Enkay Blog

Where Do You Get Your Ideas?

Sometimes I receive comments that say things like, “How did you come up with this” or others of that sort and I figured I’d do a post about it. Its not too uncommon to be sitting there and wondering what to blog about but its much easier when its a topic that comes to you when you’re not focusing on it. So, lets talk about some of the ways you can derive your blog post ideas.

1. Reading Other Blogs - This is one of the ways that I am influenced when it comes to writing my posts. I see what someone else has said and I think about whether I agree or disagree and if I think that I can add to it or explain it further then I find it a good post. If you read a post and you feel the need to respond strongly, then it can most probably be an influence for a blog post as long as the subject matter is interesting.

2. News - Sometimes news stories come around from Tech websites or the main page of Yahoo or MSN that really catch my eye. If the article pertains to the topic of my blog then I definitely use it to derive my blog post from. It helps me talk about a current issue topic and therefore it also displays in the searches better. Its a good way to discuss something that is more current and one that you can relate to your readers with.

3. Comments On Your Blog / Other Blogs - I’d say about 30-50% of my posts are derived from comments I see on my blog and other blogs out there. Some comments really turn the light bulb on, in my head. Its about how you view the comment too. See what the commentator is really trying to say and go from there. It will help you not only shed some light on them but allow you to help explain their concern which may be the concern of many others too.

4. Curiosity - I think curiosity plays a big part in some of my posts. If I see a new blog or a blog post I usually read up on the blogger and try to look into the details of the author of the post as well as the blog. Sometimes my curiosity has led to me discovering some interesting facts that I was able to compile into a post. Its not necessarily bad or sneaky things but it can be and those are the ones that usually make for good link bait posts resulting in increased traffic.

5. Experience & Time - This sounds like the weakest but this is the only one thing on here that will take time for you to develop if you’re a new blogger. Over time you naturally become used to the blogging schedule and know what sounds interesting and what isn’t. It also makes it easier for you to come up with post ideas as you have more background knowledge and can help showcase other blogs, plugins, tutorials or things of that sort.

So I hope you liked my post. I’d like to know where you get your ideas from. I’d really like to hear from all of you!

Lets Spin The Publicity Wheel!

I was recently requested by Mark Schumann to review PublicityWheel.com and after having heard of it already from a few of the other blogs, I was delighted to do so. If you haven’t heard of Publicity Wheel let me give you a quick introduction as to what it is.

How Does It Work?
The basic concept of Publicity Wheel is that you can gain an instant boost of traffic with the help of the wheel. Didn’t quite get it? Well, when the Publicity wheel is spun, it picks on website from each category and gives it full exposure for a certain length of time. Here is a diagram that can help explain it a bit further if you’re more visual like I am.

The way this works is that users include a small 125×125 banner on their website and when a website is picked, it is played on that banner automatically. So, lets say that your website was picked, then you’d be displayed on hundreds and thousands of blogs for several days in a row. This gives you a great boost in traffic and gets you the exposure you need. Best of all, its FREE!

Is It Worth It?
Think about it, it doesn’t cost you anything and all you need to do is add a small banner. A banner that is quite a bit smaller than EntreCard. Now you must be thinking, how do I increase my chances of getting picked? Well, thats quite simple too. Everytime someone clicks on the banner thats on your website you get a publicity point. Each publicity point is like a ticket in a large lucky draw like system. The more points you have, the more like you will be picked. Once you win, your points are reset to zero so that the same sites don’t get picked over and over again. As for those who don’t get picked, your points carry over to the next draw, to help you. So even if you don’t have as many clicks, you’ll still have a chance at getting picked.

Mark Schumann is the man behind this idea and when I learned about this concept I really liked it. I mean, think about it, its free and most bloggers are using Entrecard which has a bigger banner size. Why not switch to something that has a smaller banner size and brings in about the same amount of traffic?

How Much Exposure Can I Get?
Furthermore, each blog is separated into categories and so when you win, your 125×125 ad will only be displayed on websites in your category. This way, you’ll get exposure on blogs that have similar readers. Its an excellent idea and you can get as many as 12000+ views if you are part of the Internet category or around 6500+ views for Entertainment. Be sure to pick the right category in order to gain traffic that will be most interested in sticking around. Have a look at the Exposure Table to see how many views you can generate depending on the category you fall into.

Publicity Wheel Blog & Sneak Peak At The Dashboard
Publicity Wheel also has a blog that helps you stay informed with the new updates and changes that are taking place. I noticed a blog post at the end of June that said the dashboard was newly transformed and I have to say that the dashboard is very well designed. Here is what the dashboard looks like:

The dashboard is separated into 4 panels so that you can easily see what ad design you have selected, how many points you currently have, when the next spin will take place and the stats of the ad currently displaying on your website. All these features have really made it simple for a user at any experience level to login and instantly understand the way Publicity Wheel works. I was very impressed with the design considering Im a ex-webdesigner and the simplicity and choice of colors really won me over.

Conclusion
In Conlusion, there really isn’t much I can suggest to Mark. I think hes done an excellent job in marketing the website as I had already heard about it and visited before. I would recommend all of you to sign up because there are no disadvantages of doing so. There is no cost related to using Publicity Wheel and the ad is smaller than Entrecard so if you currently have that, then space shouldn’t be an issue either.

The wheel was spun just yesterday so if you sign up today, then your chances of being picked by the time the wheel is spun again are good. Go ahead and sign up and I will definitely keep you updated once I get picked! Let me know what your thoughts are about this concept considering I really like the idea. Also, I would like to know if you signed up or are currently a member.

Lets See Those Shirts!

Well, today’s post is more fun rather than educational and I wanted to see how many people actually had a Market Leverage shirt. I know that many of you have won contests or received shirts from Market Leverage as care packages. I’d really like to see pictures from all you guys that have the shirts. To make it a bit more tempting, I’ll be linking back to all of your pictures sometime later so hopefully thats incentive enough.

Plus, I was talking to Debby over at Market Leverage and shes trying to round up images of bloggers in their Market Leverage gear to display on a wall in their office. Wouldn’t you like to be part of that? So, help her out with that and in the mean time, lets have a look at those shirts! Heres a picture I took of myself wearing the shirt.

Knitted Ferrari
I came across this video on Youtube and I was highly impressed by it. A university student actually hand knitted a Ferrari replica. Still dont believe it? Well, I have found video for you to see the immense amount of time this project has taken along with the high level of detail.

Is Facebook Advertising For You?

Well, I started off with Market Leverage as my first affiliate network and after seeing others doing well I decided to give it a shot. Plus, they’ve been really helpful and nice to me and I felt kind of guilty for not even knowing how to get started. Anyway, I read a few websites and decided to give Facebook a shot. I realized that if you join the Visa Business Network, you get a $100 voucher for Facebook which will give you the opportunity to experiment with the ads.

Aside from the $100 Voucher I’ve used my Paypal account to create a virtual credit card that comes in handy and linked it to my Facebook account for additional funds. Currently, I’m not spending too much on advertising per day because I want to test it out first and I have been working with Facebook for the past week and theres a few things I’ve learned so I’d like to talk about those.

1) Your Ads Will Get Disapproved - The thing about Facebook advertising is that you will have to keep submitting your ads several times before they approve them. One of my ads was denied 33 times before finally being accepted. So the basic idea is to keep re-submitting your ads before it gets accepted. You may have to make changes so that it appears different but it won’t be long before you get accepted.

2) Capitalization Guidelines - A lot of my ads were rejected because of capitalization issues in my titles or descriptions. You cannot capitalize words that you wouldn’t usually capitalize or words that don’t need capitalization in your title and sentences. So be careful how you capitalize and use words in your ads as it can be disapproved for those reasons also.

3) URL Guidelines - A few of my ads were rejected because of domain guidelines they had. The idea is that you cannot use a redirection or an inline frame. You also have to use a URL that they believe clearly depicts your offer. In the sense that if I am running an ad for diet pills, I cannot have the URL say “Sexy Body” or “Hot Body” or anything of that sort.

4) CTR’s & Leads - The average CTR rate I have is .04% and I’ve stated that correctly. Thats not 4%, thats .04%. The CTR is quite low and thereby the leads that result from it are merely based on your landing page. The number of people who complete the offer after clicking has averaged around 50% so thats a good number however your ad racks up impressions faster than clicks so be sure to pick CPC rather than CPM to avoid paying by 1000 impressions and paying per click instead.

5) Monitor Your Performance - I know of many people that are unhappy with the way their Facebook advertising campaign is performing and so I’d recommend keeping a track of your earnings and expenditures and figure out whether its worth it for you keep investing more time and money. This is necessary to not end up in the red as some people have.

Verdict
All in all, Facebook ads is working for me however its not working for quite a few people. I would recommend you to try it out by using the coupon first and if you think its worth it then you can give it a shot otherwise you may just end up losing money and being unhappy. Pick offers that you think will appeal to your target audience and Market Leverage has several offers to appeal to all different kinds of people.

So, I hope you liked my post about Facebook Ads and I know that I’ve never talked about affiliate advertising before but since I’m just getting started I thought it would be nice to share my experience. Anyway, Happy Friday and hope you guys have a great weekend.

Are Email Subscriptions A Good Idea?

After visiting almost every blog that I know of, I realized that I’m missing a key element — Email Subscriptions. The simple fact is that many people don’t really check their RSS readers. Email Subscriptions can be a good idea and maybe thats why I’m currently figuring out a way to install it in my sidebar. For now though, you can subscribe using the form at the end of this post. Today, I’d want to talk about why email subscriptions can be a good idea.

The first reason that comes to my business mind is cost. Well, most of us have Feedburner so its completely free. I mean, it doesn’t hurt to implement it since theres no cost associated with it. When you login and select your feed in Feedburner then click on Publicize and select Email Subscriptions in the sidebar. Make sure to activate it and you’re ready to go. This is what your page should look like.

Secondly, it helps expand your subscription options by allowing people to use their email accounts instead of an RSS reader. Also, now when you have an ebook or a “special report” then you can entice people into subscribing to your blog through email subscriptions. It will not only help you increase the number of RSS subscribers but you’ll also be able to gain more exposure through the ebook or special report that you offer.

Lastly, I notice that many people don’t even check their RSS readers and I’m guilty of that and willing to accept. I mostly just open my browser and visit the blog because thats the way I’ve always done it. Email subscriptions will allow you to help appeal to those who either don’t use their RSS reader or those who don’t have one. Its basically a way for you to boost your RSS subscriber count.

I think what turns people off from Email Subscriptions is that they have to part with their email address and they’re worried that they’d get spammed and if not with advertisers, by you, the blogger. How is that possible? Well consider this, if you blog several times a day, your poor RSS readers will constantly be bombarded with emails with your latest post which occurs every 3 hours. But thats not going to be the case when you subscribe to my blog. You’ll get an email once or maybe twice and your information will never be used or sold to any third parties nor will it be used by me to advertise products or services to you.

So theres my email subscription form that you should soon see in the sidebar. If you’d like to subscribe by email then use the form above. I hope that you liked this post as I’ll be doing a case study to see how adding the email subscription has helped my RSS count. Do you guys prefer Email Subscriptions over an RSS Reader?