Entrecard brings in more traffic
Hi Friends, Hope all is well with you and you are enjoying your Holidays. It’s been a few days since my last post due to the overwhelming demand of my time from the job and family obligations brought on by the Holidays. This week I have been playing with a new web service called Entrecard. If you have not heard of it or have and just not have gotten into it yet, Let me fill you in on what is going on in the world of Entrecard and what my observations have been over the past week.
First, what is Entrecard and how does it pertain to the world of Bloggers. If you belong to a Chamber of Commerce or a Small Business Association you have been to a networking event. What these networking events do is allow members to network with each other, share triumphs, failures and basically learn from each others successes and failures. One of the key features of these meet and greets is to pass around your business card and hopefully drum up some business. This in a nutshell is what Entrecard is all about. You sign up your blog at Entrecard.com, place the widget on your site, visit other sites that have the Entrecard Widget and drop your card.
With Entrecard you get out of Entrecard what you put into it. The best way to utilize Entrecard is to log in to your dashboard, click on campaign and start choosing blogs to go to and drop your card on their sites. Soon you will get other sites wanting to advertise on your site, you earn credits by dropping your card onto the widget on the other sites and by other sites advertising on your site. You pay for these advertisements with the credits you earn, the newer the site is to Entrecard the lower the credits needed to advertise on these sites.
So now that you have your Internet Business Card, here are a few pointers on how to maximize Entrecard and bring more traffic to your blog. What I do each day is log in to my Entrecard account and check the campaigns section, I usually check the most recent section. This shows the latest 30 sites that registered with Entrecard, and usually these are the cheapest in terms of credits it cost to advertise on their site.
When you first sign up for Entrecard you will be on this list and other sites will see you and advertise on your site, for the same reason the cost to advertise is very little credits when you first start out. When these people choose to advertise with your site they go to a queue in your dashboard where you can approve them or not. As a rule I usually approve everyone unless they are not appropriate for my readers, I always go to their site and check out the site to make sure they are appropriate for my readers and while I am there I drop my card and earn another credit.
When you drop your card for someone, by clicking ‘Drop yours’ on the bottom of someone’s widget, your card will be displayed in their inbox when they log into Entrecard. The Entrecard member can click through to visit your site via your card in their inbox. I use this on a daily basis, what I do is click on the cards in my inbox and visit the site, then drop my card on their widget then click on the ad to check out the next site and drop my card on their site. I follow these advertisements until they run out and then go to the next card in my inbox. You can rack up quite a few credits doing this as well as find some very interesting blogs that you might want to visit on a regular basis or even sign up for their RSS feed. If I like the site or a particular post I will Stumble and Digg the post, I feel this is a nice way to pay back to the community.
In the image above you can see the Inbox, the key is to keep on top of it and check these sites out. Also in the image above you can see my stats, I have been in Entrecard for a little over a week and have had over 200 visitors thanks to Entrecard. To put this in perspective I have been displaying the Blogrush Widget on my site for three months and had only 16 visitors from Blogrush. Might be time to rethink that piece of real estate on my blog. Entrecard is turning out to be a fun little community to be a part of that is growing each and every day. I have found some really great blogs that I might have never found thanks to Entrecard.
Advertising Blog Traffic Entrecard internet business card networking traffic
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December 28th, 2007 at 10:04 pm
Entrecard is pretty great, just gotta watch out not to waste too much time on it
It’s kind of addicting.
Your technique for dropping cards is quite interesting. I personally have just bookmarked a buttload of blogs in my niche (this one included), and I drop cards on them daily.
The only problem with this so far though is that my drop/dropped ratio is horrible…
2312 cards you dropped
436 cards dropped on you
>< Hopefully that will improve in time. Only been using it for a week or so.
It is great for finding great posts and new blogs though, made a lot of new connections, and that in my opinion is the best part.
Tim’s last blog post..How To Make Rollover Buttons
December 29th, 2007 at 2:58 am
Great article!
I’ve got to write one for one of my blogs, too.
One thing I’d add is to be discerning in the ads you accept when you first start out. You’ll get a ton of folks wanting to advertise. After all, they’re only paying 2 EC.
Think about this… Each ad stays live for 24 hours. You’ll earn 1 credit per ad until your site starts to be worth more. On the other hand, if you get busy and drop a lot of cards, people will reciprocate and drop their cards, increasing your “dropped card average”, which ups your “ad purchase value”.
I’ve found that I accept one ad each day to add to my queue, and I like to keep the queue three or four days into the future. Sometimes that’s not possible, but I still make a choice over a 24 hour period.
January 3rd, 2008 at 7:20 am
Hi Raymond,
I have been using Entrecard for nearly 2 months. Yes it really drives traffic to my blog, but most of the visitors are coming just to drop cards, they don’t even spend 10 seconds in my blog. But you got it right, if you develop good relationship with the bloggers that you drop their cards, leave comments to their blogs, even Stumble and Digg, i am sure you will be blessed by those bloggers. Otherwise you will only cheat yourself by dropping hundreds of cards without even spending a few seconds on each of them.
Meanwhile i wish you a happy new year!
Mert
(Came to your blog through an Entrecard)
Mert’s last blog post..2008 Goals For Search For Blogging
January 3rd, 2008 at 11:08 am
Hi Mert, Thanks for the comment. I try not to just click through, I end up getting caught up in reading posts so much that my card drops are very low. I think the best way is to just allocate a certain time limit each day to dropping cards, as I will never get anything done.
January 3rd, 2008 at 12:11 pm
How come I never see a “drop yours”, even if I go to the ones who dropped a card on my site?
January 3rd, 2008 at 2:18 pm
Hey there.. Nice and informative post..
Wishing you a happy and prosperous New Year 2008!
Cheers!
- Wakish -
Wakish’s last blog post..Happy New Year 2008 Dear People & A Retrospective of Wakish Wonderz For The Past Year 2007
January 4th, 2008 at 1:56 am
Very detailed Nice. I like it. I wonder if people still read blog posts. I think people now just look for entrecard, drop theirs, and they are off. Does that ever happen? Come to think about it, it’s better than no visitors at all.
jmarzo’s last blog post..Want to Start a Company? Get a Small Business Loan
January 4th, 2008 at 1:18 pm
Oh yes, it brings in plenty of traffic but as has been stated already you have to be a little carefl because it could get addictive.
Gerri’s last blog post..Focial.com – A Bloggers Marketplace
January 10th, 2008 at 3:21 am
I found you through EntreCard, and I’ve enjoyed reading through your posts. The first thing I did was turn off the email alert feature - my inbox was flooded with “An Advert is Awaiting Your Reponse…” messages. Unreal! I do think a lot of the service, and plan to play along at least for a few weeks to monitor traffic levels.
Frugal Dad’s last blog post..You Might Be Living Frugally If?
January 10th, 2008 at 3:33 am
I like getting the emails, because I get to approve the ads pretty quickly. I much rather get these types of emails as opposed to the “grow your member” ones.
January 10th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
I agree I love Entrecard, great way to waste a couple of hours a day.
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