Do you need extra traffic? We are slowly launching our sponsor program and are looking for sponsors. It’s easy, you can sponsor Entrecard for only $25! In return, this is what you’ll get:
Receive 40,000 ad impressions across +20,000 blogs ($.60 cpm)
or Receive 20,000 ad impressions across a targeted vertical ($1.20 cpm)
PLUS:
Not only will Entrecard bring traffic to your blog, but you will see a HUGE increase in your widget ad price (up to 2000%!). Because of all the traffic you’re getting, many other entrecard members will advertise on your blog. This is an awesome way to earn MORE EC credits!!
Please email support@entrecard.com if you have any questions or concerns.
For a limited time only, we are offering new users FREE 200 credits when they become active members of the Entrecard community. The promotional credits will encourage new users to spend their credits and become familiar with the Entrecard system.
We are also having a PROMOTION FOR CURRENT USERS. Help us promote Entrecard through our referral program and receive 800 credits (previously 300 credits) for every new referral that joins Entrecard. The credits are issued to you once the user has become active for at least 14 days. So, start promoting Entrecard TODAY and start earning credits!!. You can promote Entrecard on blog posts or by putting our pre-made banners on your blog.
The sponsor ads system is starting today. Currently, we are not taking any outside sponsors. As of now, there are only 2 ads in circulation. This first is an Entrecard ad that links back to entrecard.com. The 2nd ad is promoting Entrecard Market which is linked to entrecard.com/market. You can view the list of sponsors in your dashboard under the “sponsors ads” tab. Please note that you can disable one of the ads (not both) by clicking the button below the image. The remaining ad will run no more than 15% of your widget impressions. If you wish to opt-out completely, you can do so at the rate of $5/month or $50/ year (optional). This is also located under the “Sponsor ads” link.
Please note that this is a “beta” launch and we will carefully monitor the program. Please report any bugs, problems, and questions to support@entrecard.com. All emails will be answered within 24 hours. Thank you for your patience and understanding.
We just wanted to update everyone that the sponsor ads will be postponed for another week, until Oct. 5, 2009. When it is implemented, users will have the option to opt out of the sponsor ads program completely for a small fee. For just $50 a year, you can have your widget free of sponsor ads. We have provided this option for those of you who are concerned about the sponsor ads. Thank you for your support.
We are pleased that many members are taking advantage of Entrecard services and that Entrecard is able to help users increase traffic to their blog. However in order to continue providing this free service, we will be taking 15% of our entire ad network inventory for sponsors as of Sept. 28, 09. This is a standard business model used by free advertising networks. The revenues generated by our sponsors will help cover overhead expenses and keep our service free to all our members for years to come. To keep things simple and fair, all ads will be distributed evenly in our network. We are currently working on a feature that will allow users to disable sponsor ads that may conflict with their blog. This will be available in a few weeks.
Please be assured that we will screen all sponsor ads to ensure that they meet our guidelines. All sponsor ads WILL be family oriented, and will not promote nudity, violence or anything illegal.
We thank you for your support and understanding. We will continue to make improvements to our network. Our goal is to deliver more traffic to your blog, increase your readers and comments, and let you network with other bloggers. We will focus on fine tuning every aspect of our business to ensure that our users are happy in the years ahead.
Ok, so, we had to upgrade the Entrecard blog because it fell victim to this: permalink/rss hack. While the error has been known about for some time it seems, someone went on a real hacking spree over the last maybe 24 hours or so with a bot or botnet as you can see from the timings on that thread.
Now, wise intelligent users will be looking at us in horror and saying “what? you weren’t upgraded to the latest version!?”. And you are, of course, absolutely correct. Let me re-iterate in case any of the EC community hasn’t got this message yet: There is no acceptable excuse for not having your blog upgraded to the latest stable version at all times. Most especially if you run wordpress, which is legendary for its security flaws.
The reason why we weren’t up to date is a classic example of business change: the person who used to be responsible for maintaining the blog service left, and in the confusion we never realised nobody had stepped up to take his place. The Entrecard application itself has always been my baby (and was not affected by this compromise, which provided no useful access to the attacker as far as Entrecard proper goes), but we have various bits and pieces like the help wiki, the forums and the blog which are simply themed versions of regular software and were often not installed or maintained by me.
We’re now going through each of these checking the status of the app itself and making sure someone is assigned to keep them up to date and secure.
I would like to write on behalf of ZipRunner, Inc. to express our excitement about the future of Entrecard. As an angel investor, I saw the potential in Entrecard a couple years ago. I immediately recognized its uniqueness, its networking capabilities and its diverse user base, and became a board member of Entrecard when the company was 6 months old. I truly believe Entrecard is the best networking platform for the blogging community and will continue to be a lead provider of blogging services for years to come.
Before I can begin to discuss the future of Entrecard, I would like to first express our gratitude to Graham Langdon, Founder of Entrecard. Graham has done an excellent job managing Entrecard to where it is today. It will be our duty to continue keeping users posted about changes to Entrecard and to continue providing Entrecard users with new services that will increase traffic to blogs.
I understand that there are many questions about the recent acquisition of Entrecard by ZipRunner. ZipRunner is an investment company with many years of experience with Internet companies. We intend to have a smooth transition and will continue to provide essential services such as dropping cards, earning credits and allowing bloggers to network. We believe that these services are what make Entrecard special. In addition, Entrecard will continue to have Richard Clark (phirate), Entrecard’s founding developer, on its management team.
Furthermore, ZipRunner is prepared to take Entrecard to the next level. We have carefully read blog comments and the help desk to gain a better understanding of users’ concerns. We value our Entrecard users and we intend to address your comments and to provide you with the best blogging service possible.
In closing, I would like to reiterate that ZipRunner is looking forward to working with Entrecard users and improving Entrecard services. I only ask that you give us a chance and your patience. Look for great things to follow in the coming weeks, and months.
Hey everyone, I apologize, we had an outage earlier today that lasted way longer than it should have, basically just because the database is so big now that it takes ages to move data around and clean it up in the face of an overload.
I’d explain more but it’s 6:28am and I’m dead tired, stuff should be ok now, I’ll get back with more details once I’ve had some sleep. Thanks everyone.
For a long time, there have been people who argued the pros and cons of participating in Entrecard. Those familiar with Entrecard are no doubt familiar with all the arguements. The pros are that it brings you traffic, you find good blogs, you gain quality, returning readers, you make friends, you create a support network, and you can advertise on tens of thousands of blogs for free.
The cons, more or less, have all centered around our bounce rate. While a good deal of participants in Entrecard drop with the intent of exposing themselves to good content, and actively engage in the blog, it’s no secret that a large number of Entrecards also “drop and run”.
Up until now, we’ve always allowed the “drop and run” phenomenon to take place. We figured if someone was interesting to the visitor, they’d stop and read, and it was best to let everyone go at their own pace. But now we are taking a slightly different approach, in an ongoing effort to increase the quality of Entrecard traffic across the board.
Starting soon, “dropping and running” will no longer give you credit. We are developing a proprietary algorithm to determine whether or not you engaged in the blog you visitied in some way. If you did not engage in the blog, you will not get credit. We won’t be disclosing exactly the algorithm we use, so that people can’t game it easily.
The point of Entrecard
The point of participating in Entrecard is to find new blogs you enjoy, and to interact with each other. Dropping and running, midlessly, in an effort to gain credits is the exact opposite of what Entrecard is truly about, and after a lot of deliberation over the last year and a half, we’ve finally decided to take a stand against it. It does not benefit anyone in the network, and we’d rather provide a third of the traffic to our members, but have that third be quality traffic, then to provide the amount of traffic we do now whilst only a portion of it is quality traffic.
We’re still in the process of developing this, so input is welcome. However, we are well aware that the community will be divided by this. On one hand, people who are unhappy about the quality of traffic, and people who engage in the blogs as they drop will be happy with this change. The power droppers, or the “drop and run” crowd, who this directly affects, will no doubt be up in arms because they cannot earn credits so easily and so automatically. But the traffic this group is providing to the network is of little quality, and I think we’re ready to move on.
