Creating a rush to your blog?
There’ s a new widget in the right hand margin of my travel blog with links to posts on other travel blogs. I hope that the Blogrush widget will introduce my readers to some other interesting travel blogs. It will also allow me to publicise my travel blog to more readers.
I think it appears to be a great way to get free marketing of your blog because your blog is being showcased to readers who are interested in blogs writing about your topic. There’s always the potential danger of encouraging your readers to click away from your blog. However if your blog contains informative, interesting and entertaining posts readers will come back to you. If readers do find other travel blogs that they like through my blog, it may make them view my blog as an even more useful resource.
If you have a blog it’s free and quick to register with Blogrush. There’s a short video which explains how the system works and as soon as you register, the code is produced and you just have to copy it into a widget. There are videos to help you install the widget if you’re not sure what to do.
Every time my blog is loaded with the widget displayed, I receive a credit for a link to one of my posts to be displayed on a widget on another travel blog. You also earn credits through blogs which have signed up to Blogrush by clicking the “add your blog posts free” link at the bottom of the widget ( a direct referral). You’d need a maths degree to fully understand the credit system but you still receive 1:1 credits for direct referral and a 2nd layer referral. You receive a reducing ratio up to the 10th layer. Blogrush will keep 10% of the headline spaces to sell these to make money from Blogrush.
I feel reassured when I read from the start how a company plans to make money from a free service. I think that if there is profit in it for them it makes them more focused on promotion and getting their systems running smoothly.
My main concern is the quality of the blogs which register. I don’t want to be displaying links to blogs of dubious quality. It is possible to block specific blogs and keywords from appearing in your widget. However it would be very time consuming to monitor carefully.
I’ve also added a widget to this blog but the links are looking slightly dodgy eg get rich quick schemes. I had to choose between either the Business or Marketing category and plumped for Business but I may change to Marketing to give it a try. I suspect that as the network grows more topics will be added to the list as I’d prefer a Business Blogging category.
When all is said and done there’s no point in your blog titles being displayed on other sites unless the link is clicked and the post read. You can increase the chances of this by having eyecatching blog titles. Once a reader comes to your blog you want to impress them with your dazzling array of well written posts and the attractive layout and design of your blog.
I will be concentrating more of the number of visitors coming to my blog through Postrush rather than the number of impressions. There’s no point in your title being displayed thousands of times if there are very few clicks through to your blog.
I suppose that the position of the Postrush widget is bound to imfluence the click through rate. It really has to appear on the first page display in order for readers to notice it.
Please let me know how Blogrush is performing on your blog.
on September 19th, 2007 at 12:38 am
Interesting concept. My blog is pretty much strictly a parenting one. I’m not sure I want to open it up to five link titles that haven’t been authorized or moderated ahead of time.
I wonder if this is something that will really take off. Is there any hurry in “signing on now?” I’m much more likely to wait and see if people in my ‘niche’ make use of the program.
Thanks for reviewing Blog Rush!
on September 19th, 2007 at 12:48 am
You are right, Cathy, to be wary of the quality of the links. I’m concerned too. I’ll be keeping a eye on the situation and clicking through on the links to see what the posts are like.
I think it could take off, it’s only been available for a a few days and all the big blogging guns like John Chow and Darren Rowse have been fairly positive so far.
In theory the good thing about signing up early is that you can potentially earn more credits through referrals.
on September 22nd, 2007 at 12:45 pm
I just added BlogRush on our blog (please click on my name above). It’s still new so I will evaluate it on a daily basis.
on September 22nd, 2007 at 8:30 pm
Yes Mikael, I think everyone is waiting to see if Blogrush lives up the hype.