What tips can you give bloggers to help them derive the most benefits from Entrecard? How should bloggers use Entrecard?
Everyone's level of participation is going to vary. You would get the most benefit from Entrecard by visiting every blog in your category and related categories, dropping a card, and leaving a genuine well thought-out comment on the most recent post for each one. Then, start an engaging discussion in the forum. You will instantly start earning tons of credits and become a powerhouse purchaser of ads in the Entrecard network. Do this for a week or two, and you'll be getting a thousand or more hits per day from Entrecard.
However, this is a tall order and a lot to ask. You can use Entrecard as much or as little as you like, and ultimately you should get out great rewards for whatever time and effort you put in.
One of the drawbacks to Entrecard is getting "qualified" traffic from it. Many users "drop and dash" meaning they drop off their business cards and then leave. This brings short term spikes in traffic to a blog but few long term benefits in terms of creating loyal readers. How can members combat the drop and dash behavior? What efforts is Entrecard taking to reduce drop and dash?
The goal of any blogger should be to draw a loyal readership. This is a two part equation, where the first is creating quality and engaging content for your readers. Then, you must actually get them to your site. Entrecard is great at getting hundreds, if not thousands of bloggers to your site. However, it is your content and your content alone that will determine whether or not they subscribe to your RSS feed and become a loyal reader.
Only great content will ultimately get other bloggers to start talking about and linking to your great content and submitting your posts to Digg for you, and then your traffic sources will start to diversify wonderfully. But Entrecard is great for providing a decent amount of traffic while you build your content masterpieces. It also logically follows that the service will be less effective for you if your blog's content is of poor quality.
Reducing Drop and Dash!
Pictures and images work wonders with Entrecard traffic. A picture really is worth a thousand words, and if an Entrecard who's intention is just to drop a card gets caught up by an interesting picture, they'll likely read whatever text is below it and from there you can pull them into the whole article.
Catchy headlines are the second best tool for an Entrecard member. I would be willing to bet that 100% of Entrecard traffic, even the drop-and-dash folks, always take notice of the headline of your most recent post. If that headline perks their interest, they'll probably read. If they really like what they read, they'll probably subscribe.
Emphasize your comments button! How do you expect a visitor to leave a comment if they can't find your comment button or if it isn't clearly displayed. A great comment button / link is very visible at the beginning or end of your post and draws attention to it, enticing the reader to leave a comment!
So think of Entrecard traffic like traffic on a highway, and your blog is a billboard. Hundreds, maybe even thousands of people will pass by it every day, just like they'll pass through your blog. Some of them "drive that way" to work every day, and pass your blog all the time. Some times, people will "only drive down your road once" but everyone is part of the highway and road system of the Entrecard economy.
Will everyone who passes by a billboard advertisement for Burger King stop and buy a whopper? No, but with a catchy headline and an interesting image, they significantly improve their conversions. And by using catchy headlines and interesting images in your posts, you will dramatically improve the amount of Entrecard traffic that "buys a Whopper," or in this case, subscribes to your blog, reads posts, comments, and so on.
It's also important to remember that every time someone drops their card on you, you still earn a credit even if they immediately leave your site. These credits can be spent to further advertise your blog.
In terms of efforts we're taking to reduce drop and dash, we have instituted an Etiquette for Entrecard. It is now considered proper Etiquette to read a post and leave a comment when dropping a card. In addition, we've limited the number of drops you can make daily to 300. In fact, this limit has been in place since the beginning.
We are also in talks with a number of companies that offer comment plugins for Wordpress. Our eventual goal is to reward members for leaving a comment, thus boosting engagement and reducing bounce rate. We will also likely reward members who spend a bit longer on blogs by featuring them in a superlative style list.
Other than that we don't want to become too bureaucratic over limiting the ways in which people can utilize the service, but we want to make a positive impact in members' behavior through a mutual understanding that dropping and dashing is not an ethical practice. The majority of members, overwhelmingly, are not drop and dashers. But they tend to visit a full 300 sites per day, and thus they are well represented in the dropper community.
You gave some tips to help bloggers use Entrecard more effectively, now how about some warnings? Are there any requirements or guidelines Entrecard users should be aware of before they join?
Yes, there are a few. First, your blog should be of good quality with at least a handful of existing posts. If your blog is empty, and you put an Entrecard widget on it, it will simply be deleted. Also, if your blog contains any pornography or other offensive materially, it will be removed immediately. Entrecard is for bloggers with quality blogs appealing to a general audience of internet goers.
