Taughnee Stone continues to write about her experiences of starting a new blog – the Alaska Blog which continues to grow after just 12 days of existence. Interestingly she’s chosen to use Blog Explosion to drive traffic to her site. This is not a method I’ve tried as my initial exposure to it left me feeling it was not a wise move. As Taughnee writes – the traffic that comes is not really interested in your blog – they are directed to it as part of a program to build up their own blog’s traffic. To me this is a rather ’empty’ approach which means the stats you end up with are quite meaningless.
However as I read Taughnee’s post I realized that perhaps in the start up phase of a new blog that this type of traffic might actually have some use. You see Taughnee writes that as a result of this traffic a small number of those who surfed in have linked to her. One would think that a small percentage would become regular loyal readers also. So perhaps it’s not a complete waste of time (although I would still avoid it as I’ve had feedback from a couple of bloggers that it’s a waste of time).
Anyway whilst I would suggest caution with Blog Explosion – Taughnee’s post has some interesting stuff in it from a blogger in start up mode. Hopefully it helps some.
Blogexplosion turned me down for having to many ads. So be careful. my blog has what google allows me to have. But blogexplosion decided that I had more ads then posts.
BlogExplosion has worked well for me (in addition to the hard work of networking via commenting on others’ blogs and writing content, of course!). I’ve had over 30 people link to my blog and specific posts. I don’t know how long it would have taken them to find my blog, esp. the genetics one since most non-scientists would never think to be interested in that unless they’re looking for specific information. I think the rate of return for traffic exchange sites is low but it’s there and worth a try.
I can’t say I disagree with you about Blog Explosion Darren. I’ve avoided using it for my other blogs because I didn’t want *random* traffic, preferring instead to grow a quality, targetted readership over time (lots of time).
For this site, I took a chance. If you want a “wide net” to see what you might catch, you’ll certainly get it.
It may or may not be a waste of time depending on your intended audience and your own personal goals for the site. While I wait for google to find me and to develop my blog network, I wanted as many people as possible reading and giving me feedback.
The biggest benefit so far (other than gaining a few links) is the comments and emails about the content. It takes some time to find your voice (for me anyway) and to decide what type of content will keep people coming back for more. For me this experiment has been really helpful in that regard.
And it doesn’t hurt the old ego either at this stage in the game, I’d rather have a few comments from random BE surfers telling me they enjoy the site than to see empty stats. lol
To be honest, I don’t plan on relying too heavily on Blog Explosion long-term. As Lei says the rate of return is low — but it’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick at this point.
:) Thanks for keeping tabs on my progress everyone, I am loving the discussion and appreciate it so much!
I subscribed to the free membership version of “Traffic Swarm” in the late summer of 2004 .. It’s quite obvious from the stats that all your visitors are waiting for the 30 seconds to expire before they move on. That’s not all, everybody who is signed up and using the service is also trying to sell something. So, promoting my online store in there seemed to be either an oxymoron, or I was just a moron.
I didn’t stick with it for 9 months for the traffic credits. I continued to use this to see what other online stores were doing. It’s the same way with Blog Explosion and Blog Clicker. I’ve used both of these since I started blogging May 31st (and Traffic Swarm too) just to see what’s out there in the blogworld.
I may find the odd reader that notices either of my two blogs in the stats that stay awhile, or blogrolls me, but I’m doing it to surf for me. But I blogExplosion just to see what designs and new things are out there. Some of the time, I quickly scroll down to the utility section, and see what new 91×17 ‘gifs’ are out there and often click those links too.
Most of the time, it’s all judged by the cover – if I don’t like the front page design or the last entry, I just multi-task in another window until time runs out and I can click again.
I like it better when there is a chance that I’m random surfing than settling on a specific theme or recommendation from somebody or some site that may be biased. It’s the same reason that if you click on my name and visit my site, I put a random surfing button for all of my categories … to give people that same randomness chance to view my site, without really thinking what they want to look at. I’m kooky that way.
I would agree with Taughnee, and say that casting a wide net is helpful at the initial start. But the best quality links and readers have come from my own comments or from forum postings in areas that are around my niche.
Frugal for Life
I will be giving blogexplosion a shot for my somewhat new blog. We will soon see what will happen.