Damien at the Speed of Life

I’ve written two previous posts on Entrecard in the past few months. You’ll find them linked below. This post will be my 3rd and serve as a conclusion to the many items I left unanswered.

• Entrecard Time Tracking
• Entrecard after a Month

I titled this post the way I did because I don’t mean to draw extra attention to Entrecard for good or bad. While I find their service quite good for certain bloggers, I am not convinced it is the best way to promote blog posts. This is what I was using it for. That’s the real point I am making, it depends what you use Entrecard for that determines its value to you. Since I need it to promote my blog posts, that’s where my review is coming from. There are other things you can do at Entrecard besides that. I have no interest in them.

To summarize my “real estate” on the web: I have three blogs. The one you are reading now is my general/personal blog where I write about blogging and my life. The other two are niche in nature: self-improvement/psychology and teaching. I used the widget for almost 4 months and saw no significant increase in traffic via Entrecard. Incidentally, I saw most growth coming from Stumble-upon. I recommend getting friends there and doing mutual Stumbling when you like each others’ posts. Entrecard traffic did come to some degree only when I spent a lot of hours a week “dropping” my card. This is a devil’s paradise that left me cross-eyed every time. It just isn’t natural to visit 100-300 blogs a day. With Entrecard, that’s one of the main ways you gain clout and theoretically: traffic.

I tried my hand at their marketplace and found it quite fun. It was also laborious though. You gain clout there by doing “tasks” for other bloggers as a means of a service. I got tired of doing that pretty fast as well.

So, with no real benefit to promoting my posts, I decided to be a “passive” Entrecard member. I have heard they occasionally ban people who speak ill of them so I want to make it abundantly clear I am only speaking about my experience. I definitely don’t want to be banned. I do believe Entrecard can and does work to entertain and promote many bloggers. It just hasn’t worked for me. You might ask yourself how many times you click on their widget? As for me, in truth it is next to never. If my experience is common to the blogosphere what you are doing there is working to get credits to put their widget on your blog. My question is why when you yourself don’t click on their widgets?

I already know a few friends who are going to take me to school about this post. I recommend you don’t. I remain a member of Entrecard and will use their services but for the time being, their service is not meeting my need of promoting blog posts. Because I know some of my mentees read this, I’ll just throw out who I am finding traffic with. If you want to know how, that’s what the comments box is for. I’d be happy to explain:

Main Stuff that works for me to promote blog posts:

Email lists
Ping.fm
Twitter
Facebook
MyBlogLog
BlogCatalog
Stumbleupon
Your recommendations?