Written on October 3rd, 2005 at 11:10 pm by Darren Rowse
BlogNetworkWatch Launches
Martin has decided to start a blog on Blog Networks over at BlogNetworkWatch. It’s definitely a popular topic at the moment so should be an interesting one to watch.
Written on October 3rd, 2005 at 09:10 am by Darren Rowse
Positioning Your Blog for a Profitable Christmas
There are 82 Days until Christmas.
Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year for many enternetuserss - especially those with product related sites. The number of people searching for information on products that are given as gifts as well as the numbers of people actually buying presents online leap in the lead up to Christmas - the question is - ‘Are you Ready?’
If you start preparing your blog for Christmas in December you’re probably too late. The Christmas rush starts late in November and escalates right through until the big day.
Bloggers need to take account for the fact that if they want Search Engine traffic to bring Christmas traffic that you need to think ahead. It takes day, weeks and even longer to get posts ranking in SE’s.
So how are you preparing your blog for Christmas?
Here are five areas I’ve been working on:
- Deep link Affiliate links - I actually did a lot of work on my blogs in preparation for December a month or two back. In addition to my normal blogging I’ve added hundreds of individualized and relevant Amazon text affiliate links to individual posts on some of my blogs. You can add links to affiliate programs in your sidebars - but the most effective affiliates actually add links to actual articles and posts (hence the name ‘deep linking’). I found last year that my Amazon earnings for November and December were triple my normal levels - so this year will be watching for similar or even better results.
- SEO - I’ve also been going through a lot of older posts and each of my blogs and have been tweaking them on an SEO front in the hope that it will help increase my rankings in Google and the other SE’s. Search Engines like fresh content - so consider adding new information and updating some of your older posts to give them some freshness.
- eMiniMall Optimization - I’ve so happy to have found the eMiniMalls - they are almost the perfect type of ad for the Christmas rush as they give readers a picture, price and comparative options for making a purchase. I’ve spent the last couple of days adding them to most of my blogs and working on their integration into the blogs in terms of positioning and design. I have a feeling that they will be my big winner this year. In terms of optimization tips for eMiniMalls - I’ll write about this later in the week - but I’m finding that the best positions so far similar positions to clever Adsense positioning and design.
- Adsense Optimization - Similarly I’ve been casting a critical eye over my blogs and their Adsense ads in terms of design and positioning. Sometimes things get a bit stale over time if you leave them in the one spot and its worth doing some review in this area and experimenting with new ways of configuring them so that in the last month or so you can have them fine tuned.
- Christmas Posts and Suggested Gifts - I generally don’t target specific ‘Christmas Words’ (there is so much competition) but I will be running a few posts over the coming weeks on a few of my blogs witch suggested Gift items which I’ll link prominently in my sidebars and menus. Of course these posts will have affiliate links embedded into them as well as the normal Amazon ads.
So on a blogging front - what are you doing to prepare yourself for Christmas this year? Are you thinking ahead about positioning yourself to be a part of the increased traffic and earnings that it generally brings?
Written on October 2nd, 2005 at 05:10 pm by Darren Rowse
enternetusers - Out of Google’s Sandbox
A little new trend started these past few weeks at this blog that gave me a little cause for celebration.
I started getting traffic from Google.
Yes I’ve had the odd hit from Google over the past 8 months since moving enternetusers to this domain - but the reality has been that since that time 99% of my traffic was from loyal repeat readers or from referrals coming from other blogs.
Why did it take so long?
Well despite my best intentions and thousands of incoming links from other blogs to this site Google seemed to have me on probation. They had me in what some refer to as the sandbox - a place that they seem to keep new sites that they are watching to see if they are spamming the system.
I suspect the reason enternetusers.net found its way to the sandbox was that it got too many links pointing to it too quickly - and perhaps because it just suddenly appeared on this domain with 100 or so ready made pages which I had transferred across from my previous version of the site. The theory is that spam sites quite often appear on new domains with loads of inbound links and lots of pages over night - and so if any site does so it might just trigger some alarm bells in the Google algorithm.
It’s a theory - one to keep in mind - but one I’m happy to be on the other side on (I hope).
Written on October 1st, 2005 at 06:10 pm by Darren Rowse
Audi Finds that Blog Advertising is Cost Effective
A recent Blogads.com campaign by Audi brought about some pretty staggering results with 29% of traffic to their Audi A3 promotional website coming from BlogAds. The amazing part is that the BlogAds cost were just 1.5% of their total ad spend for the campaign. Now THAT is a good return on investment!
Blog Advertising works!
Found via Adrants
Written on October 1st, 2005 at 04:10 pm by Darren Rowse
Advertising In Blogs - Survey
Tris has posted about an Advertising in Blogs - linking to a survey that Qumana did of bloggers. The survey only had a pretty small sample size so you’ll not want to take it as ultimate truth - but the results are interesting. They found
- 37% of bloggers had ads on their blogs and 22% had ads in their RSS feeds
- 85 (ish) % of those with Ads use Adsense - a figure that we found when we did our last poll on the topic of income sources for bloggers also
- 34% of bloggers who don’t participate in advertising do intend to sign up for an advertising program of some sort
I won’t go through all the stats - you can read them here - but I do find it an interesting topic to examine.
One of the themes that Tris and Arieanna seem to be picking up on and arguing is that many bloggers don’t use Adsense or other advertising systems because of the complexity of adding them to a blog.
My initial reaction to this argument was one of skepticism - this comes from me seeing some of the most technically inept people I know (including me a couple of years ago) working out how to ad Adsense to their blogs.
On the other hand I think they might actually be onto something - those of us who have been blogging for a while do tend to forget what it was like in our early days. While I now confidently make changes to my Adsense code and can find the spot in my templates to add other ad programs - I know from the emails that I get that many people don’t even know where to begin with tweaking the back end of their blog.
Of course anyone who reads the post by Tris will read between the lines where their critique of Adsense and other Ad systems is going. In fact you don’t really even need to read between the lines - I suspect where it’s all going is staring us all right in the face in blue and yellow!
It will be interesting to get a look at what they’re up to in the coming weeks.
Written on October 1st, 2005 at 08:10 am by Darren Rowse
Chitika eMiniMalls Tips
If you’re one of the many bloggers who have just signed up for Chitika eMiniMalls after reading my review you might like to check out Quick Online Tips who have just posted tips on running Chitika eMiniMalls & Google Adsense on Same Webpage.
There they give code that helps you to set your eMiniMalls up in a way that is non contextual (and is therefore allowable with Adsense) but in a way that rotates a variety of ads which will help you to get a bit of variety in your ads which will help combat ad blindness.
I’ve been using this rotating ads code over the past day or two and have noticed an increase in earnings already.
Another thing I’ve noticed is that the bloggers that are reporting the best successes with eMiniMalls are the ones that are targeting products on their blogs. I know I mentioned this in the review - but bloggers with a focus upon gadgets, clothes, shoes etc seem to be doing well from them.
Disclaimer: the links to Chitika in this post are affiliate links - if you sign up using these links I earn a small amount as a commission. It does not impact what you earn from Chitika but rather is paid by Chitika. While these links are affiliate links I genuinely believe in the product and have pointed out both its benefits and weaknesses.
Written on September 30th, 2005 at 11:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Why are Some Blog Networks So Successful?
Scrivs has waded into the ‘How much should blog networks pay their bloggers?’ conversation by refocussing the question (as he is in the habit of doing):
‘So really should we be asking how writers in these networks should be getting paid? I don’t think so because you can find people to write for you in almost any model. The question you have to ask yourself is what type of model do you need to bring in the talent to help you succeed?’
I’ve been pondering this whole question for a few days now since we launched internetusers and I’m coming to a similar position.
The question of ‘how much’ IS important. But I’m wondering what else makes a blog network successful?
I chatted this morning with a blog network owner who told me how he couldn’t believe the response we’d had at b5 from people wanting to be involved - he asked why he’d had little interest from a similar invitation to bloggers to join with what he thought sounded like much more generous terms.
I’ve been wondering ever since why this is the case? With networks being announced every second day (I saw two new ones yesterday alone) - why are some taking off while others seem to disappear so quickly?
My answer to this question is still forming in my mind - but let me attempt to give a glimpse of what I’m coming to by describing what I’ve noticed so far about those wanting to join b5media.
One of the few things that I can put my finger on is that in most cases people seem to want to be involved with Duncan, Jeremy and/or myself.
This sounds totally arrogant and to be honest I laugh at the thought of people wanting to join an ordinary fellow like me at anything - but the fact is that over the last three years of blogging - for some reason that baffles us all a little - the three of us have built some level of credibility, trust and/or respect with those who read our sites. We’ve got some runs on the board in terms of running blogs and we’ve built relationships with other bloggers in the process.
These things seem to be the foundation for many of the applications we’ve had so far.
From what I see - people are not joining up because they see a cash cow (although everyone would like to make some money from it) - they are joining because they want to belong to something that goes beyond the money. I’m yet to put my finger on exactly what it is but I’m wondering if one of the keys to successful blog networks is that they are started by people with track records of actually doing it for themselves previously.
It would be interesting to see someone do some research around this (I wish I had the time) - investigating what characteristics the established blog network owners share etc. I know my theory stacks up well with Jason Calacanis (who has a history of successful ventures) and Nick Denton (who similarly has been behind some successful start ups).
I also suspect it’s behind what Paul Scrivens is doing (although he doesn’t have any big companies to point at - he’s definitely put the runs on the board in starting, running and selling some successful blogs).
I’m sure there is more to it than this - but I wonder if it might be one factor that could be the difference between attracting quality bloggers and not. I know as a blogger I’d be much more likely to join with someone who I’d seen build something successfully previously than joining one that I’d never heard of who just put up an invitation to come join them.
Interested in others thoughts.
Written on September 30th, 2005 at 10:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Search Engine Ranking Factors
Steve Rubel points to a useful resource over at seomoz on Search Engine Ranking Factors which is one of the better descriptions of how Search Engines rank pages that I’ve seen recently. It lists 93 factors to keep in mind. Sounds like a lot to remember - so luckily they’ve arranged them into different levels of importance (only problem is that on all three of my Mac browsers the symbols that tell what is important or not don’t seem to be working at the moment).
Written on September 30th, 2005 at 02:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Engadget Labs is Coming (and enternetusers Labs is here!)
I’ve long fantasized about having a blog HQ where I could blog from - with space for designers, writers, reviewers and for me to sit back in a spa sipping champagne watching it all - so when Niall Kennedy reported that Weblogs Inc is launching Engadget Labs I got really jealous.
‘Editors Peter Rojas and Ryan Block will work out of their new office in New York with possibly a few other members of the Weblogs Inc. network. The new office space will include a special podcasting room for interviews with visiting companies as well as the weekly Engadget podcast.’
Ok - it could just be a spare room or two in someone’s apartment - but knowing the way the Weblogs Inc team does things it will be a step up from that! It certainly sounds cool.
Update: Ok - if Engadget can have Labs - so should enternetusers! Here they are….
taken with a Sony Ericsson K750i camera phone
Written on September 30th, 2005 at 02:09 pm by Darren Rowse
Blogging Stories - How Blogs Change Lives
I just spoke to a reader of enternetusers on the phone who left a comment on the Chitika Mini-Malls Review that totally knocked me off my feet.
Rachel (not her real name - she is wanting to protect her niche and not go public) has been reading enternetusers for the past few months and has slowly built her blog earnings up from nothing to $40 per day through Adsense. That was until yesterday when she started using mini-malls. I’ll let her explain in her own words in her comment (used with permission):
‘OH MY GOODNESS!!!
I put these (the mini-malls) on my blog after reading this review a day ago and today I’ve earned just under $150 from them in a day! I know this will probably go down a little when my readers get used to them but it’s amazing!!!
Adsense was only earning me $40 a day previously!
Thankyou SOOO much for this review Darren. You have just changed my life.
I cannot express to you what this means to me. if the $150 per day continues I will be able to go off welfare payments at last and should be able to put my two little kids into some non 2nd hand clothes for the first time in their lives.
I’m a single mum and never considered being able to earn this type of money. I am so grateful to this blog Darren, you were the one who got me up to $40 a day, but this is is unbelievable. I’m trying not to count all my chickens before they hatch, but wow.
thankyou so much Darren’
I’m blown away. Not by the figures - or even by the success of the mini-malls - but by the ability of blogging to have this kind of an impact upon someone’s life. This is one of the main the reasons I started enternetusers - because I saw potential for ordinary people like myself (and Rachel) to find a voice in an area they learn and talk about and to find ways to build an income stream around it.
I doubt Rachel will ever be a millionaire blogger - in fact she has told me that she only wants to do it to a part time level because she wants to spend significant time being a mum to her kids - but the great thing is that she’s taking it to a level that meets some of the dreams she has for her family. She’s someone who a year ago was in a low place and wondering how they’d get by who now has some hope.
I suspect we’ll see more and more stories like this in the coming months and years. They might not be stories that make it into papers or magazines about what the big networks are doing - but they are stories that matter in the lives of individuals and their families.
In my mind they are the stories that really do matter.
I’d love to hear your stories if you have them of how blogging has and is making a difference in your life. Feel free to share them in comments below either with your name attached or anonymously. If you leave an email address it won’t be public but I’ll see it.
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