Last week I made a post about people who use Entrecard precariously and place their widgets above the fold. I do not agree with this strategy and claimed that it takes up valuable space that could be used to monetize your website. Divablogger took the bait and issued a nicely written response to my argument. The following post is my retort.

Let’s start with the first comment that got my attention:

“placing it somewhere more accessible makes it convenient for people to drop their cards”

I agree completely with you. This statement is actually helping me to prove my point. You see, although I do like Entrecard for its potential to generate a fair amount of traffic to a website, the advertisements on the widgets are still free and cost $0 in real world money. So why would you sacrifice space on your website where you could be making real money in order to promote somebody else’s site who is just using you for your widget? Don’t you feel so….used? You are willingly giving up the potential to sell ad space on your site and make money online for a silly Entrecard point. I’m no economist but I would call this “negative equity”. You are not gaining anything valuable by giving away prime real estate on your blog nor are you being properly compensated for it. If ever in doubt, just repeat this mantra: “What Would John Chow Do?”.

You also stated the following:

“Being in directories (which are strongly promoted by the creators) is like being a part of the daily life of entrecarders who use these directories and are too lazy to create their own.”

I’m not entirely sure what you meant by that statement. Firstly, of course directories will be promoted by their creators! I promote all kinds of things that I make; this started in kindergarten when I made my first hand print on paint then had my parents hang it on their refrigerator. It’s just plain simple to understand. Secondly, although Entrecard is a fantastic avenue to reach a wide readership and gain an audience, I don’t necessarily want to be in a directory of lazy people. “Dress for success”, as they say. I would rather have proactive Entrecarders and Bloggers like my sponsor JasonBoom that participate and support my site. He is obviously working hard at promoting his brand and blog and is not a “lazy” blogger. If you take away all of the lazy bloggers, I believe that the web would be filled with content that is of much higher in quality than what is available today.

I guess we could go around and around in this argument. You believe that placing your Entrecard widget, which gives away a free link and takes away space for paid advertisers “above the fold” is the smarter and better thing to do. I believe that placing the free link widget that still brings me traffic “below the fold”, thus saving more prominent spaces for paid advertisers is the smarter thing to do. The point I was trying to make is a financial one, where as you were making a point about quantity of traffic. In the end it is just a question of “quality versus quantity”. I would much rather have 1000 daily visitors who found my site through other quality “non-lazy” blogger’s websites. These visitors would probably read multiple posts and pages per visit, leave comments, become advertisers, and even help me out by clicking and following my affiliate links. It seems to me that you, on the other hand, would be satisfied with 1000 daily visitors who get to your site, click the widget and leave. I’m in this for the quality, but if that’s the kind of visitor that you want going to your site, then I hope your strategy works out for you. To me, it’s a no-brainer.

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Today I was perusing a certain store and I found an item that caught my attention. The store was the Entrecard shop and the product was a custom logo design. This logo design cost me 500 Entrecard Credits, an amount which I found considerable.

The logo will be done in the next few days, and I hope that the end result is successful. I want a brand / header image that really captures the essence of this site and the environment that it fosters. My plan for this site is to share with you everything that I know and everything that I learn about making money online through blogging or affiliate marketing. I am certain that this aspect is quite nebulous and I hope that the designer that works on my logo will be able to understand what I mean.

500ec, although a big part of my Entrecard bank account, is quite a deal for a custom designed logo. Services on Digital Point range from $20 and up, so I was thrilled to know I could get the same service for Entrecard Credits. I think that a new logo will help me to spruce up my branding now that I have the owl at my side. The owl, along with some catchy typeography could help make my site more memorable. I think the owl is doing a good job; since adding him to my site I’ve seen my RSS readership and daily visits go up. That may also have something to do with my guests posts at other blogs, but for now let’s just assume it was the owl.

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It’s been said that a picture is worth a thousand words. As a blogger, I can relate to that point. When coming up with a post, often times I find that my post would be enhanced and taken to another level if I could only find the right image to add to my article. Sometimes a visual can really carry a point across to the audience in order to help them really understand what is being said. Other times, a picture can help readers quickly grasp your main concept without actually reading every single word of an article.When it comes to writing for a certain audience, especially when it comes to getting new users to like your site and stay a while, a image is crucial. Coppyblogger suggests that a blogger should

“Start with a striking visual cue: A picture is worth a thousand words, and Stumblers really take that to heart. Nothing grabs their attention more than a striking image. StumbleUpon users seem more likely to be drawn in by the smart use of images, and there’s no better placement for a great image than at the top of your article.”

Although the Coppyblogger article is written specifically for grabbing the attention of StumbleUpon users, I think that guests coming your site from other blogs are likely to treat your blog the same way as a SU user. That is, within 2-3 seconds they will judge your site on looks and aesthetic appeal. If that fails, they will move on. However, if your site grabs their attention with an image or its design, they will stick around and listen to what you have to say.

Daily Blog Tips states that

“yes, you can overcome a bad first impression with great content, but why not take advantage of the first impression? An attractive, professional-looking blog design will give you the look of a blog that’s on its way to success, and visitors are more likely to want to be a part of that. “

While they are not necessarily talking about only a catchy image, what they say rings true. If you want your users to associate your blog with being “good”, you may as well make it look like it belongs with the likes of the pros, right?

Most blogs that I see fall in to one of two categories: Those that will be here in 2 years and those that won’t be here in 2 years. I think that it’s easy to categorize a blog after reading it and looking at the blog for a few days. Right now, blogging about making money online is the “in” thing to do. Most bloggers want to get lucky and be the next John Chow. I’m sure that the 80/20 rule will apply to this niche as well; 80% of those bloggers won’t be around in 2 years.

If you are a blogger that wants to be around in 2 years, make sure to grab new readers any way you can! Add a good pictures to your post from places like stock.xchng, the Creative Commons image search, or the FreePhotoBank. These sites are free and offer you images that you can legally use on your blog without restrictions.

It’s not easy to compete in this flooded market of “make money online” blogs. Give yourself any advantage you can find and a good place to start is by commanding your reader’s attention with a high quality contextual image. The closer your blog appears to success, the more likely you’ll work hard to make your blog succeed!

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If you’ve ever wanted a website review but couldn’t afford one, here’s your chance. I’m am giving away 2 FREE website reviews to random RSS by email subscribers! Sign up to my RSS feed using the signup form on the top of the website and be automagically entered to win a FREE website review!

The contest starts today and winners will be drawn when I hit 100 RSS subscribers. By waiting until I hit 100 RSS subscribers, your site will benefit from an influx of loyal readers as the review will be seen by not only my readers but those surfers who find my site by other means.

Want a free high quality website review like this one? Sign up for this giveaway today!

Want an extra entry? Make a post on your blog linking back to this blog post with either the word “Webtrepreneur” or “RSS contest” as the link text!

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This is my second post for Tyler and the positive comments have been great so far. I hope to continue working with Tyler as I develop my marketing prowess and know that we can benefit one another.

For my loyal readers, check out my new post and leave a comment telling me your opinions on the post. I think you’ll like it!

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The Contenders

Tyler “the man, the myth, and the legend” Cruz has been my “coach” these last few weeks, has provided me with some valuable tips to make my site better, has given me the awesome opportunity to make guest postings on his site, and has really inspired me to be a better blogger in general.

Gyutae “nice guys finish first” Park has also been influential in my blogging sphere as of late. Gyutae is proving to be a marketing maven and has been able to generate huge buzz for his site by giving away 1 review (valued at $450) on John Chow’s website, and has brought traffic to his and others’ sites by offering free blog audits to anyone who makes 10 genuine comments on his blog. Gyutae is a genuine nice guy and is rapidly making a good name for himself in the blogosphere.

The Prize

This is where the contest gets interesting. As with every contest, there seems to always be a winner and a loser with the winner getting a big prize. Think the Superbowl, the BCS Championship, the World Series, the World Cup, Wimbledon, World’s Longest Fingernail, and so on. The winner gets something for winning.

With this contest, the winner doesn’t really win anything but the voters are the ones who win. If you vote for the winner, you enter for a chance to win up to $100 paid for by the LOSER of the competition.

In addition to perhaps winning $100, each candidate is giving away a freebie to sway voters one way or another. Gyutae is giving away a free T-shirt to his first 30 voters and Tyler is giving away 100 free Entrecard credits to each of his voters. Some schwag for a vote can’t hurt, right?

My Vote

Unlike big government elections, I feel as though my vote actually counts in this race, and it is with a great degree of difficulty that I cast is. The aforementioned candidates are both very deserving of my vote. This is not a popularity contest nor is it a measure of the quality of the website. I am not voting on the basis of monthly earnings nor am I voting on the basis of friendship. I am, however, voting for the candidate with whom I can relate the most, I am voting for the guy who started his blog at the same time that I started mine and I am voting for the guy that makes me feel like I can reach my goals just like he is reaching his.

Also, since I like movies and sports where the underdog is triumphant, I am voting for Gyutae’s Winning the Web. I know that Tyler has some tricks up his sleeve and like the Chow vs. Shoemaker RSS contest, Tyler will probably unleash the hounds closer to the end of the contest.

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If you’ve ever had an income stream online, you’ve probably thought to yourself at one point or another that you really should have more than one way to make money, just in case something would happen to your site. These are 5 reasons to do it now:

1. Trends Change

It should be no surprise to learn that we live in a fickle, materialistic society. People want the latest and greatest things at a moment’s notice, especially when it comes to technology. If you have a website that revolves around technology, you’d better be prepared to act quickly and serve those people who may no longer be interested in your product line.

The same goes with many other niches; health, fashion, automotive, etc. If you are sitting still in an ever changing business environment, a new trend will come up and your site will be left in the dust.

2. Competition Changes

Remember the old way we used to obtain music? Going to the store, shopping the aisles, finding the right genre, looking at shrink wrapped packages (On a side note, why do they have to make CD’s so hard to open? I wonder if a music exec has ever had to open one. I doubt it, else they’d realize how dumb that packaging is.), opening up the CD and popping it in to our CD players or portable Discman’s.

All of a sudden, out of nowhere, comes iTunes and revolutionizes how we listen to music. Now we can buy individual songs or entire albums with the click of a button. Music executives didn’t believe in iTunes or digital delivery, now they’re crying foul and wondering why they’re not selling any more CD’s.

The same can be applied to your website. Things could be going along just fine, then all of a sudden a new competitor arises. You can do one of two things: Prepare your business to tackle the opponent or sit there like a lame duck and blame others when thinss start to go wrong. I suggest the first option.

3. Google Changes

Google is a business baromter of sorts. They claim that the good stuff shows up first and the bad stuff is not displayed at all. Many web business live and die by the rankings given to them by Google.

If you currently just have one site for one product, then you’d better be prepared for a rocky road ahead. Google’s algorithm changes occasionally and if you are not prepared to take the hit, then you’ll be in trouble when changes head your way.

Google search rankings mean everything to some businesses, and unless you’re really good at obtaining one of the top spots, you’ll have to rely on luck and little else to make money online. Prepare yourself, make good websiteS and have a solid business plan to make you money for the long run

4. Stuff Happens

Another reason to have more than one income plan is that, in all honesty, things happen out there that are beyond your control. For example, if you had a site that was somehow making money selling Enron gear, the day they went out of business you too would have been out of business. If you sell health products and the FDA changes stance on them, you’d better be prepared to take a hit.

5. More is Better

If you’ve manage to stay out of trouble, either through luck or preparation, you should diversify your net portfolio because in all honesty, we’re in this for the money. More income streams = more earning potential. More earning potential = more money in the long run.

Prepare yourself, make GOOD QUALITY websites about your niche products, and stick to your guns. Always grow and learn in order to position yourself ahead of your competitors.

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One too that I use in order to track my metrics is Alexa.  Alexa is “The Web Information Company” and they analyze traffic to all websites and present the traffic in a stock-style line chart. These charts are very helpful, especially because you can compare the performance of different websites to spot trends.  This is helpful especially when considering the purchase of advertising space!

I was a bit surprised when I ran this comparative test between Entrecard and Blogrush.  For those not yet familiar with Blogrush, it is a service similar to Entrecard where you as a blogger place a widget on your site and people use the widget to click through other sites and from other sites to yours.  In principle, Blogrush was pretty cool but I think that it was rushed to launch before the product was tweaked for the blogger’s benefit.  John Reese, the man behind Blogrush is a marketing guy so he created a lot of buzz for Blogrush.  I belive he over promised and under delivered.

As you see on the following 3 chards, Entrecard is outpacing Blogrush in just about every stat.

Reach

Reach is defined as the “percentage of all Internet users who visit a given site. So, for example, if a site like yahoo.com has a reach of 28%, this means that of all global Internet users measured by Alexa, 28% of them visit yahoo.com”.  On the graph below, Entrecard is on pace to pass Blogrush any day now.  That means that more people will be visiting Entrecard than will be visiting Blogrush.

Rank

Alexa defines Rank as the “geometric mean of these two quantities [reach and pageviews] averaged over time (so that the rank of a site reflects both the number of users who visit that site as well as the number of pages on the site viewed by those users). The three-month change is determined by comparing the site’s current rank with its rank from three months ago”.  What this means is that they take the number of visitors and they take the number of pages that each visitor views.  They find the average and call it “rank”.  Only 2.5 weeks after launch, Entrecard has already passed Blogrush in rank meaning that more people are viewing more pages from Entrecard than from Blogrush.

Pageviews

Pageviews is the simplest of the definitions; pageviews are the “number of pages viewed by Alexa Toolbar users”.  Users who use the Alexa toolbar go to websites and it measures how many pages each users views.  On this category, I think you’ll be surprised by the results.

Check that out!  Entrecard is kicking Blogrush where it hurts!

In summation, Entrecard is doing a fantastic job for bloggers.  They are sending bloggers a lot of traffic, they are providing very cheap (Free!) exposure to bloggers in the form of advertisements on other websites, and they are doing well at promoting themselves while doing all those things for others.  Blogrush, on the other hand, was a premature system that doesn’t really benefit bloggers but it does benefit Blogrush as they use a certain portion of links to make money.  The difference between the two is simple: Blogrush was created for profit and Entrecard seems to have been created as a real useful tool for bloggers.  I’m not sure yet how Entrecard will make money, but for now I’m very satisfied with the service.

If you don’t yet have an Entrecard account, you are missing out on a potentially nice amount of traffic!  Go get one and drop it here on this site!

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I think that Entrecard can do the same for you, and that’s why I am starting the very first contest for this website!

Up for grabs will  be at least 100 credits to Entrecard so that you can advertise your site on several other websites.  Advertising starts at just 2 credits, so with 100 credits you can put your site on as many as 50 websites!

Here are the rules:

1. Sign up to my RSS Feed through the email signup form at the top of the page.
2. Validate your subscription by following FeedBurner’s instructions
3. Leave a comment on this post saying that you signed up using the same email that you signed up for the feed.

BONUS CONTEST

If you want to win 500 or more credits to Entrecard, post a link to this post on your blog and make sure to have the anchor text “Make Money Online” pointing to this website.

A winner will be drawn at random by the end of next  week for both contests and the winners will be mentioned on my front page with a link to your own site!

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With a little bit of viral marketing, he has coined a new term: “Blog Hopping“. Park says that this idea of Blog Hopping is a virtual parallel to pub crawling in that you get a lot of people together at one place in order to hang out socially. Park says that it will be a great way to “discover new blogs and ideas, network with bloggers, and help one another out.”

By participating in the blog hop, visitors will read posts, leave comments and hopefully become regular readers of the featured blogs. There’s even a chance for blogs to be featured and to bring in more traffic to their own sites.
I think that Gyutae is doing a great job with Winning the Web; his recent contest to win a “ReviewMe” by John Chow has brought the spotlight on his young blog but he has proven to be up to the task.

If you haven’t done so already, head on over to Winning the Web and give it a read!

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