Friday, October 22, 2010

Day 311

Amazing! The Texas Rangers are going to the World Series! Just finished watching the game and if they keep playing like this, they'll win the World Series. Not only is this good for the team and for the fans who have stayed loyal through thick and thin, it is also good for the Dallas economy. Everyone within a hundred mile radius that owns a restaurant or a hotel is probably celebrating big time tonight, since Dallas will be hosting a Super Bowl and a World Series in the same year. Something like this will give a huge boost to the local economy. Hats off to Nolan Ryan for really turning this team around.

I guess today is as good a day as any to write my Entrecard Review and get the 5,000 EC credits they're promising. Lord knows why I think I need more EC credits. I never seem to get around to using the credits I already have. I do have my opinions about Entrecard though. It might not be the tight knit, loyal little community it once was, but it is still the best place on the Internet for a new blogger to find lot of new visitors in a hurry. Sure, a lot of these visitors never bother to read your blog and are only interested in clicking on the EC widget before leaving as fast as they can. To me, it doesn't really matter if 90% of your newly acquired traffic is just passing through. The 10% who do stick around will still give you significantly more readers than you had before. If you're interested in climbing to the top of one of Entrecard's many categories, keep dropping until your fingers get numb. If what you're looking for is just more visitors and a better Alexa score, buying one of their sponsor ads is a lot easier and produces pretty much the same results as a massive amount of clicking. The click-thru rates on these EC sponsor ads are amazingly good and you can see the results in your Google Analytics report within a day or two. The only downside to sponsor ads is since not a lot of people are currently buying them, it doesn't take long at all for your ad to deliver the number of impressions that you purchased. You get a lot of exposure very quickly, but it can be a bit pricy to keep your ad in front of people for any significant length of time. Buying a banner ad on Entrecard is a less expensive way of keeping your name in front of people, but there is little incentive to click on these banner ads. I've tried dropping on 300 blogs a day, sponsor ads and even a banner ad. For me, the sponsor ads are the most effective way to get traffic. I'm definitely not a big fan of clicking on widgets, but I do like Entrecard. EC has done more to increase traffic for me than any other single thing I can think of.

Can you tell it's been a slow day? I did have my meeting with the SPCA this afternoon. They confirmed that want me to do the promotional materials for their big spay/neuter benefit in February. I won't make any money on the project, but hopefully I won't lose any either. Even though I spend most of my time working with Dalmatians, I would never turn down a project for the SPCA. They do a great job helping animals in the community and it couldn't hurt to work with them a little more often than I have in the past.

It's getting closer to Halloween and I've got a few more Dalmatians in costume for you. Tonight, we've got Dot all dressed up in her Mardi Gras finery.

Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day