Random Blatherings

Everyone who uses Entrecard wants to get lots of card drops, otherwise what’s the point of using it? Getting lots of drops is easy, but it does take work. Below are my tips on getting lots of Entrecard traffic.

• Have a nice clear layout. I’ve lost count of the amount of blogs I’ve visited where I’ve had to hunt for the Entrecard widget. Lots of 125×125 adverts on a page, with the widget hidden in the middle of them, is a really bad idea. People aren’t going to find it, and if they can’t find it, they can’t click on it.
• Always ensure that the advert is “above the fold”. The fold is the point at which the user needs to scroll down the page to view the rest of it. It’s subtle, but if a user views a page, and sees the Entrecard widget straight away, they’re more likely to click on it. If they start reading your blog, and scrolling, they’re less likely to look outside of your posting, and so less likely to drop their card.
• Any chance you get to join a drop list, take it. People who maintain drop lists are serious Entrecarders. These are the people you need to form relationships with to get lots of Entrecard drops. You might find someone advertising their drop list underneath their Entrecard widget, or you might find it by studying where your traffic is coming from. The method of getting onto the daily drop list varies. Some will put you on it just for asking, some request that you drop on them for a certain number of days, etc. Being consistent with dropping on sites whose owners reciprocate is always a good idea, whether there is a drop list or not.
• Reciprocate card drops. If you prove to people that you are a regular, consistent dropper, they’ll be more likely to drop on you, mainly because they’re hoping to get a reciprocated drop from you. Following who has dropped their cards is easy - check out your Drops Inbox. This shows you the adverts of everyone who has dropped their card on you. It’s the perfect place to find blogs to drop on, because every blog is neatly laid out, ready to be visited, and you’re creating some goodwill, because you’re reciprocating drops.
• Comment on blogs you visit. In itself, this wont get you Entrecard drops, but it will encourage a friendly relationship between yourself and the blogger, and get you a link back to your own site. You like to know that people are reading your blog, don’t you? We all do. Leaving a comment on a blog is a great way to develop a relationship with a blogger. And getting your site “out there” for people to see is imperative for developing traffic. If people don’t know your site exists, they can’t visit it.
• Spend your Entrecredits wisely. You’ve worked hard to get those credits, so spend them wisely. There are several schools of thought on how to spend your credits, but I tend to either save them up and buy an advert on a very well trafficked blog in my category, or buy lots and lots of adverts for 2, 4 or 8 Entrecredits on lots of different blogs. For example, my blog is in the Self Improvement category, so I might choose to apply for an advert on Saphrym.com if I had a lot of credits to spare. This blog is consistently at the top of the ratings, which is a good sign that I will get lots of clickthrough advert drops. If I was looking to advertise on as many blogs as possible, I would visit the Category Browser, set the limit to 8ec (or whatever I was comfortable with), and then apply for lots of adverts on lots of blogs. I find that preparing a mix of the two methods seems to work well.
• Make full use of your Statistics page. This page contains a wealth of useful information - how many drops you got each day, where the most drops came from, etc. It enables you to work out which adverts were the most effective, and the most cost effective. Read the information on the page carefully, and use it to work out which blogs are the best to advertise on. For example, using the information I have here, I work out that an advert bought on Saphrym.com got me 133 clicks, at a cost of 7.6ec each, while several adverts I took out on Soul Meets World netted me 1373 clicks, at an average cost of 5.3ec. In this case, it seems that advertising regularly on Soul Meets World is a better idea than advertising on Saphrym.com once. Of course, this isn’t a hard and fast rule - several adverts on Saphrym.com might be a better overall idea in the long term. It really pays dividends to keep track of your Statistics page.
• Cultivate your top 10 droppers. Your “Top 10″ are the top 10 people who have been the most consistent on dropping their cards on your blog. You can find out who they are (and a lot more useful info) at the Statistics page. If you have a daily drop list, add them to it. If you don’t have a daily drop list, create one, and add them to it. These are the 10 people who have got you the most credits over the past 30 days. They are an invaluable resource. Encourage them to continue dropping on you by reciprocating drops on them.
• Have a well designed, eye-catching advert. Do not use the default multicoloured Entrecard one - they look as though you can’t be bothered at best. Spend some time crafting your advert, because that is what is going to be drawing people to your site. If you are serious about Entrecard, it’s worth investing $6 in getting an advert designed for you. Jay has created some excellent designs for various people, including my own, and is well worth talking to. A lacklustre advert is useless - capture the essence of your site in your advert to convert views into drops.
• Optimise your page for Entrecard - make the advert nice and visible, with little else round it, and keep it at the top of the page. A slow loading page will put viewers off no matter the site, but if people are bloghopping, they are even less likely to stick around to wait for the advert to load. You may even consider having a drop page like Srajaram.com. A fast loading, clean page will make it very easy for visitors to drop their cards. A page full of adverts and slow-loading flash animations will encourage them to move on.
• Be consistent. Keep your advert in the same place on your page. Drop on your daily drop list every day.
• If you offer people the chance to get onto your daily drop list, update it regularly, with the caveat that they need to drop on you regularly to stay on it. They’ll keep dropping on you, because they know you can be trusted to drop on them. It’s probably a good idea to make the drop list public - most everyone likes extra traffic.

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