@ Gary: I agree, putting affiliate links in your feed is the best way to go about monetizing it. The Adsense thing is kicking off but I have not messed with it yet.
Just keeping the fingers crossed that feedburner should now show any sneeze on last day! 🙂 – Just kidding!
By the way, this contest really helped me to focus on RSS subscribers aspect of the blog. I never bothered before much for this side of the promotion. This contest was fruitful to everyone rather – we are seeing many blogs gaining double the subscribers this month, thanks to Daniel!
My plan is continue with this motivation and increase the RSS subscribers to 4000 by year end. Difficult but possible!
One important information I don’t have – how to monetize the RSS feeds! Any online guide available?
Gary, you are talking about only one side of the coin, that is only RSS subscribers. The feedburner if delivers the email successfully to email subscribers, count those subscribers in the number shown.
And that is the reason some of the blogs don’t show decrease in number due to higher portion of email subscriptions. I hope it resolves your query, doubt and suspicion.
Small fluctuations are natural. The number is a function of how many people poll the XML file on a given day. That is the ONLY way which feedburner knows how many subscribers you have. They can’t fix that. There is nothing to fix. People sometimes don’t check RSS every day or are away from their computers.
Show me a well known, respected site where RSS numbers increase every single day without decreasing. I’ll also bet they have hits >>> subscribers.
If you’re count drops regularly. You could go to feedburner and they have a link their to google groups or another google site. Just ask why your count dips once every 5-6 days. They will ask you for your feed and it will get fixed 🙂
Speaking for myself, my blog has a regular subscriber dip on weekends. Since I blog about work-related topics, people tend to read during business hours. Since FB is one day back, that means my numbers are always lower on Sat/Sun/Mon (Israel’s weekend begins on Friday) and so I would expect the same for at least some of the other blogs here, and Life is Colorful seems to confirm it.
Luckily, the contest is ending mid-week. Hopefully there won’t be a FB sneeze then.
You could have different divisions (0-100, 101-250, etc) or use multiple metrics and assign points to them: Technorati rank, alexa rank, Google Backlinks, and RSS. Each of those metrics is flawed, but taken as a whole, they might be better.
Even if there was no prize, I think competitions can be helpful. My traffic and subscribers have increased more in July than in the previous two months, just because I had extra incentive given the contest.
One other idea, would be to make Blogging Idol more closely mirror American Idol. Use something like the above methods to try and get about 20 sites.
Get a panel of blogging celebrities to review sites, make suggestions for improvement, and then let people vote sites out of the contest. To a certain degree, this would be impossible to game. If a site sucks, it sucks no matter how much you can game numbers.
I like the contest and I think a lot of good can come from continuing it. I’m sure you’ve learned a lot from this first attempt at it.
I don’t want subscribers per se. I want readers. I want real human beings who really want to read what I have to say and to follow along with what I’m doing. Almost any single number can be gamed to some degree.
Long term success involves getting people to care about what you are doing. No amount of gaming can ever fake that. The long term value of real people who are interested in what you have to say will outweigh the benefits of winning an RSS contest. They will share your site with others, will be more apt to buy books and/or merchandise, and will be more likely talk back to you.
So just “getting subscribers” via some gimick doesn’t mean squat if they only reason they are subscribing is some contest or something where they just unsubscribe the moment it is over, because they don’t care about the content to begin with.
RSS is, I think, a very good approximation of real readers, but it isn’t perfect. Having a black hat method of making a number bigger wont make you or your site a real influence in your niche, which is the ultimate goal.
With a few exception, most of the sites in the top 10 are sites which had high RSS numbers to begin with. I think it is much easier to get your second 100 RSS subscribers than the first 100.
Also, going from 500 to 600 is a 20% increase where going from 100 to 200 is a 100% increase. I think that is something which might want to be considering in future contests. A 2 year old blog will have a different set of challenges and opportunities than a brand new blog.
Daniel Scocco is a programmer and entrepreneur located in São Paulo, Brazil. His first company, Online Profits, builds and manages websites in different niches. His second company, Kubic, specializes in developing mobile apps for the iOS and Android platforms.
Any chance of having a blogging idol in 2010 ?
@ Gary: I agree, putting affiliate links in your feed is the best way to go about monetizing it. The Adsense thing is kicking off but I have not messed with it yet.
Adsense for RSS is slowly being released. Other than that, the best bet is to put affiliate ads in your feed.
Just keeping the fingers crossed that feedburner should now show any sneeze on last day! 🙂 – Just kidding!
By the way, this contest really helped me to focus on RSS subscribers aspect of the blog. I never bothered before much for this side of the promotion. This contest was fruitful to everyone rather – we are seeing many blogs gaining double the subscribers this month, thanks to Daniel!
My plan is continue with this motivation and increase the RSS subscribers to 4000 by year end. Difficult but possible!
One important information I don’t have – how to monetize the RSS feeds! Any online guide available?
Exciting contest is coming to an end. Congrats to organisers and competitors. Bye.
Seems like Feedburner came back with right numbers. Here is today’s top 10 with two new entries at the bottom.
Here is the latest list of Top 10 today
(Past rank->Current rank) Blog | Increase
(1 From 1) #2 stockmarketindia – 953 => 1499 = 546
Monday worked for this blog it seems, compared to lull weekend. Just short of 1 subscriber for 1500.
(2 From 4) #105 stockmarketguide – 559 => 768 = 209
Gained 2nd position after deciding to make it Top 3 in comments over here.
(3 From 2) #8 homedesignfind – 89 => 292 = 203
Going steady, but lost the 2nd position
(4 From 8) #3 theuniversitykid – 417 => 588 = 171
Great going TUK, Love your growth in last 2-3 days.
(5 From 4) #23 everything-everywhere – 435 => 600 = 165
Gary, you are going steady too bro!
(6 From 6) #1 standoutblogger – 30 => 187 = 157
(7 From 7) #108 bloggingisnotacrime – 0 => 148 = 148
(8 From 9) #24 umarsiddiqi – 69 => 210 = 141
(9 OLD) #91 mommymeryl – 17 => 142 = 125
(10 New) #67 thenetfool – 333 => 453 = 120
im suprised didnt know theres something like blog idols!
Gary, you are talking about only one side of the coin, that is only RSS subscribers. The feedburner if delivers the email successfully to email subscribers, count those subscribers in the number shown.
And that is the reason some of the blogs don’t show decrease in number due to higher portion of email subscriptions. I hope it resolves your query, doubt and suspicion.
Small fluctuations are natural. The number is a function of how many people poll the XML file on a given day. That is the ONLY way which feedburner knows how many subscribers you have. They can’t fix that. There is nothing to fix. People sometimes don’t check RSS every day or are away from their computers.
Show me a well known, respected site where RSS numbers increase every single day without decreasing. I’ll also bet they have hits >>> subscribers.
If you’re count drops regularly. You could go to feedburner and they have a link their to google groups or another google site. Just ask why your count dips once every 5-6 days. They will ask you for your feed and it will get fixed 🙂
It Seems Nice Competition……
Weekend drops like this are natural. Likewise, sites which NEVER show drops in subscribers is not natural. Hint.
Speaking for myself, my blog has a regular subscriber dip on weekends. Since I blog about work-related topics, people tend to read during business hours. Since FB is one day back, that means my numbers are always lower on Sat/Sun/Mon (Israel’s weekend begins on Friday) and so I would expect the same for at least some of the other blogs here, and Life is Colorful seems to confirm it.
Luckily, the contest is ending mid-week. Hopefully there won’t be a FB sneeze then.
No updates today, as I am seeing dip in many blogs’ RSS subscribers. Tomorrow hopefully feedburner sneeze would not be playing with the numbers.
@Daniel
Obviously, a percentage contest wouldn’t work.
You could have different divisions (0-100, 101-250, etc) or use multiple metrics and assign points to them: Technorati rank, alexa rank, Google Backlinks, and RSS. Each of those metrics is flawed, but taken as a whole, they might be better.
Even if there was no prize, I think competitions can be helpful. My traffic and subscribers have increased more in July than in the previous two months, just because I had extra incentive given the contest.
One other idea, would be to make Blogging Idol more closely mirror American Idol. Use something like the above methods to try and get about 20 sites.
Get a panel of blogging celebrities to review sites, make suggestions for improvement, and then let people vote sites out of the contest. To a certain degree, this would be impossible to game. If a site sucks, it sucks no matter how much you can game numbers.
I like the contest and I think a lot of good can come from continuing it. I’m sure you’ve learned a lot from this first attempt at it.
Rome,
I don’t want subscribers per se. I want readers. I want real human beings who really want to read what I have to say and to follow along with what I’m doing. Almost any single number can be gamed to some degree.
Long term success involves getting people to care about what you are doing. No amount of gaming can ever fake that. The long term value of real people who are interested in what you have to say will outweigh the benefits of winning an RSS contest. They will share your site with others, will be more apt to buy books and/or merchandise, and will be more likely talk back to you.
So just “getting subscribers” via some gimick doesn’t mean squat if they only reason they are subscribing is some contest or something where they just unsubscribe the moment it is over, because they don’t care about the content to begin with.
RSS is, I think, a very good approximation of real readers, but it isn’t perfect. Having a black hat method of making a number bigger wont make you or your site a real influence in your niche, which is the ultimate goal.
Today, I dont have much time but still dont want you to miss the Top 10 🙂
Here is the latest list of Top 10 today
(Past rank->Current rank) Blog | Increase
(1 From 1) #2 stockmarketindia – 953 -> 1461 = 484
(2 From 2) #8 homedesignfind – 89 -> 309 = 220
(3 From 4) #58 inspiredology – 829 -> 1037 = 208
Outstanding jump from 10th position to 4th position last time and now at 3rd position.
(4 From 3) #105 stockmarketguide – 559 -> 763 = 204
(5 From 4) #23 everything-everywhere – 435 -> 608 = 173
(6 From 7) #1 standoutblogger – 30 -> 188 = 158
(7 From 8) #108 bloggingisnotacrime – 0 -> 151 = 151
(8 From 10) #3 theuniversitykid – 417 -> 566 = 149
(9 OLD) #24 umarsiddiqi.com/blog/ – 69 -> 199 = 130
(10 From 9) #91 solidsmack – 780 -> 906 = 126
It really just depend on how well you know how to get subscribers. There are a ton of ways to get them 🙂 The starting number really doesn’t matter.
@Gary, I considered that, but I still found that the limits I used were as good as we could go.
Using % is not an option. Else someone starting with 1 subscriber will be everyone else.
Perhaps the cap could have been lower, say at 500 subscribers max.
With a few exception, most of the sites in the top 10 are sites which had high RSS numbers to begin with. I think it is much easier to get your second 100 RSS subscribers than the first 100.
Also, going from 500 to 600 is a 20% increase where going from 100 to 200 is a 100% increase. I think that is something which might want to be considering in future contests. A 2 year old blog will have a different set of challenges and opportunities than a brand new blog.
Here is the latest list of Top 10 today
(Past rank->Current rank) Blog | Increase
(1 From 1) #2 stockmarketindia – 953 -> 1437 = 484
Stready increase as usual!
(2 From 2) #8 homedesignfind – 89 -> 300 = 211
Steady increase again!
(3 From 3) #105 stockmarketguide – 559 -> 763 = 204
Good jump today, retaining 3rd position.
(4 From 10) #58 inspiredology – 829 -> 1002 = 173
Outstanding jump from 10th position to 4th position with 50+ increase in a day.
(5 From 4) #23 everything-everywhere – 435 -> 603 = 168
Going steady!
(6 OLD) #23 jobmob – 684 -> 838 = 154
Yesterday, the feedburner sneeze pushed it out of the list, for today’s return!
(7 From 6) #1 standoutblogger – 30 -> 177 = 147
Need to push more!
(8 From 6) #108 bloggingisnotacrime – 0 -> 145 = 145
No increase today!
(9 From 8) #91 solidsmack – 780 -> 920 = 140
Can do better!
(10 From 7) #3 theuniversitykid – 417 -> 551 = 134
Went down from 7th to 10th, due to 1 subscriber down
Alright guys, that’s it for now! See you tomorrow!