27 October 2008

Blog things

I have tried this Entrecard thing for quite some time, and while it appears to have driven some content to my site, it has increased the bounce-rate too much for my liking.
For me, the purpose of this blog is to share my experiences with writing rather than getting millions of hits. And it would seem that the Entrecard network has deteriorated a little to the point where the only reason people visit blogs would be for drops. So, for this reason I will be removing the Entrecard widget from this blog at the end of the week - this gives those who have bought spots on the widget a chance to get their money's worth, sort of.
I also don't want to lose touch completely with the Entrecard network, because I have discovered some fantastic blogs through it, so I will keep the widget on my scribbles blog.

7 comments:

Mandy said...

I use the Firefox toolbar to browse and drop on Entrecard and I find it suits my needs perfectly. I will browse through hundreds of blogs at a time and for me, the purpose is to find blogs that catch my interest.

I see the fact that I land up syndicating only 1% of blogs I drop on as more of an indication of the blogs out there than a failure in the Entrecard system. But yes, when I do consider leaving Entrecard it is at those times when I see my bounce rate. Very scary.

Preston said...

I am new to this so what is a "bounce rate" and how do I find mine. I like Entrecard but I think a lot of users simply drop and run. I have found some cool blogs there so I am keeping it for the time. I saved you as a fav in Technorati because I saw no other way to follow your blog unless I bookmark you.

Vanessa said...

@Emm: The problem is that it has become just like every other system out there. It is impossible to police/evaluate every application, so every blog that applies for an Entrecard account gets one. The network has grown too big and too focused on making bucks rather than creating communities.

@Preston: I use Google Analytics to gather stats for this blog. It gives a nice breakdown of your traffic, as well as your bounce rates. Your bounce rate is the number of visitors that visit the site and do not click through - essentially one hit wonders. A successful website wants repeat visitors, and visitors that read the content (thus clicking through the pages).
And thank you - I realised that I forgot to return the subscribe links when I updated my theme recently. I have added it back, so it should be a little easier now to bookmark my blog.

Mandy said...

Isn't it hard to analyse bounce rate on a blog though? If you have a magazine-style that require click-through to view the whole story then that might count. If you have several posts on one page, your bounce rate is always going to be high. However, if you restrict it to one or two posts on a page then your readers get irritated and leave.

The best advice I have picked up is to reply to each and every comment personally (like you did in this post) and to post regularly. I have definitely seen the amount of comments rising on my blog and I think that those two factors helped that. Then again, I don't want to blog professionaly - I just don't want to feel like I'mblogging for no audience.

Vanessa said...

@Emm: Google Analytics does a pretty good job at measuring the bounce rate. Not sure how, but it also factors in the average time spent by a visitor on the site. Also, when I look at my stats, more than 60% of the traffic came from Entrecard, and the bounce rate and the number of referrals from Entrecard pretty much match up.

I agree though, it does make a difference when one responds to the comments. I am not overly fond of the comment system on Blogger, probably because the years of using LJ has spoilt me :)
Like you, I have no real interest in being a professional blogger, but also don't want to write for no audience. Luckily I can see the number of subscribers to my feed slowly increasing, so I am possibly doing something right? (or there are a bunch of masochists out there who love to be bored to death *grin*)

Mandy said...

You're definitely doing something right - I see your site has a pretty decent Alexa score.

Vanessa said...

@Emm: Yay :D I wonder if it is not a combination between regular, on-topic posting, not linking to mallware and occassionally responding to comments *boggles*

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