Entrecard doesn’t give lasting visitors
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Last month as i was browsing through some sites while doing my entrecard dropping round, i chanced upon bono riau’s spirit of blogging site. His article about entrecard’s touch and go traffic touched a nerve in me. In a nutshell he said that although entrecard can bring visitors and traffic to your site, these same visitors will dwindle down when the widget is removed.
We were amazed at what this small EC widget can bring in terms of building traffic. Being new bloggers that we are, we were not sure how to start building traffic so we decided to go with how other blogs start up.
Testing the article:
After reading that article i decided to put it to a test. A couple of days ago, i decided not to drop any entrecard to any site. I noticed the difference right away in the google analytics. Our visitors went from around 200 daily to just around 20-30 in just a matter of 3 days. Ouch!
Checking our online journey Stats:
entrecard.com (referral) 62.78%
direct 29.70%
janelh.wikidot.com 3.76%
others 5%
As you can see, most of our traffic comes from entrecard. Imagine that. I stopped dropping entrecards for a few days and that’s what i get. So what if i decided to remove the widget? Where will we be then?
On one hand i am really thankful for EC for driving traffic to our rags to riches online blog. On the other hand i can’t get it off my head that it’s giving us drop and leave visitors. We have 91.35% Bounce Rate and
00:00:43 Avg. Time on Site. Just enough for a person to load the site, drop their card then leave.
My conclusion:
Keep the entrecard widget going. I am an optimist and I know i can bring some entrecard bloggers into loyal subscribers. I am already thankful that other bloggers visit our site even to just drop their card. I have the visitors already. I just need to make them stay longer in our online journey on rags to riches online blog.
I can do that. I have my skills. I have my love. I have my determination. How can i ask for more?
You should also find other sources of traffic like forums. You can also comment on other blogs.
If you would regularly comment on other blogs in your niche, in time, they will be visiting your site too and will be commenting on your blog too. Of course, you need attractive articles.
Have a nice day!
@richie, you know what? i might do just that! i subscribe to blogs that interest me and i bookmark some that have interesting articles. but i rarely comment. i will comment next time. make our presence known. thanks!
Hello there Richie is right about leaving comments and forums and it does take more time, but if you are looking for loyal readers the percentage from Entrecard will be very low sorry to say.
I comment when I can and I drop from my inbox and if the widget isn’t there then I don’t drop unless there isn’t 300 cards then I go to campaign and look for familiar widgets to finish with.
I know what you mean about drop and leave traffic, but I think one must also consider that no matter what means you use to promote your blog that the same will happen; that is, many people will look once and not come back. Most promotional work on the web at best will yield 5% return. 5% who visit will come back. Most of your web marketing books state that percentage.
There’s always the chance that one of the “droppers” will “drop by” one day and spot something that turns them into a reader.
Another Entrecard advantage: It’s free. Invest a half hour of your time everyday to it and you get visitors (some stay, some go). You also earn credits which allow you to advertise on other sites, and that brings more visitors (some hit and run, some stay, some return).
A half hour of your time for no cash out of pocket is not so bad.
@Jude and Robert, yeah i realize that. I appreciate the fact that EC is free and it yields visitors. I know i still need more effort and i will do so.
i am sure if that we can bring loyal subscribers and it matters of time how thats gonna be true.just keep our positive thinking and i am agree with you.
you too ipanks. keep that positive attitude going ^_^
Networking with other bloggers really help. Visiting their blogs, leaving sincere comments. Also at times recognize them in your blog, by writing an article and links some blogs you think worthy of the link love. Entrecard is good esp when you’re new, that’s where you can get the initial traffic – but to sustain and attract more visitors, of course setting aside great contents, being connected with other bloggers could helped a lot. But don’t get discouraged, over time, we all gonna achieve that.
Forum is great idea too, but I haven’t done that yet… Just be careful bec some people might misjudge you as spamming the board. You somehow need to be “in” with the community before you can even post some links- that’s my opinion… So it takes lots of time as well.
All tips are great tips here in the comments. If you really want to get your Entrecard traffic going, you should prioritize reciprocating your drops above everything else
@B, yups i am reading other blogs as well and am starting to comment on articles i find interesting instead of just being a passive reader. i am thankful some people do the same now.
@michael, i am reciprocating drops and sometimes exceed that. i know it’s a start. thanks for doing the same. ^_^
Hi Janrafi! I say u gotta comment more on those blogs that u love. And thank u for dropping your EC at my site as well, have a good one!
@mariuca, will do and thanks for dropping by as well.
Is always a good start to be with EC. It is ultimately a tool and like all tools, they are some who enrich from it and others who abuse it.
Not too long ago I asked myself do I want people to just drop card for web traffic or do I want readers interaction. If we want readers, then the quality of our content played the important part.
However, We must always be true to our agenda of having a blog.
Just my 2cents.
You can use entrecard to socialize with other bloggers. Once you have visited their site try to comment relevant post and you would see that some of them will become your valuable readers.
@paul, yups been doing that. i will still do that. ^_^ thanks for dropping by.