Being a neophyte blogger, I'm not all that attuned to the social networking (better term than "marketing") tools that bloggers use. But a few days ago, a friend and successful humor writer clued me in to Entrecard.
What is Entrecard?
Entrecard helps bloggers and readers discover more blogs like the ones they like. It uses kind of a business card model, where bloggers trade cards virtually. I just joined last night, and my "business card" for my blog is pictured right (Harv of course). Further over, in the right-hand column, you can see the the Entrecard presence on my blog. It's essentially a place for other bloggers -- hopefully with blogs similar to mine -- can place their cards on my blog. I can do the same on other bloggers' sites if they have an Entrecard presence. To place a card on the other blogs, you use "chits" that you accumulate by visiting other Entrecard blogs. Entrecard does a lot more, and you can read their thorough documentation if you're interested.
Right now there are few (maybe two, including me) horse bloggers that are using Entrecard right now, although there are a lot of humor, pet/animal, writing, and environmental blogs. It strikes me as a useful way of connecting with other bloggers, but I'd like it so much more if more equestrians were part of the network!
At any rate, here is a funny post about the topic of my last blog entry--kids--from the blog Ok, Crazy...
I'm not interested in putting advertising on my blog or in blogging for money (it's a good thing, too)! But some of the entries take some research and time, and I would like to get the word out to folks who might be interested. For awhile I was posting to some bulletin boards, but I wasn't entirely comfortable with that.
I'm interested to hear what equestrian readers and bloggers thing of this tool -- whether you've heard of it, tried it, or have an opinion. Thanks
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Entrecard: horse bloggers out there, interested?
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Not something I'd join, to be honest.
ReplyDeleteIt just looks horribly inefficient and it runs the risk of increasing page views but not building any real readership (e.g. people visiting just to get their credit, but not paying any attention to content).
I'd rather stick with the tried and true leave a comment and hope you get a courtesy comment back method. Erm... if I were the sort to leave comments. Which I'm generally not.
Besides, comments stick around forever (or until there's a database snafu), while these card things seem like they only display on a short-term basis.
Of course, I don't do anything a blogger is supposed to do to gain traffic, so maybe my "eh, no" reaction is a sign that this is the Next Great Thing.
Entrecard is useful, but you have a lot moer to gain from it if there are relevant/related blogs also using hte network, so you're doing hte right thing by encouraging other horsey bloggers to join.
ReplyDeleteOtherwise you'll be swept up in a sea of cats.
Yes, you can see my current cards are not horse related -- I do find that exploring other entrecard sites has led me to some that I really like -- mostly humor, but also some environmental and craft sites.
ReplyDeleteHalt, I agree that right now it might not bring the "meaningful readership" I'm hoping for, at least not right now. My fingers are crossed though.
I have been using Entrecard (for a week or so now), I have found a bunch of interesting blogs through it. I am also hoping for more related blogs to join. My blog is however, not entirely equestrian related (that is only 90% of my life)
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the shout out! I really appreciate it!
ReplyDeleteAlso, yeah, a lot of traffic from Entre is just people coming to your blog to drop a card. But, I've had a lot of people come and stay and read as well. After joining, my regular readership and number of comments definitely went up.
And I've found a lot of other blogs that I read now as well.
It shouldn't be your only source of advertising, but as a supplement, I think it does a pretty good job.
I had the same experience as OK Crazy. Comments and readership increased after joining Entrecard. Many of the readers I picked up through the network aren't even from my own niche, which I found surprising. Yes, there will be many drive-by visits, but I've gained a lot of loyal readers as well. More than I could get organically. It's been very valuable to me. EC also turned me on to a collection of blogs I likely would not have found on my own.
ReplyDeleteThank you for the info. I'd never heard of EntreCard before. I've signed up and am looking around at the features now. Thank you for the very kind recommendation. :)
ReplyDelete