the real purpose of the favorite feature. The way I see some people talking about swapping favorites to climb the rankings seems to miss the real benefit of the feature.
The Top 100 Most Favorited list might give me a fleeting ego boost - but the fact that 1170+ technorati users have a chance of seeing my latest post next time they go to Technorati’s front page is the real bonus in my mind.
In fact - as I analyze my blog’s stats it’s the front page that drives me as much traffic as any other part of Technorati (although it’s still only a few hundred a month).
So What do I think about swapping Favorites to Climb the Top 100 Most Favorited Blogs List?
This might not be popular - but I think that the practice of swapping favorites is a little sad and that the energy that some bloggers are putting into doing it could be much better spent by actually engaging with readers and encouraging genuine relationships to be formed.
I’d much rather 10 genuine readers mark me as a favorite and see my posts when they next log in than 180 do it to get me into a list that doesn’t seem to do anything more than boost my ego.
My feeling is that the favorites feature on Technorati is potentially a good feature for getting your work in the faces of readers and that it could be well worth adding the button to your sidebar for this gain. I’ll continue to encourage people to favorite me (you can do it right now if you’re genuinely interested in reading more of what I write) but in doing so hope to do it in ways that will bring readership conversion rather than to be at the top of some list.
My other concern is that this practice is making the Top 100 list more and more laughable and useless - and that Technorati are likely to either change their TOS and ban people who do it or scrap the list altogether (probably not a bad thing). Why invest so much time in a practice that could get you in trouble with one of the biggest blog related sites and that doesn’t actually convert to bringing in new traffic or increased profile?
My advice - put the energy into building a better blog, show people how to favorite you and let the list look after itself.
What do I think about the Top 100 Most Favorited Blogs List?
The Top 100 list could also be a potentially useful tool - but only if the favorites feature is used widely (I suspect it’s not, the top blog only has 1800 votes from the last year or so that people have been able to use it) and only if Technorati set some guidelines or terms of service in place to stop it being manipulated.
Otherwise the list will simply become a list of those who have managed to swap favors and in doing so it becomes a less useful resource for Technorati’s users. If this happens it becomes pretty useless and actually runs the risk of making Technorati less valuable to it’s readers.
Perhaps a more useful feature instead of (or in addition to) the Top 100 Most Favorited blogs would be a favorites list that could be access somehow by topics (although I guess this can be done by searching for tags).
But that’s just my thinking - what do you think about the practice of swapping Technorati Favorites? Do you do it? Why? Who’s benefiting from the practice most?
PS: More reading on the topic - see Amit’s recent post about how the practice has made Technorati’s Most Favorited list Worthless.
Written on April 29th, 2007 at 11:04 am by David Shawver
What’s Wrong With Your Blog?
Modern Life has a useful post titled ‘What’s Wrong With My Blog?’ which outlines 11 ‘common pitfalls, mistakes & faux pas in blogging’.
I think it’s a really useful list to run through periodically for bloggers.
Which of the 11 might you need to work on for your blog?
What would you add to it?
Written on April 28th, 2007 at 01:04 pm by David Shawver
Speedlinking - 28 April 2007
Just a few quick ones today.
- While using StumbleUpon this afternoon I came across 16 Must Read Articles For Bloggers which might make for some worthwhile reading if you’re looking for something to do over the weekend.
- ProNet Advertising shares why the Digg Button Gets Your Buried, Not Dugg
- Another great read today is from Alister Cameron - Blogging in the eye of the storm - enjoy.
Written on April 28th, 2007 at 04:04 am by David Shawver
How a Young Couple Made Half a Million Dollars In an Hour Before My Eyes
Just a few weeks ago I found myself sitting in a room full of 500 aspiring internet marketers who had gathered together to learn the art of growing an online business.
I was there to present on the topic of blogging but after presenting right up front as one of the first speakers found myself fascinated by the way in which the other speakers presented.
Each speaker was given just over an hour to talk and then 10 or so minutes to pitch a product, resource or service to those attending.
Over the three days of presentations I saw a wide array of presentation styles:
from the quiet and humble interview that the organizer did with one presenter who was making her fortune through selling pearls
through to the hype filled presentation of a black hat SEO splogger (who made me feel ill)
through to the dynamic presentation of a 22 year old young man who was building an online community with hundreds of thousands of members around teaching people to play piano by ear
The array of stories and presentation styles left me feeling numb by the end of the three days.
But there was one presentation that rocked my world.
It started when a young couple quietly got up on stage. He was dressed in a suit (but didn’t look like he wore one very often) and she was heavily pregnant.
Each had a sheet of paper in hand - their ’script’.
At first I was a little despondent - their start was nervous and in quite a stilted way they almost seemed to be reading their presentation. He would say a few lines and she would take a turn.
But within seconds - and despite their ’style’ - I was hooked.
Why?
They told their story
Over the next 45 minutes this young couple nervously shared their rags to riches story. From being broke, unemployed and with few prospects they turned to the internet and over a few years built a multi million dollar business. In fact their business made what I’ve built look like chicken feed. They’d created a 7 (actually it was probably 8) figure income and they were a three person business.
To be honest, I look back on their presentation and can’t say that I learned a lot on a technical level - however the simple way that they put their teaching in the context of their own story was brilliant.
When it came time for their presentation to end and for them to pitch a product or service they offered themselves as coaches to people in the room - for a fee.
The price was high (it was in excess of $20,000 and was the most highly priced pitch for the three days).
I found myself doubting that they’d make any sales - but within minutes of them starting to make their pitch for their services and well before they’d finished speaking people began to leave their seats.
They were not leaving the room - they were heading for the sales table.
I don’t know how many people signed up for their services that day - but my suspicion was that they made over 20 - 30 sales - they probably made around half a million dollars in sales in just that hour.
Why did people buy?
I’m sure many did it because they felt they could learn something from this couple (they certainly knew how to make money) - however the clincher of the deal was that the pitch was made in the context of a story.
Stories are powerful and I’m convinced bloggers who use them have a tool in their arsenal that can make them incredibly influential and persuasive communicators.
For more on learning how to utilize the power of telling tantalizing stories to kick off a blog post - check out Brian’s post on the topic - he’s definitely onto something.
Written on April 27th, 2007 at 10:04 pm by David Shawver
Be a Better Blogger - enternetusers/b5media 1 Day Conference in NYC - June 2007
Do you want to improve your blogging? Do you live near New York City (or are you able to get there? If so, this is a post you’ll want to read.
I’m really excited to announce that in just over a month enternetusers and internetusers will be holding a 1 day event for bloggers who want to take their blogs up a level and meet other bloggers who are working on the same thing.
We’re still working on the exact details but plans for this one day event are firming up enough to announce them so that people can begin to make plans to attend.
These details are not confirmed yet so don’t go booking any flights if you’re planning on flying in - but here’s what we’re aiming for.
Date - Saturday 9 June 2007 (the day after FOOA - so if you’re planning on attending that, stay an extra day).
Time - 10am - 4pm for the training part of the day and then from 7pm for a Party
What - I can’t announce the speakers at this point but will say that I’ll be leading a session and that there will be an array of other speakers and panelists over the course of the day. We’re still confirming who’ll be presenting and what their topics are but we’re aiming this event at beginner to intermediate bloggers who want to learn from professional bloggers. We’re aiming for a mix of topics from some of the technical aspects of blogging through to a session on finding readers through to a session on monetizing blogs. Details to follow.
The sessions will largely be a presenter talking on their topic for 30 minutes and then 25 minutes of questions and answers.
The evening will be similar to the last enternetusers meetup in NYC. Networking, drinks, food and fun. This will be open to both those who attended during the day and others.
Cost - We will be charging for the event but it won’t be big dollars as we want to keep it as affordable as possible and are just hoping to cover costs. We’re confirming the location in the next week so once we’ve done that and have costed it out we’ll be able to announce this also. My hope is that it’ll be somewhere in the $60 - $70 range and that that will include lunch.
Where - Somewhere central in NYC.
Who - 100 Bloggers. This is an estimate and the final number of tickets available will depend upon the venue - but we will probably be capping the numbers at 100 bloggers. The enternetusers meetup that we held in NYC a month back attracted around 70 attendees so we’re pretty sure we can hit the 100 mark. When we announce that tickets are going on sale there will be a first come first served system.
My hope with this event is that it will be:
- informative - I’m not interested in any ‘fluffy’ sessions - I want ‘how to’ and practical stuff
- fun - yes bloggers can let their hair down
- a chance for lots of networking and collaboration
- attendee driven - lots of Q and A
- informal - I’m a pretty casual guy and hope that while there’ll be a structured schedule that it’ll be relaxed
Interested in attending?
We’re not taking bookings yet - but if you’re interested in coming along please express that interest my leaving a comment below with your name. Also make sure that you leave a valid email address in the email field of the comment form so we can email you when we announce how you can book.
I’d also love to hear any suggestions that you might have for what sessions/topics you’d like to see covered on the event. While we’ve already planned a lot of what we want to do - if there’s a groundswell of requests for something we’ve not included we’ll do our best to adapt the program.
Written on April 27th, 2007 at 01:04 am by David Shawver
Tim Ferris Interview - Part II
This is Part 2 of my in depth IM interview with Tim Ferris, author of The 4-Hour Workweek. You can read my introduction to Tim in my previous post. You can also read Part 1 here.
In today’s post Tim and I talk blogging. I ask him about some of the lessons he’s learned about driving traffic, posting frequency and being a productive blogger.
Darren - Why did you choose to add a blog to your strategy for promoting your book?
Tim - Good question, but I’ll reword it for you: why did I start a blog? It actually wasn’t solely to promote the book, though that’s a side-effect. There are a few reasons. First, a number of authors-cum-bloggers told me that they wasted thousands of dollars on book sites when a free blog ended up being the best PR tool. I believe that a good book site is important (www.fourhourworkweek.com), but the blog is much more.
The blog is how I build a “platform”. In publisher-speak, that means a fan base. Once you have a fan base — and I think my blog, forums, and other communities can be much bigger than the book — you have tons of options. Those options could be for monetizing (advertising, products, speaking, consulting, etc.) or simply extending your influence. There is power in numbers. Once I have enough clout with subscribers and fan base, I’ll be lobbying in Silicon Valley to establish an official “E-mail Detox Day” under law, for example! Lots of fun things coming.
Darren - What have you learnt about blogging since starting yours a month ago? Teach us oh wise one!
Tim - LOL… I don’t claim to have all of the answers, of course. Not even most of them, but I’m a pretty good “reductionist”. That just means that I question what everyone is doing and ask myself: if I ignore what’s popular, what everyone says you “have to do,” what actually works? I cut out all the fat and look at just the highest-impact variables.
For example, I’ve been told I need to post everyday, but when I really looked at the facts, a different picture emerged.
i’ve found that if i post less often, my blog has a sine wave sign-up curve. in other words: if i post just infrequently enough (for me, once every 4-6 days), the comments add up on each post, making the site look very popular, and rss subscriptions spike. if i post too often, it doesn’t look popular (since posts get pushed down and comment-count is low), so it is actually better for my site to post less often! love it when that happens…
The most important thing I’ve learned? Blogging is underestimated by many, but it’s overestimated by even more. It’s not a panacea or a silver bullet. It is a tool you should pay a ton of attention to, but it’s still just one tool.
Here’s another odd one.
I pay more attention to decreases in subscribers than increases. There are too many variables that could account for increases, and the easily identified reasons (a link from a prominent blogger) are often outside your control, and thus hard to repeat. Unsubscribes, on the other hand — defection — is due to one of two things, in my opinion, TOO MANY POSTS or POOR CONTENT. Whenever I get a dip, I look at the characteristics of the post — How was the headline different? How long was it? Did it have too many photos? Was it too about me without how-to information?
Paying attention to unsubscribes has allowed me to avoid problem posts and build my base not just quickly, but faster and faster.
Darren - What about getting Traffic for your blog - how are you building that?
Tim - One: guest post on other blogs as often as possible, and be creative. For example, I asked for ideas for book promotion at Ok Dork and got a great response. Not only did it give me great ideas for promotion, it got me a lot of new traffic. I just had my first post on the homepage on Huffington Post this morning, and it’s around Alexa 2,500.
Two: look at the blogrolls of prominent bloggers and look for names you don’t recognize. These are often thought leaders who are well-respected but perhaps not hard-core bloggers. A friend at SXSW told me I had to meet a guy named Brian Oberkirch, so I tracked him down at the event. Super cool guy, and we hit it off. He recently interviewed me for his blog, which is high quality and popular but not huge, and — unbenowst to me — he is friends with Merlin Mann of 43Folders. Brian’s post, and thus my book, then ended up on 43Folders. Moral of the story? Don’t be a traffic bigot. Seek out smart, original thinkers and look for lateral degrees of separation.
Darren - Many of the bloggers that I interact with have anything but a 4 hour work week - how can we make ourselves more productive in the day to day of blogging?
Tim - Just remember: you don’t HAVE TO do anything. Set the rules of the game so that you can win and have a life at the same time. If you set the expectation that you’ll post 12 times a day, it’s going to overwhelm you. Focus on quality over quantity and the critical few vs. the trivial many. How do you do that? You first define precisely what you want yourself and others to get out of the blog — why are you doing it, and what are you doing it for? It is vain to do with more what can be done with less (that’s quoting William of Occam, originator of “Occam’s Razor”), so if you can get your readers to where they need to be with one post a day, or one post per week, establish that as your rule.
Other things you can do:
“Batch” email and check it only once or twice per day. Use an autoresponder and other tools to help you do this. One of my most popular blog posts gives examples of this: http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2007/03/22/how-to-check-e-mail-twice-a-day-or-once-every-10-days/
Invite guest bloggers to create content for you, write posts in batches, repurpose material from multiple sources (you can bet I’ll be linking to this interview in a post on my blog!), and also unsubscribe from nearly every RSS feed you have consuming your attention and time.
Darren - Many bloggers have big dreams for their online businesses but many seem to hit a ceiling of how much they can achieve - how can they scale up what they do without becoming slaves to their blogs?
Tim - Before you ask yourself how to scale (the brief answer is designing a process-driven instead of founder-driven business model), you need to ask yourself — what am I scaling for? What is your goal with the blog? Let’s assume you want to “make money”.
I encourage you to define your ideal lifestyle in terms of having, being, and doing, then calculate the average monthly cost. If you want a Lamborghini Gallardo, yearly trips to Fiji, and to take cooking classes with a professional chef, great. Determine what all of that averages out to on a monthly basis: this is your TMI — Target Monthly Income — and your goal for your business.
IPOs and acquisitions are fine, but they shouldn’t be your top priority. It’s too easy to defer life if you become myopically fixated on an often elusive exit. Besides, building a business that you can be removed from, and focusing on profitability, are all ingredients for getting a good price when selling your business.
Bigger and more often is not necessarily better, and almost never is from a lifestyle standpoint. Focus on being the best rather the biggest, and focus on hitting your TMI — and most important, living your dreams instead of working for work’s sake — and you’ll be able to enjoy yourself without feeling like you’re shoveling coal into the furnace 24/7 with a monster you have to feed.
Darren - You talk quite a bit in your book about outsourcing - do you outsource any aspects of your blogging?
Tim - I outsourced a good portion of design implementation (I designed the look and architecture with sketches first), as well as SEO work. I haven’t outsourced any writing, but I will be adding guest posters as traffic builds and becomes attrActive to good writers. I’ll be training and hiring people to help with responding to comments once volume gets high, as I will with the forums. The secret to keeping my blog low-stress is still a relatively low frequency of posting. All of the time-consumers and stress producers multiply with the number of your posts.
Darren - Where do you find people to outsource different aspects of your businesses to? Do you ever have issues of unreliability? Any tips for finding quality people?
Tim - I’ve used a great company called GetFriday, as well as Elance. There are a number of keys:
1) Hire groups of people or companies, not single people. If you become dependent on a single person and they get sick, for example, you have a single point of failure. Hire companies or groups where there are checks and balances, and where people can replace each other in emergencies.
2) If you narrow it down to, say, five potential groups on Elance, as them all to perform a simple 20-minute task by a specific time. Ask for a report afterwards indicating what worked well, what didn’t, and what they’d change about the process. If they miss the deadline or don’t follow directions perfectly, don’t hire them.
3) If you have a project that you anticipate will take 20 hours, ask for them to confirm understaning first, then ask for a status update after 3 hours. If not, you could end up with something you didn’t even ask for in the end, and it will be too late to correct misinterpretation.
GetFriday offers a 7-day trial for their services, and they are really good. Very experienced with processes in place.
Darren - cool - I think that’s my main questions covered - did you have anything else to add?
Tim - It might be interesting for people to know that I don’t even use an RSS reader. I visit a handful of sites once or twice per week. RSS readers are too easy to abuse and let consume your entire day.
Darren - Interesting - do you have any ‘watch lists’ or ‘alerts’ for your name or your book’s name to help you track what people are saying about you so that you can engage in those conversations?
Tim - Good question. I use GoogleAlerts for news and blogs, and I also check incoming links from within WordPress.
Darren - Thats about all I’ve got. Thanks for your time Tim - as usual, it’s been great chatting with you!
Tim - No problem, it’s been great.
Get a Copy of Tim’s book - The 4-Hour Workweek
Written on April 26th, 2007 at 02:04 am by David Shawver
Tim Ferriss Interview - Part I
This is Part 1 of my in depth IM interview with Tim Ferriss author of The 4-Hour Workweek. You can read my introduction to Tim in my previous post.
In Part 1 I ask Tim about the concept behind his book, we talk about how he wrote it (as I know many bloggers are looking at getting book deals) and talk about some of the lessons he’s learned about building buzz around his book. In Part 2 (which I’ll publish tomorrow) Tim and I talk blogging and he shares some of the lessons that he’s learnt in using a blog to support his blog launch.
Darren - ‘The 4 Hour Work Week’ is a great title for a book - what’s it about?
Tim - The premise of The 4-Hour Workweek is that there are three currencies in a digital world: time, income, and mobility. In the last 2-3 years, it’s become possible to do things like outsource your life and create virtual businesses, both of which can enable you to live the lifestyle of a millionaire on less than $50,000 per year.
The concept of retirement, as well as single offices with 9-5 clocks, is hopelessly outdated.
Darren - How did you come up with the idea for the book?
Tim - It came out of my guest lectures in high-tech entrepreneurship at Princeton University. In 2004, I was working 80-hour weeks in Silicon Valley as the CEO of my own start-up, and I realized that income had no practical value without time. The next two years were spent traveling through more than 20 countries, automating my business, checking e-mail once per week, and interviewing other “lifestyle designers” who had figured out how to “hack” life in a digital and flat world. It was a wild ride that continues today.
My students were the ones who suggested I make it into a book, and the idea wouldn’t go away, so here we are.
Darren - A lot of bloggers are also aspiring book writers - what advice would you give bloggers currently writing books (both the writing of them but also the promotion of them)?
Tim - Bloggers are uniquely positioned to create bestsellers, but there are some huge myths among bloggers about publishing. Number one: do not write your book and then attempt to sell it. Non-fiction is sold with book proposals, not completed books. Above all, do not create an e-book or self-publish as a path to a big publisher. No publisher will purchase something already self-published.
For actual writing, I found that identifying your peak periods in your circadian rhythm is key. Some big-name authors recommended I just sit in front of my computer every day from 8am to 6pm, and it was like living The Shining. Awful. My book only took off once I accepted that my best writing was done from 1-4am when I was highly caffeinated on yerba mate tea. The quality of my writing dropped miserably if I tried to do more than four hours per day. It’s not necessary to put in 9-5 hours.
For promotion, I recommend becoming an quoted expert first, using something like ProfNet to figure out what journalists are working on. PR Leads is a good outfit: www.prleads.com or, if you want to get an extra month through me, www.prleads.com/discountpage
Second, I recommend spending $500-1500 on “media training,” to both train for offline Q&As, but also to get a reel of yourself that you can use to sell yourself as a guest to TV producers. You can see a demo reel I did in LA at http://www.timferriss.com/dev/ferriss-multimedia.htm.
Third, focus on promoting internally at the publisher as much as promoting outside to readers. Without publisher support, you won’t have good distribution, a good publicist, etc. Make the people at your publisher your allies and it will set the stage for a successful launch. It is impossible to launch a big book alone.
Darren - Where does one buy yerba mate tea?
I bought it in Argentina, but you can just search for it online. I don’t recommend liquid types — too unstable. My favorite brands are Cruz de Malta and Rosamonte. If you can’t deal with loose leafs, you can get Cruz de Malta in little tea bags, which is called “mate cocido”. It’s awesome stuff. I was quoted in the NY Times for a yerba mate article, which I found out about via PR Leads. Now I can legitimately say I was featured in the NY Times, and that helps you in a million ways.
Darren - How’s the launch of your book going? I’ve heard it’s already ranking well on Amazon?
Tim - The launch is going extremely well. I should say “pre-launch”, as the book isn’t technically out until tomorrow (Tues)!
The book has been around #100 on Amazon for about four days straight, which is very unusual. It was on the “movers and shakers” and also around #30 in it’s categories. So, technically, it’s already a bestseller and isn’t even out yet!
Darren - Wow - nice work. How’d you get it so high?
Tim - The key has been establishing real friendships with awesome bloggers who share similar interests. There are some cool writers in the blogging world, and I’ve gone out of my way to ensure I meet them when they’re most vulnerable: in person. Somewhat like how I stalked you! LOL…
Darren - I wondered why you were so friendly :-)
Tim - There are a few rules for building buzz about anything in the blogosphere, whether a book, a product, or your own blog….
I have built my blog traffic and book buzz using mostly offline activities, and I recommend others do the same. It is the empty channel right now. I come from a direct marketing background (including online analytics with companies like Marketing Experiments, which I partnered with for close to six years). Once a marketing channel becomes saturated, like PPC, it gets expensive and largely ineffective. This is when I would migrate to a neglected medium like print or radio for advertising. Similarly, there are different media, or vehicles, for reaching bloggers. The most saturated and difficult is e-mail, followed by phone, and the least popular and most effective at the moment is in-person. Rather than fight for attention with everyone online, I’ve focused on attending and speaking at events where bloggers are the attendees.
This seems expensive — with plane tickets, hotels, and all — but I look at it like a direct marketer would. I want leads, whether that is readers or bloggers who can link to me. What is their Lifetime Value (LV) to you in dollars, if you had to quantify it? If one good blogger links to you and you get 200 high-quality subscribers, are they each worth $2, and the blogger therefore at least $400? If you can productize your knowledge effectively, certainly.
Here is the most important part, though: for it to work, you need to be genuine. What does that mean? If you wouldn’t want to grab a beer with a blogger or hang out with them, you’re just trying to sell them something, and it’s transparent. If you have the shared interests and personality traits that would make you a good match in the first place, it happens naturally once you take the effort to introduce yourself and… another key… help them somehow, whether commenting well on their blog, offering advice, or introducing them to other cool folk.
I just had a pre-launch party for the book last Friday, which is a case study in what can been done if you make the in-person connections. Three of my now friends are heavily involved in the tech communities and all have birthdays around the time of book launch, so we held a “Birthdays, Beer, and Book Bash!” that got 250+ RSVP from a ton of the top bloggers around San Francisco. I gave away about 200 books, signed copies, had a ton to drink, misbehaved and had fun. I was 100% genuine and just myself. The outcome has been awesome — becoming an Amazon bestseller is just a sample of things to come. I’ve also been interviewed by the largest newspapers in Canada and the UK as a result of buzz from the party! Fun stuff.
Darren - I notice on your book (which I got a preview copy of today - thanks) that it says that it’s also available as an e-book. Why are you doing that and how did you get your publisher to agree to that?
Tim - Ha! That’s a funny one. So, here’s one thing I forgot to mention. YOU don’t usually sell a book to a publisher. You get an agent, then that agent pitches the book to editors, and then you and your agent decide what to negotiate if they make an offer. In my case, we decided to sell worldwide rights to Crown (an imprint/division of Random House). They also go e-book rights, so that’s their work. The funniest part for me? The e-book costs around $17… and the hardcover costs less than $14 on Amazon! Fuzzy economics, but what do I know?
Darren - So a 4 hour work week sounds like a pretty nice goal - how many hours do you work per week?
Tim - If we define “work” as what you do for income, I spend about 2 hours every 10-14 days checking email for my companies. The structure is entirely virtual, even though I have 200-300 contractors at any given time, and I’ve removed myself from the information and decision flow.
Now, if we look at time on the book, it’s a lot higher, but I’m not doing the book for income. NOTE TO ASPIRING AUTHORS: writing books is not a good way to make money. The benefits are huge, but not often financial. For me, if I had 100 million dollars in the bank, I would still be writing this book and spending most of my time learning about publishing and PR. I love it.
My book is not about being idle at all. It’s about spending little or no time doing things that you dislike or find boring. It’s about adding more life, not just subtracting work.
Darren - So if one’s only working 4 hours a week - what do they do with the other 164? Taking out the sleep, there’s still a lot of time to fill in. Do people find it hard to adjust to all the ’space’?
Tim - It is enormously difficult, and that’s why retirement is so flawed. Please just assume that they’ll make enough money to stop working and then be happy. Instead — and I’ve interviewed dozens of millionaires and retirees who agree on this — you get severely depressed and even suicidal! Why? Because most most people never define the alternate non-work activities that they’ll use to “fill the void” once they remove work and the office. It is not as simple as most think. Sitting on a tropical beach is cool for about three days, then it’s just as boring as hell. I dedicate an entire chapter, called Filling the Void, to this, as I’ve never seen it addressed well elsewhere. For me, it’s learning new skills (especially languages), and thinking up hugely ambitious projects like this book. I’m also trying to get every teacher in every public school in the US access to private investors for better materials, trips, etc. THAT is a big project! It’s exciting, and that’s what I think people should chase in life: excitement. Not happiness — the term is so overused as to have no meaning. Chase excitement and you’ll find happiness, but not the other way around.
Read Part II of this interview with Tim
Want to know more about Tim’s ideas? Buy the The 4-Hour Workweek
Written on April 26th, 2007 at 01:04 am by David Shawver
Tim Ferriss - The 4 Hour Work Week - An Interview
Tim Ferriss and I first met in person in Washington DC on my recent trip. He came up to me seconds after a presentation that I made and told me how he’d worked with a mate of mine and then asked if he could take me to lunch (hint - free food is always a good way to make a good impression with me).
The lunch that ensued was one that I won’t forget in a hurry - we hit it off and I quickly realized that I’d already heard about Tim (through a bizarre and surreal connection that I’m not allowed to tell you about - he IS a champion kick boxer and world champion cage fighter - I’m not going to break that promise).
Tim’s got a long list of accomplishments to his name - he’s a successful entrepreneur, he’s a Princeton guest lecturer, he’s a fighter, he’s a dancer (a world record holding one) and he’s an actor (among man other things) - however what got my attention most about Tim is that he’s the author of a book with a fascinating title - The 4-Hour Workweek.
After a long lunch, numerous other conversations and then dinner with Tim and my wife V you could say that I was pretty much sold on Tim and couldn’t wait to read his book.
My preview copy arrived this week and while I’m still only part of the way into it I can tell you that this is a book that is going to make a real impression on many thousands of people once it is launched (it’s being released this week).
Tim and I have been in contact since we met up and he kindly agreed to be interviewed via Instant Messaging this week. The interview was fascinating - in fact it was so interesting to me that I just couldn’t stop asking questions and it ended up being rather long. As a result I’m going to break it into three parts. The first one I’ll post in a few minutes - I hope you enjoy it!
While you’re waiting for the interview - get Tim’s book The 4-Hour Workweek at Amazon - it’s a great read.
Written on April 25th, 2007 at 02:04 pm by David Shawver
Expose Yourself to My Readers - Group Writing Project Sponsor Needed
Hmmm - that title didn’t really come out right - I can just imagine the offers I could get for this.
After massive reader demand (I get emails every day asking about this) I’ve decided to do another enternetusers Group Writing Project - and I’m looking for a sponsor!
Yep - this time I’ve decided to go with ONE prize instead of 5 or more because I want to give one generous sponsor the chance to get all the attention.
What I need - I need a fantastic prize! Previously our prizes have been pretty amazing - we’ve given away a week’s accommodation in Spain in a luxury Villa, video game consoles, vidoe ipods, thousands of dollars worth of vouchers to various online shops etc.
This time I’d like one jaw dropping prize.
What You get
- Over the week of a group writing project sponsors get talked up in at least 7 enternetusers posts. I generally include a link to the sponsor and the prize that they’re offering towards the top of posts
- As you’ll be the only sponsor you’ll get exclusive billing in each of these posts
- In addition to that I’m happy to run a 125 x 125 pixel ad in my side bar for the week and write an introductory post on enternetusers launching you as the project’s sponsor for the week. I’m happy in that post to talk about your company and any product or service that you’re promoting
- These group projects get 300-500 participants, most of whom link back to the pages that your links are on - some even link to the sponsors so the potential for a viral campaign is there if you have a worthwhile enough prize
Previous Sponsors have had some pretty nice results from sponsoring these projects and many have applied to come back for a second round of sponsoring the project. Those that did best had something a little different about the prize they were offering.
How to Apply - You’ve got two days from…. now…. to email me with details of the prize that you’re willing to offer. Please email me via my contact form with the following details:
Your Company Name:
Your Contact Person’s Name:
The Prize (a short description including a link to it if you have one):
The Value of the Prize:
A brief Description of what you’re wanting to achieve with the sponsorship (I want to tailor what I give you to your needs and hopes)
For enternetusers Readers wanting to participate in the Project - sit tight. Once we’ve got the prize nailed down we’ll move forward with it and I’ll announce the topic.
If you’ve got a topic you’d like to see us use feel free to suggest it in comments below.
Written on April 25th, 2007 at 01:04 am by David Shawver
How to Leverage Your Blog for Bigger Things - Springboard Blogging Part II
Yesterday I wrote about using a blog as a Springboard for bigger things. In the post I talked about different kinds of bloggers and shared a little of my own story. Today I want to suggest a few ways to build a blog that launches you into bigger things.
So how does one become a ‘Springboard Blogger?’
Much of what I wrote yesterday about my own journey shows how accidental, evolutionary and lucky the process was for me (although I’ve become a little more strategic in recent times). Having said that - there are seven lessons that I’ve learned along the way that might be helpful for some.
1. Set Goals
While I’m not the best goal setter going around I do have some broad dreams and agendas in mind as I blog. I tend not to get bogged down in specific and detailed goals but instead set myself a broad course and then allow the wind to blow me where it will.
For example - with Digital Photography School (DPS) my broad goal was to create a space for beginner to intermediate photographers to learn how to use their cameras. I didn’t set out to create a blog with forums and then to write photography resources - I’ve let my readership, luck and circumstance hone the goal and the opportunities have opened up.
2. Position Yourself for the Next Bounce
As I say - my style with this type of process is to set broad goals and then to let the wind take me where it will. This isn’t completely true - when the wind takes me in a direction and I begin to see a potential next step I then take the rudder and begin to position myself for that next opportunity.
So with DPS, even in the first few days after launching that blog I began to hear back from readers that they wanted a space to discuss photography. I began to suspect that a forum was on the cards but didn’t want to launch one with such a small readership. So I positioned myself for the eventual destination of a forum by starting a Flickr discussion group. This was a tester but also a place where I could cultivate a culture of discussing photography (it was also a great recruiting ground for new readers).
As the Flickr group grew I began to position myself for the forum even further by recruiting moderators and building excitement about the new forum. I also had a ‘beta test’ of the new forum with a select few key users of the Flickr group so that when the forum actually launched it already had members, moderators and it was a very natural progression.
The lesson learned is that there’s a balance between this process being evolutionary (letting the wind blow you where it will) and then taking control and being strategic about getting to the destination.
3. Be Relational
At every step on my own personal journey the springboard moments have come as a result of relationships and working together with others. Looking carefully for potential partnerships and being open to synergy with them is key in leveraging your current success to launch new things.
4. Think Verticals
I’ve written previously about how my strategy has changed over the last few years in terms of the topic that I blog about. I used to think lots of blogs on lots of topics would do better for me but over time realized that there was more power in launching blogs that related with one another and that could launch one another. This is part of the reason that b5media is arranged around channels and is why DPS has been successful for me.
5. Look for ‘Energy Points’
This might sound a little New Age or something but I’m a big believer in being in touch with what’s going around you and looking for points where there is a natural flow or energy. Spotting these points in your life and then working in them can bring about wonderful things. For example - as a result of my original photography blog I used to get a lot of questions about photography technique from readers (despite this not being the focus of my blog). These types of emails became so frequent around the time that I launched DPS that it would have been crazy for me not to do something like launch a tips blog.
6. Be Flexible
I sometimes look back at the last 5 years of my life with amazement and wonder at the luck that I’ve had along the way. On numerous occasions it has been the accidents and mistakes that have been the keys to success of ventures. For example, when readers of my personal blog started complaining that I was writing too much about blogging I could have seen that as a negative thing and just stopped doing it - instead I turned it into an opportunity for a new blog - enternetusers.
7. Have a Safety Net
One of the problems that us entrepreneurial types often face is that sometimes our ideas are just a little too big and that sometimes we get caught up in the creation of a new idea and launch things that only we think are great. One of the lessons that I’ve learnt along the way has been to always have a backup plan (or an escape route). Do think big and do follow your dreams - but don’t set yourself up to be destitute if those ideas don’t work. For me this meant that for a long while I had part time jobs while I got my blogging up to speed and it meant that I kept current projects going while I launched new ones.
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And we just found out about get paid to. When your phone rings or you receive an email or receive a text message then you get paid. Could it be that my groom’s fantasies might actually be wilder than the site of me perfectly coiffed, bustled, and veiled?
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