Has Entrecard Jumped the Shark?
Posted on : 06-04-2009 | By : mcangeli | In : Delusions |
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It’s called Jumping the Shark and it usually refers to TV shows who have passed their prime (did you know it takes its name from an episode of Happy Days??). It’s also been applied to web startups, new companies, and ideas that are worn out or before their time. In this case, I’m wondering if EntreCard has jumped the shark. EntreCard is (was?) a pretty good traffic sharing tool and a good way to find some good (and some not so good) blogs to read/visit on a regular basis. Without EntreCard, I would not have found CigarJack’s, Five Blondes or The Hawg. And for periods where I haven’t written anything worth reading, its has provided some steady traffic, ensuring that I keep my blog in front of some eyes.
The original premise was simple. Display the Entrecard Widget. Visit other blogs with the widget and drop your “card” on their widget. In theory, people would visit those that had dropped and would drop their card in kind. A “I scratch your back, you scratch mine” kind of traffic trade. You could use built up credits to advertise on other blogs and sometimes the traffic they generated was good. Really good. Some times not so much. However, having the EC widget on a site didn’t really hurt. Until Now.
On Saturday, Entrecard Announced on their blog that the “beta” of their new paid advertising system was going in to effect. People could ‘buy’ ads on your site in the EC widget and EntreCard would benefit. You however, would not. Currently, the way things are working, Paid Ads are taking precedence over the traditional EC ads. So if you purchased a traditional EC Ad with EC Credits, you could be preempted at any time during your run on a blog. I pulled up my site this morning and was greeted with every ad except the one that should have been there. I logged in to my dashboard and there were over 30 paid ads waiting to be approved. Of course, I couldn’t see them, as ABP was blocking the ads (apparently).
Once I went through and rejected ALL the paid ads, I was able to accept the regular ones and the Card on my blog appeared as it should. All normal like. As I said, currently, the blog owner is not able to benefit from the paid ads at all other than the fact that Entrecard is able to pay their bills (which, if their math is correct, they must have had some hella venture capital for startup money). Eventually, the plan is to ‘pay’ blog owners 25% of whatever the ad was purchased for and allow them to then buy Entrecard credits with that. There by, keeping all the income for EC and basically ‘gifting’ extra credits to the blog owners. How this is going to work out has yet to be seen as that portion of the program ISN’T WRITTEN YET.
That’s why I’m wondering if EntreCard has Jumped the Shark. I, like many others have rejected most (if not all) of the paid ads in lieu of the traditional EC ads. Entrecard had a good thing going. Did they screw it up with this seemingly poor implementation of the paid ad system? Should they have added another set of code for only paid ads? I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
EDIT: Apparently, I have my figure wrong. EC is only keeping 25% of the income from the ad’s the other 75% is going to the members through a ec buyback program “The fact of the matter is that 75% of all the revenue we’re generating from the paid ads is going to the members. “
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The whole project roll out was not properly planned and executed. The EC system was pretty slow for the past few days with intermittent downtimes. I still believe that my widget is reserved for advertisers who purchased ads with their hard-earned credits.
BK’s last blog post..Strangers are family you have yet to come to know
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@BK I have to agree. Though I have noticed, even tho I killed (rejected) all paid ads, there are still some showing up.
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Somehow I feel that the Paid Ads are generated and placed within your dashboard whether you like it or not. I removed all the paid ads and when i log back in 30min later, it’s all there again asking me to approve.
In a way, I feel that what they are doing is spoiling the fun for their users. Even received an email from them asking me to move the Widget to the top of my blog or get my account revoked. What nonsense is this?
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So far, I’m not loving this new system, either. I used the ads to surf to new blogs, but now, I’ve lost that. I miss it already.
We shall see…
Susan Helene Gottfried’s last blog post..Susan’s Music Talk: Good Day to Be Alive, Sir.
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I accepted quite a few of the paid ads for my site, but now I’m regretting that move. I thought I’d help Entrecard out by doing that, but they’ve squeezed my regular people out in the process.
One thing about Entrecard that is consistent: whenever they roll out a new project, its execution never quite works as planned.
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One thing I have noticed is that even if you haven’t approved the paid ads yet, those “paid” ads waiting to be approved display in place of the normal EC cards. Thats not cool.
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It certainly has jumped the shark. Despite what most people thought, there was a sense of community that has now been replaced by an ad swap/buy service with the emphasis being on the advertiser.
The only thing is that the advertiser emphasis and insistence of where to place the widget, diminishes advertising real estate as bloggers realize you don’t need an ad to be an advertiser.
Best,
Rich
Rich Becker’s last blog post..Bagging On Taxes: American Taxpayers
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Well, here we are a couple of weeks after all this stuff started and I’d say there are definite problems with Entrecard. Why? My EC ad price is in the toilet, traffic has dropped quite a bit and there is much anger and discontent amongst members (well, some members love it).
It’s an absolute mess. I agree with you — I’ve found some great blogs through Entrecard (and thanks for mentioning mine!). However, I’m starting to believe there are other ways of getting traffic. I hope things improve at Entrecard and I’m staying active for now, but who knows how things will go over there?
I’m started to put a lot of blogs on my bloglist so as not to lose anyone should I get fed up and shut down my Entrecard account (and, yes, you are on there!)
Take care…
The Hawg!’s last blog post..Music Monday — Cameo
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