Postcards from the Funny Farm

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In this post I discuss how valuable Twiter and you may have heard of Twitter is you are not already using it. It is an enigma to me still trying to understand it’s huge popularity. It IS popular though so that alone becomes the impetus to join. As you Twitter, you theoretically can gain reader for your site or blog. I might as well change those terms into your “online ego.” Twitter will feed it for sure. That little blue “t” ca do a lot for your online ego. Whether it’s going to build your traffic? Well, the jury is still out on that one.

Twitter is a simple time-line of messages that users assemble from all over the globe intermittently as they feel the inspiration to do so. It reminds me a lot of the way PHPbb forums used to be. I would post in the morning what I was doing that day and when I got home I would check for questions or responses and I would reply. Twitter gives the reply function but it doesn’t alert the writer that her/his Twitter message has been replied to. To be, this is a huge drawback since the only way to find replies is to go back and back and back into the message since your twitter post to find the reply. Many times after all that, you find no one replied.

So what is it good for? Twitter is good for connecting friends who are online. It is also good for posting sites your run across to recommend, like a tumblelog. You can get traffic this way, but for me it hasn’t brought much. The best part of Twittering for me has been seeing what my friends are doing and getting ideas for content from that. I haven’t had much referral traffic for Twitter.

My friend Chris Gray really likes Twitter and he has this to say about it:

1. Online diary — I like to send updates on various milestones that I would have never otherwise written down. For example, I can go back and now recall the date and time my wife and I took our youngest son to get his first haircut or when he took his first steps. It’s also fun to look back at various other moments, goals, frustration points, and see where I’m at right this moment. I use it as a kind of gauge (if that makes any sense).
2. I also use it as a quick way to communicate with my friends (since I have twitter hooked up to my cell phone I can send them tweets wherever I am). I also use Twadget (Vista sidebar gadget) to post/keep up with tweets.
3. Finally, I occasionally use Twitter to advertise new blog posts (while I haven’t had the chance to do this for some time now- since my posts have been sparse

Thanks to Chris for that helpful info!

My conclusion? Twitter is a luxury/fun item that you should play with to keep up with friends as well as make new ones but I don’t see it as a way to improve traffic.

The other service I want to look at in this article is IZEA. Now, IZEA is a larger company that produces several smaller ones. The most well known one is PayPerPost. This is a service you apply to and, once acceoted, may choose from a list of “Opps” from paying advertisers for varying amounts of money (usually at my level I see opps from 7-45 dollars). Izea also has a new PayPerPost social marketing site called “Social Spark.” It is currently in a invite-only beta phase but i have been told that very soon it will launch publicly. There isn’t much to review with regards to traffic but from what I can tell, this will become both a monster way to find paying ad sponsors, but also a way to network and increase your traffic. The one drawback I see is the fact that some people will perceive this as a competition and not linkback etc. I hope that is not the case and that IZEA creates incentives for referrals and links to other members. If that proves impossible with this business model, I hope they will seek out ways to make members friendly with each others and helpful toward one another.

So, those are the two social networking sites I wanted to write about tonight. I’m getting more and more into this online social marketing stuff. So much so that I have already purchased some patch panels for the computer room in our new home. But whatever I recommend and however much hardware you have in your home, you have to see what really works best for your needs. Use these services as much as you can before you take my review as gospel truth. For some, these may work better than for others. Enjoy.

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I couldn’t get this out Sunday for 2 reasons: #1) I was busy getting my theme and layout all sorted and #2) I hadn’t done that much time in the jeep! What you have here is a collection of the stuff that made me oooh and aaah last week. Fasten your seatbelts and thank you for riding Funny Farm tours.

Dad Balance has rebranded to The Man Page. What do you think of the new brand?

Kimberly Clay asks the question: SEO or personal c...

Make your blog into a spiffy hardbound or paperbac...

Check how many backlinks you have …

It may not be the “law” but Joanna sho...

Sick and wrong cow testosterone activities (LOL i...

Katy started talking about Social Spark at the lau...

Like Tyler, I’ve been popping my head in Twi...

Guys, we have to face that this guy is telling the...

Thanks to all the animals on the 3 hour tour this week. As always, each got a well-deserved Stumble.

I’ve had the honor and pleasure of meeting Kimberly Clay, internet marketing expert, online entrepeneur, and founder/blogger at GetMyWealthNow. You may have seen her 125×125 ad on my blog that reads: “Make Money, Build Wealth.” I whole-heartedly endorse her services. They are largely free and extremely helpful in generating online wealth. She’s an expert. When I read through her posts I always find something new of great value. And you may recall last month she asked me to write a guestblog in her niche, and I wrote about how to master making money through blogging one st.... That was a lot of fun, since I don’t usually write about mmol stuff. I am getting more and more into it … you should too if you’re not already! Kimberly’s blog and website is an excellent way to do just that.

Readers that have been here since the early days know that my progression into money has been a gradual one. I’ve taken and continue to take “baby steps” into the marvelous world of being paid. Some ask me “How are you making money with your blog?”  I will tell you that reading Kimberly’s blog is part of how.  So far with the money I have made through blogging has taken my wife and I out on dates, bought my son some reard treats at the store, and allowed me to do advertising of my own of Postcards from the Funny Farm.

Kimberly is not just a stellar coach who will work with you and help you create wealth through blogging, she is also a very nice person who I am happy to know. Her emails are always upbeat and positive and she always takes the extra time to answer my questions about making blog money. You should click on her link and see if you agree with me about Kimberly. What have you got to lose? A couple seconds? I can tell you what you have to gain by knowing Kimberly and/or reading her blog: bucks in your pocket and traffic for your blog!

I wrote just days ago about how to choose Entrecard advertisers. It’s still valid except for one thing, cheap doesn’t mean what cheap used to mean. Here’s an excerpt from the article on their blog below:

Written on April 7th, 2008 by Graham
Today we release our long-awaited modification to the pricing system.

It’s going to go live within the next 24 hours. Just to be clear, we are talking about a complete change to the way everyone’s advertising prices are calculated.

Starting today, your ad price is determined solely by demand for your ad spot. Every time someone purchases, or applies to purchase an ad on your site, your price doubles. Every time an ad finishes running, your price halves.

Cheap ads now will mean that not enough people apply to advertise on them.  With my own blog costing in the 600’s per day now, it is going to cost a poor blogger 600 clicks for one day on my blog.  I wouldn’t wish that torture on anyone.  Still, we’ll have to see how it plays out.  It could be a positive and kick those really high pointer blogs that have very little value in their content off the top of the mountain.  If that happens, that will be very good.  I wrote about the actual system of Entrecard if you want to know more from a beginner standpoint.  You’ll find that article here.

This is an example of yet another company who has an idea and thinks every idea they will have after that will be just as good.  One thing I like about Blog Catalog is that they respect their users enough to ask their input repetitively.  That’s what Web 2.0 is all about.  I’d have liked to done a poll at least about this before it went live.  I’ll have to try it and see if it’s something I like or something I’m going to make new space for my own advertising on my sidebar with.

What do you think of Entrecard’s new pricing system?

Here’s the best I ran across last week. As always, the posts all received a well deserved Stumble. If you enjoy them, I request you do the same. It’s also Safari etiquette to leave them a comment. These are animals for which the guide encourages feeding. Enjoy!

myrnaslist.com/2008/03/25/eckhart-tolle-on-the-me...
I’m becoming more and more of a fan of this writer (and this blog). For some people it goes way beyond that. This blogger calls him a spiritual leader. I simply find his creative ways to look at the universe fascinating and healing.

blog.getmywealthnow.com/2008/02/email-guts-innard...
Kimberly Clay offers us the crucial innards of a marketing email. I am very careful when I do these, I don’t want to turn anyone off. This post from a professional affiliate marketer tells what to put in and most importantly, what to leave out.

itmightbelove.com/2008/04/03/kill-the-spidersbe-a...
Chelle gives us an excellent reminder that the guys can still be chivalrous to an extent in today’s world.

diigo.com/dashboard
This is just amazing. You can sticky note websites and others see your notes.

lifeisrantastic.blogspot.com/2008/04/paperback-wr...
Jessica the Rock Chick is writing a book! Where can I pre order?

FuelMyBlog is an awesome service I have been using for blog marketing and networking. They were kind enough to publish my guestblog today about widgets on their site. I have been studying and using widgets for over a year now and have learned a thing or two. I put that knowledge in this guestblog. There are a few widgets out there that everyone needs to have and some that definitely should have never seen the light of day. Then there are those that are custom suited to a particular blog type. It would be nice to get a discussion going about widgets. I know I could still learn a ton myself. If you are interested in reading my guestblog and joining the discussion at FuelMyBlog you can read it at the url below:

blog.fuelmyblog.com/2008/03/do-you-know-where-your...

If you are interested in having me guestblog for your blog for free, read the page explaining the process and contact me.  Thanks!  I hope to hear from you.

I’ve been using a new social networking/marketing service called Entrecard and this post is a summary of my findings. By way of introduction, let me just tell you that this is one startup company that if they were handing out logo pens I would be eagerly taking several. This company is valuable and serves a viable purpose, unlike so many internet startups out there.

Entrecard is a service that allows you to drop your virtual card on blogs you visit as they leave theirs on yours. You both get “credits” for doing so and this allows you with time to purchase advertising on other blogs. This is not normal advertising, it is just exposure or advertising for your blog. Above in the screen shot you see the line of cards that were dropped on my site just today. It is good etiquette to visit each one and drop and comment back. In all honesty, I don’t always comment. There are some weak blogs on Entrecard. Besides that, sometimes I have 50 or more dropped on my blog and who has time to read and comment on that many blogs?

You see here one of the size choices for a widget. This is the size I have here on my blog. You can see it’s a simple pic with a link to the site along with a bar down below that allows you to drop your Entrecard.

This is a great day to find new blogs out there. It’s also a great way to get your blog noticed. One drawback is that the established Entrecard blogs are very expensive (in terms of credits, nothing costs anything in terms of dollars and cents) to advertise on and I have noticed this doesn’t necessarily correlate with quality.

At the same time, the “drops inbox” has a feed so you can subscribe to the feed that tells you who dropped at your blog. This makes “dropping back” really easy, well I won’t say easy, but it gets done!

People will request to advertise on your site. Once approved by you, their widget will appear for one day on your site. It’s a cool back to grassroots marketing for blogs.

There is a limited selection of blogs on Entrecard which I don’t know is a blessing or a curse. For example, I was looking for blogs on Fuel my Blog the other day and it was like sifting through hayseed. Entrecard is the opposite, there are only a handful to choose from in each category and that makes it easy to get familiar with the ones you frequent.

To conclude my very short review, I find Entrecard productive. I have gained a few new readers and some traffic as a result of using it. the drawbacks are that it is time consuming and limited in the blogs it exposes you to. If you try it out, make sure you drop on this site!

Yes, you read it right: 100 free postcards for your group or business! They come from a company called VistaPrint and they are running a deal right now where you get 100 free custom postcards printed just for you. Do you run a business? How about a small interest group that has a mailing campaign? This could be an awesome way for you to promote your group or your work through marketing. I remember one year we were worried here at the school I work at that not enough kids would show up for summer school. To help market the opportunity we printed and sent out postcards that read “Good News its Summer School Time.”

So what happened?

We got so many kids that year we had to turn some away to neighboring programs. This company is great, I have used them myself. They give you online templates to choose from or you can create your own artwork. Their website also offers rubber stamps, address labels, magnets, and a variety of other fun tools to make marketing your group or business a cinch. You could also of course use the postcards to send to your family or friends for announcements or other broadcast information. Think you might want these freebies? Okay, in closing, let me tell you how to get the postcards promotion:

Select and order custom postcards here

Use coupon code “BlogPostcards100” at checkout to receive 100 free postcards.