Written on February 2nd, 2007 at 08:02 am by Darren Rowse
10 Tools for More Efficient Webmastering
LeeDodd has put together a useful list of 10 Ways to Become a More Efficient Webmaster. It’s a list of 10 tools that he uses in the running of his numerous sites and forums.
They include a number of SEO tools that could be used for all types of websites. Interestingly he’s put free blog tools as his #1 (remember - he’s a forum guy). Nice list Lee.
Written on February 2nd, 2007 at 05:02 am by Darren Rowse
Speedlinking - 2 February 2007
- Jeremy’s just published the podcast of an interview that he did with Brian Axe from AdSense (he’s a group product manager) which is one of the more illuminating insights into AdSense that I’ve seen for a while. I won’t rehash the whole thing here as Jeremy’s written some worthwhile show notes on it but they do cover some interesting ground. Particularly interesting was Brian’s comments on YouTube’s user revenue model which is on the way - it’ll be quite AdSense like.
- Wendy Piersall has put together a post with some of the lessons she’s been learning on her blog - including lessons on promoting RSS feeds, designing site navigation and more.
- Another Interview - Aaron Wall has an interview with Brian Clark from CopyBlogger.
- SEOmoz has a post on the usefulness of Stumbleupon for promoting your best posts.
- Here’s a cool new WP plugin called Top Posts by Category that arranges you top posts by category arranged either by traffic or comment numbers.
Written on February 2nd, 2007 at 12:02 am by Darren Rowse
Get your enternetusers Blidget Here
I’ve just added the ability for readers to put a enternetusers Widget on their blog’s sidebars using a new system called Blidgets by Widgetbox.
To use my widget you can get it at Widgetbox - enternetusers Widget or click this icon.
If you use it I’d love to hear about it - let me know in comments!
Written on February 2nd, 2007 at 12:02 am by Darren Rowse
WordPress Custom Fields Contest - Win Great Prizes
Aaron is holding a contest for WP users who want to show the most effective use of the WP ‘Custom Fields’ feature.
Read details of the competition at WordPress Custom Fields Contest. I’m one of five judges (no bribes will be (publicly) accepted).
There are already some good prizes up for grabs including cash and goods at Amazon.
I think the competition is such a good idea that I’ve put up $100 of products from Amazon (winners choice). I think the more we support and celebrate innovative uses of features like custom fields the more we’ll improve collectively as bloggers.
Aaron would love to get more sponsors - so if you have a prize to offer shoot him an email.
Written on February 1st, 2007 at 05:02 pm by Darren Rowse
Pay Per Post to Launch New Features
Clickz reports today that Pay Per Post is readying itself to launch some new features this Monday including the following:
- 3 new video ad products - where advertisers can pay bloggers to create videos about their products, where they can run ads before and/or after the video reviews and where advertisers can give bloggers multimedia elements for their reviews.
- targeting capabilities - letting advertisers target their opportunities to different segments of the blogosphere - categories.
- a unit that combines disclosure of ad affiliation and a format giving more advertiser control - a pop up style box that shows who the message is sponsored by and that shows the advertisers logo (something that advertisers control the look and content of).
- tiered blogger ranking payments - ranking blogs by their Alexa, Google and Technorati rankings so that higher profiled bloggers are paid more.
I’m glad that PPP has moved to a disclosure model over the last month or so and think that some of these new features make their service more useful both to bloggers and advertisers.
I’m not really a fan of pop up elements on a blog so the pop-up disclosure unit doesn’t appeal - however until I see it in action I’ll with hold judgement on it.
As I’ve said previously - I’m not really into writing paid reviews on a blog - however I’m not completely opposed to the idea IF there is disclosure. I also think bloggers should think carefully about the relevancy of the review they are doing to their blog and should put considerable effort into genuine and useful reviews.
I’ve actually see a few paid reviews lately that have both impressed and frustrated me. On the one hand I’ve seen a few bloggers writing genuine and useful reviews for products on their blogs.
In other instances some of what I’ve seen produced as paid reviews have been nothing much more than republished press releases or promotional materials - all this second rate ‘review’ does is frustrate and anger readers.
The key with successful paid reviews is similar to the key to successful content of any sort - make it worthwhile for your readers and you’ll not only earn a few extra dollars for your review but also help grow your blog into something worthwhile.
Written on February 1st, 2007 at 04:02 pm by Darren Rowse
BlogAds Live linking Ads
Blogads.com are beta testing a dynamic ad called ‘live linking’ ads which is a new ad unit that updates it’d headlines every fifteen minutes from an advertisers RSS feed.
Here’s an example of how one they’re testing looks.
It looks like an interesting ad style and one that is ideal for bloggers wanting to promote their own blogs.
Written on February 1st, 2007 at 10:02 am by Darren Rowse
Remove Performancing Partners Code from your Blogs
If you were participating in Performancing’s Partners Ad Network they are today asking you to remove Partners Code from your Blogs as today the program officially ends (as was previously announced).
I’ve taken the code off enternetusers today but am still taking advertisers in the same position (just under the ‘Search enternetusers’ section. 125 x 125 ads can be bought on a month by month basis there - limited to 4 advertisers as a time - shoot me an email for details.
Written on February 1st, 2007 at 10:02 am by Darren Rowse
What enternetuserss Can Learn from TechCrunch 20
I’m always fascinated to see bloggers launching new business ventures off the profile and popularity of their blogs. Today Jason Calacanis and Mike Arrington announced a new conference - the TechCrunch 20 - something that I suspect will be very popular.
The conference will give opportunity to 20 start ups to demonstrate their products/services to attendees. The demonstrators don’t pay anything for the demonstration - but attendees do and the conference will be sponsored by a small number of high level sponsors.
Obviously between them Jason and Mike have real profile (and readership) to leverage and this isn’t something that the average blogger would be able to do - however it illustrates two important principle of making money from blogs
1. Indirect Methods of Leveraging Blog Profile - It illustrates that sometimes the best ways to do it are not through direct methods like advertising or affiliate programs. Instead - what’s they’re doing with TechCrunch 20 is an indirect money maker that leverages the profile and traffic that MIke and Jason have built up over the years. It’s these indirect ventures where the real potential lays for many bloggers.
2. The Power of Collaboration - TechCrunch 20 also illustrates the power of networking and collaboration. If Jason or Mike had gone for this alone they would probably have done reasonably well - but working together they are likely to achieve a lot more. Just the fact that they are launching this together creates a buzz - their different skill sets and networks will only make it a stronger venture.
Bring these two principles together around your own niche (once you have some profile in it) and the possibilities for new ventures could be endless.
I’d love to hear your examples of these principles. I can think of a few from my own experience:
- Six Figure Blogging - Andy and I came together to launch a product on a topic related to our experience
- Elite Retreat - 6 bloggers meeting together to present their knowledge to a small group of others wanting to network and learn
- internetusers - a small number of bloggers coming together to explore how they can collaborate, share their expertise and leverage their profile - the result, a new blog network.
Each time I’ve done this type of thing I’ve learned and relearned the power of collaboration and looking for indirect ways of leveraging a blog.
What have you (or others) done that illustrate these principles.
Written on February 1st, 2007 at 12:02 am by Darren Rowse
How do you Find Stories for Your blog? - Open Mike
On the weekend I asked readers to submit their tips on how they find readers for their blog in an ‘open mike’ discussion - the results were pretty good (it’s done pretty well on Digg today - I hope some of those featured got some good flow on traffic).
Today I’d like to open up a discussion around another question.
Where do you Find Stories for Your Blog?
I’m interested to hear from bloggers of all varieties (news bloggers, tips bloggers, business bloggers etc).
- Where do the ideas from your stories come?
- What tools do you use to find them?
- What blogs/sites/offline sources do you use to track them?
- How do you work out which stories to write about and which to leave out?
I’m really after any tip that you’ve found helpful in keeping your blog up to date with interesting, useful and unique content. There’s no wrong or right answers - no tip is too simple or advanced.
Looking forward to reading your wisdom - hopefully we all can learn a thing or two in the process.
Written on January 31st, 2007 at 02:01 pm by Darren Rowse
Technorati launches WTF Digg Clone
Steve writes that Technorati has launched a new digg clone feature called Technorati WTF (where’s the fire).
It allows users to submit posts that they think are hot - and then people vote for what they think is… hot.
I’m getting an 404 error page when I go there at present so maybe they’re still launching but like Steve I’m a little confused as to why they’re going in this direction.
I guess it makes sense that they might have a service that identifies what’s hot around the web at any given time - but wouldn’t it be more useful to have some sort of an index of hot posts via how many links they have incoming - as that’s what they track with their core service anyway (ie a Tech Meme Clone)? I guess they’re sort of doing this already with their ‘top videos’, ‘top news’, ‘top blooks’ lists.
Perhaps another way to do it would be to index digg, delicious, reddit etc and have a ‘top bookmarks’ list or something.
Anyway - it’s hard to critique something that isn’t working from a screenshot - so hopefully we’ll get to see it working soon enough.
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