Thats really exciting to be in the competition. By the way the link to my blog Island Crisis (http://islandcrisis.blogspot.com) above is not good… There is the “http” twice in the link when you click it (http://http//islandcrisis.blogspot.com/) and it goes to http.com - Please correct it. Thanks.
Hey guys, I’m just curious, how many additional subscribers you aim?
Because I figured the best tactic is I find that out, then aim for 5 as much, but if it’s too high, I’m better off focusing on your vote love
Wow, I am in! Since my country does not like Feed Burner and blocks it, I haven’t offered FeedBurner feed on my blog until now.
In China, most of the blogs used FeedSky instead of FeedBurner.
In order to take part in this blogging idol, I burnt the feed on Feedburner.google.com instead of feedburner.com. And the RSS logo is linked to http://feedproxy.google.com/e-blog instead of the original feed. Of course, the original feed is still and will be always active, since my over 600 subscribers may be angry with me if I did so.
Well, I will try the best to promote my new feed. You maybe like my blog if you like and know Chinese language.
Hi! This is very exciting and I’m impressed at the huge participation.
But no worries. Though I’m presently at #75, it’s going to be the #1 position by the completion of this competition
Do I’ve to promote it? Nope. I’m confident that people who read my blog, automatically opt to subscribe to it to (without any hesitation) get instant updates
“But no worries. Though I’m presently at #75, it’s going to be the #1 position by the completion of this competition
Do I’ve to promote it? Nope. I’m confident that people who read my blog, automatically opt to subscribe to it to (without any hesitation) get instant updates”
Can not you write something else? First you showed your arrogance at the other post related post and now here!
It is nice that you have got 91 or more Diggs on almost every post and lot of comments, but arrogance is not good.
I think the stats for the first day shows the real variance in RSS stats. Everyone is negative due to both a holiday and a weekend…with one enormous exception.
Seeing all -xx at “Gain” field. How can we over come these fluctuations? This may effect the winner right? for example we are seeing -50 also in “Gain”.
I have seen RSS Count fluctuate, but if we can sign up more readers everyday .i.e taking typical 5% example, if we can signup +5% everyday, then we will not see the drop in RSS Count right?
Raghu, No it doesn’t work that way. RSS isn’t like Twitter.
Feedburner count are based on the number of times a feed is requested per day. Subscribers only count if they request the feed on a given day. If you sign up 5% more every day, you WONT show a steady increase, because signing up isn’t the same as someone accessing the feed. Signing up just means they accessed a feed for the first time. There is no official “signing up” with RSS like there is with Twitter.
That is why you see so many negative numbers today. People don’t get on their computers as much on weekends and holidays, so RSS numbers go down. It doesn’t mean people stopped subscribing, it means they just didn’t access the feed on that day. Somehow, your users never take a day off. Ever.
So when you never show a dip, it looks fishy. Reader behavior is a stochastic. It has random elements to it, even if it goes up in the long run. Its like the stock market. You can have up days in a bear market or down days in a bull market.
Also, when your subscribers are well above your hits, that REALLY looks fishy. I mean REALLY.
Note the daily hits shows stochastic characteristic. It goes up and down. The RSS subscribers do not. Moreover, the subscribers is more than the hits.
Take ANY large website you know to really be a large website: Problogger, DailyBlogTips, anything. Put their Feedburner URL into that website can see how their hits are greater than their subscribers.
If the hits to your sites are stochastic, then I can’t see how your subscriber numbers avoid this phenomenon. Actual visitors to your site behave like real people. Your subscribers behave like a computer.
I’m listed as starting at 825. Last week, I hit a high of 850. A few days ago, I showed 799. If I was able to start at 799, that would be great, because I’d probably get a free 50. Likewise, if I started at my peak of 850, I’d have to earn everything. As it is, I ended up in the middle. To that extent, bigger sites can have a slight advantage over smaller sites. Look at the daily RSS movements of any site with over 10,000 subscribers. It can go up and down by the hundreds or thousands every day.
If you dip on the last day….well, thems are the breaks. If the last contest is any indication, it probably wont matter. Also, the new rules don’t make it as big of a deal.
Even if someone is faking their RSS numbers, it is only 1/7 of the total score, and it is pretty obvious to tell when someone is faking their numbers. (which people never figure out when the go down the road of faking numbers) and I’m sure it will doom them in voting.
I’m super confused…I have people who were subscribing to me prior to the contest…why are they not counted by the RSS feed? Secondly, I know that at least one person has subscribed to me since the contest began…why is that not counted on here or on my homepage either?
@Colleen, sometimes the timing of subscription matters… If it’s an email subscription, for example, based on the actual delivery of your next blog/post update it will be counted as one subscription!
Feedburner delivery by mail happens only at a particualr time of everyday (which obviously you can change)
Even I had a few email subscriptions (that I can see in the feedburner account now) but not reflected in the feedcounter.
Cheers,
Ajith
Daniel Scocco on
November 3rd, 2008 4:44 am
@Gary, yeah same pattern as we had in the first competition.
I will start checking with Raghdun to run a cheating test on his account. Will require screenshots and stuff to see where the subscribers are coming from.
Content is the key to getting more subscriber.
You can make as many of them to subscribe but they wont read your feed as long your content is “What your reader expects?”
So I am paying more attention on content. Better the content more the subscribers.
That’s my perspective to the whole thing.
I am quite eager to know what strategy others are implementing?
Heh, I’m really interested in what Happyschoolsblog is doing …
If he doesn’t cheat, then it’s gonna be a really great way to get subscribers, but I wonder why he had only 1400 subscribers when he can get almost 500 in 2 days
Hey guys, I definitely have to say what I’m doing, since 2 days 410 subscriber will raise all sort of cheating questions.
I missed out Idol 1 and when Daniel said about Idol 2 with different rules first time, I created a domain, but I was glad when rules changed back to increasing RSS Subscribers.
Reason, I’m gaining so much was coincidence of 4 things.
1) My blogs’s niche
2) Targeted Audience
3) Timing
4) Content is King!
I will send a write up of my strategy to Daniel by this weekend, so everyone can know how easy its to gain subscribers, but again my niche happened t be like that.
My target was to add 2000 subscribers in 30 days, but even I didn’t expect to get 410 in 2 days. There is no cheating involved. It’s pure coincidence of my strategy, content I provide and target audience.
If in doubt, I can provide access to any site traffic stats, subscribers sign up details to Daniel.
HappySchoolsBlog had ~7000 pageviews in Jan 2008 and Oct 2008 its was 150,000, so I will let you know how I was able to increase the traffic too.
I would also like to know what is this secret recipe to obtain such a high number if rss subscribers in such a short time. However from the figures I think this trend will not be continuous. Well if it does then…I think Raghu must sell his formula at a high price
Daniel maybe you could post on a PHP forum or something, so the pros there can help you out with the rankings thing, if you give them a clear description on what you want, they’ll probably come up with a solution in a few days, and it would be very useful for everyone. And it shouldn’t take longer than a few minutes.
Just an idea…
Ooops, I saw you’re tweaking the script, if you’re working on that, I said nothing
Matej on
November 4th, 2008 2:35 pm
All I could have found is that he is promoting his newsletters on most searched posts. Nothing to special, but that’s how Romeuy got so many subscribers also.
And like Raghu said, if you have the content visitor is looking for, conversation rate is always great - put there some ads or link to newsletters and you will see difference.
I better shut up now, less people know better hehe …
He also uses this pop-up window thingy, but it’s kinda annoying for me, so I don’t think I’ll ever use it. I saw it on Darren Rowse’s Photography School too. The idea is that it doesn’t disturb you more than once, because it uses a cookie, but I often delete them, so it can be very annoying that big pop-up into my face every single time I visit the site…
I guess, the popup once per user (cookie based) is kinda okay. However, it should be for the niche blogs - probably it fits Raghu’s blog and Darren’s but not mine for sure
I somehow feel that the rules of this competition is not completely fair for all blog types. For example, if somebody has an established blog with say 3000 visitors per day (and an initial RSS count of 1500), it may be a lot easier for him to increase the RSS subscription by 500 or even 1000 in a month via some campaign. Where as somebody with 100 readers per day (and 50-100 RSS readers) may take an year or more to reach that kind of a target.
So based on the initial RSS count, probably there had to be some kind of slab system for this competition. Otherwise one could have considered the % increase (and not absolute difference) in RSS subscription. Slab system would be like the following. If the initial RSS values in ranges such as 0-25, 25-100, 100-500, 500-1000,1000-2000, there will be absolute increases in that range considered first and then % increases at a all level.
Hope I am making myself clear. What do others feel? Just my thought though I am completely abiding by current rules!
Ajith, I think the contest is fairly balanced. If you don’t feel like you can win the RSS part, then go for the others.
By the way, note that you have some truth in what you’re saying, but starting from 1500, you can easily loose much more too.
Daniel Scocco on
November 4th, 2008 7:39 pm
@Matej, I know the list is not update, I am working on it.
@ajith I wouldn’t get too worked up over blog niches and readers and such at this point. Do what you can. You are correct that bigger blogs have an advantage, but remember that raw increases are only 1/7 of the contest.
I don’t think there is a chance in hell that I can get the most RSS subscribers, but I think there is a good chance I can be in the top 5 or 10. (I think I’m currently #5)
Do your best to get on the radar and then when it comes to voting, hope that certain things will be taken into consideration. I’m not sure I would sacrifice my user experience with a pop up window, even if it got me more readers. The long term health of my site and my brand are more important than the contest. That is also something judges and voters will have to take into consideration.
In the end, winning would be nice, but getting more subscribers is a reward in itself. If I can hit 1,000 subscribers by the end of this contest, the prizes are secondary. That is what I like about this contest. You really can’t lose if you try. It is sort of like the Biggest Loser
i accept with Gary a pop up window for subscription would be good for contest but users would be irritated seeing the window pop up.I feel it is not a real good strategy to increase readers…
@seogenuis: I think you should not bother about it. Yesterday I saw that I had ZERO subscribers from 30!! lol. But this morning it went back to normal and i got 3 more to 50.
However if you see the decrease for some days then its worth bothering.
Daniel Scocco on
November 5th, 2008 12:42 pm
@Gary and AroJoy, remember that even Darren Rowse (on his photography blog) and Shoemoney and John Chow are using popup to encourage newsletter subscription these days .
Hello everyone, there’s been so much buzz about pop up strategy. I’m using not just pop-up strategy to get conversions and I’m getting atleast 4 times more conversion in other strategies in play.
So, is this updated now? Because the feedburner on my site says I have 6 subscribers, but this still says -1? Maybe it just takes a little longer to register within this site…
@Daniel That really doesn’t impress me. Pop ups are annoying no matter who does it. If John Chow jumped off a bridge, I sure wouldn’t follow. Anyone who subscribes to find out what John Chow had for lunch or to watch videos of him talking about bowel movements, probably wont mind a popup. Developing a reputation of doing anything to milk money from my readers is the last thing I want to develop.
My long term plans for my site have a significant off line component, and I don’t want to ruin that by trying to get an extra tiny advantage online.
Daniel Scocco on
November 5th, 2008 1:36 pm
@Gary, my point is, sometimes the drawbacks of the popups could be lower than the benefits.
Darren is getting 350 new daily newsletter subscribers with the popups.
I am not sure if the annoying factor for the visitors weighs more than 10,000 new subscribers in the end of the month.
@Daniel: I’ve noticed the pop-up on Darren’s photography blog, and though that site is my favorite on subject, it really ruins the user experience, it pops up even after I subscribe. And I don’t think mere numbers can weigh more than its downside.
Maybe it would be a wiser idea to remember IP instead of a cookie, so it won’t bother you again. (Although I don’t know how much space and/or speed loss would that induce on a large blog like that…)
@Daniel : even though if we get more reader at the end of month its not fair to show the user who comes for some information and get a pop up in just seconds…
Would anyone else prefer the scoreboard to be in ranking order? Or is there a reason why it isn’t? I’d be interested in looking to see where I am in the pecking order so to speak.
I suppose I could cut and paste the table into excel and sort it myself…
Daniel I’ve taken a look at this php scripting thing, and it seems to me it wouldn’t be such a big trouble to rearrange the list in order with using an array containing the numbers and some “for loops”, although I certainly don’t know the details and how it works with the SQL database, but I can check that too if you want, just let me know if there are any more “technical limitations” I’m not aware of…
5-NOV 2008: If you use our Site Stats product on feedburner.com, you may notice that your numbers for today, 5-Nov, are much lower than usual. We had a reporting process fail that normally reports numbers during the overnight hours. This process has been restored and visitor stats are being recorded again, although the daily total will not be complete for 5-Nov. Starting with 6-Nov, you should see site statistics that are closer to your usual daily totals.
test comment
Thanks for accepting my applications. Congrats and good luck to all those who made it to the Blogging Idol!
Let the showdown begins.
Good Luck Everyone!
104 are a lot! May the best one win!
Yay! Just wondering how often this updates? Hope I win ;D
@Joel Drapper, daily. It is automatic in fact.
Looks like I’ll be sitting this one out, good luck to everyone!
Yay, I’m happy to finally be up there! My URL is missing a key word, though:
http://budgetdisneywedding.blogspot.com
Let the fun begin!
I entered my blog, but my name isn’t on the list. Sup with that?
Nevermind. I didn’t meet requirements. Let me try and meet now.
Good luck everyone!
Hello Daniel
Thats really exciting to be in the competition. By the way the link to my blog Island Crisis (http://islandcrisis.blogspot.com) above is not good… There is the “http” twice in the link when you click it (http://http//islandcrisis.blogspot.com/) and it goes to http.com - Please correct it. Thanks.
Regards and lets grab the rss
Hey guys, I’m just curious, how many additional subscribers you aim?
Because I figured the best tactic is I find that out, then aim for 5 as much, but if it’s too high, I’m better off focusing on your vote love
@Jani
No idea. My count is stable lately meaning I exhausted current readership… so I will gain as much as I visibility to new people I can gain.
Oow….Better than Blogging Idol1.
Its looking great. Hope I will do better this time, inspite of my exams in my College
I wish good luck to everyone.
Thanks for the great competition Daniel,
I missed the chance at Idol 1, But this time i will be the winner
Jus kidding.I will try my best to be the winner
Even am customizing new theme to change entire look of TechZoomIn to attract more visitors.
I have some other plans to be the winner. will share later
Hehe Rarst not a bad idea, it surprises me I haven’t thought about it before…
Wow, I am in! Since my country does not like Feed Burner and blocks it, I haven’t offered FeedBurner feed on my blog until now.
In China, most of the blogs used FeedSky instead of FeedBurner.
In order to take part in this blogging idol, I burnt the feed on Feedburner.google.com instead of feedburner.com. And the RSS logo is linked to http://feedproxy.google.com/e-blog instead of the original feed. Of course, the original feed is still and will be always active, since my over 600 subscribers may be angry with me if I did so.
Well, I will try the best to promote my new feed. You maybe like my blog if you like and know Chinese language.
I missed Blogging Idol 1, but I’m ready to go now. My counts are looking good so far, but way below my target for Day 1.
Good Luck to everyone.
Sorry about that Daniel, I have it up now. If you could please add my site to the list, I’d really appreciate it.
Thanks,
Jonathan
Hello Daniel,
I just realized my blog feed was for Blogger. I have added one for Feedburner at the top of the right column followed immediately by FeedCount.
Sorry for not double-checking.
Thanks.
Boyd
This is one of the things I’ll be doing to boost subscribers: http://everything-everywhere.c.....nt-3436245
Dang! I received 4 new subscribers 1 day too early. :p
140 competitors
Good luck everyone
I am at #13 - the unlucky spot
Can the unlucky turn lucky?
Cheers,
Ajith
Hi! This is very exciting and I’m impressed at the huge participation.
But no worries. Though I’m presently at #75, it’s going to be the #1 position by the completion of this competition
Do I’ve to promote it? Nope. I’m confident that people who read my blog, automatically opt to subscribe to it to (without any hesitation) get instant updates
I am still in the race, just had a few problems with my blog while I am changing hosting providers. It will all be sorted soon.
@ Meghna
“But no worries. Though I’m presently at #75, it’s going to be the #1 position by the completion of this competition
Do I’ve to promote it? Nope. I’m confident that people who read my blog, automatically opt to subscribe to it to (without any hesitation) get instant updates”
Can not you write something else? First you showed your arrogance at the other post related post and now here!
It is nice that you have got 91 or more Diggs on almost every post and lot of comments, but arrogance is not good.
Wondering if the stats above are ok :S Its showing -27 here when infact i got 3 more today and its 30 :S Maybe a problem with feedburner stats.
Hah now its ok…
Yay, I’m on the list. Let the games begin!
I think the stats for the first day shows the real variance in RSS stats. Everyone is negative due to both a holiday and a weekend…with one enormous exception.
139 increase on first day? Impressive! MUst be using very good strategy
So far is looking good - 139 and my target for Day 1 was +70.
Will let you know know more about my strategy in coming weeks.
Daniel,
Seeing all -xx at “Gain” field. How can we over come these fluctuations? This may effect the winner right? for example we are seeing -50 also in “Gain”.
Amazing strategy. No dips in subscribers at all over the last four months. Not even typical 5% daily fluctuation normally seen on almost every blog.
And your subscribers are way above your hits, which oddly enough does fluctuate.
I haven’t seen a graph like that since…..the last contest.
@Gray,
-1 Can also drag you to 2nd position some times. Seeing -11 for your blog right?
Am just wondering what if this happends on last day!
I have seen RSS Count fluctuate, but if we can sign up more readers everyday .i.e taking typical 5% example, if we can signup +5% everyday, then we will not see the drop in RSS Count right?
@Raghu,
Its typical to decide
You must say all the tips, as you getting good number here
Raghu, No it doesn’t work that way. RSS isn’t like Twitter.
Feedburner count are based on the number of times a feed is requested per day. Subscribers only count if they request the feed on a given day. If you sign up 5% more every day, you WONT show a steady increase, because signing up isn’t the same as someone accessing the feed. Signing up just means they accessed a feed for the first time. There is no official “signing up” with RSS like there is with Twitter.
That is why you see so many negative numbers today. People don’t get on their computers as much on weekends and holidays, so RSS numbers go down. It doesn’t mean people stopped subscribing, it means they just didn’t access the feed on that day. Somehow, your users never take a day off. Ever.
So when you never show a dip, it looks fishy. Reader behavior is a stochastic. It has random elements to it, even if it goes up in the long run. Its like the stock market. You can have up days in a bear market or down days in a bull market.
Also, when your subscribers are well above your hits, that REALLY looks fishy. I mean REALLY.
Anyone can check this out themselves. Go to http://blogperfume.com/feed-analysis/ and put in the Feedburner URL.
The second graph is the key. When the orange line is above the green line, something is wrong.
http://www.blogperfume.com/fee.....ppySchools
That is the graph for HappySchools.
Note the daily hits shows stochastic characteristic. It goes up and down. The RSS subscribers do not. Moreover, the subscribers is more than the hits.
Take ANY large website you know to really be a large website: Problogger, DailyBlogTips, anything. Put their Feedburner URL into that website can see how their hits are greater than their subscribers.
If the hits to your sites are stochastic, then I can’t see how your subscriber numbers avoid this phenomenon. Actual visitors to your site behave like real people. Your subscribers behave like a computer.
@Gray,
Good one. My orange line is below the green line.
So nothing wrong right?
@techzoomin then you are screwed.
I’m listed as starting at 825. Last week, I hit a high of 850. A few days ago, I showed 799. If I was able to start at 799, that would be great, because I’d probably get a free 50. Likewise, if I started at my peak of 850, I’d have to earn everything. As it is, I ended up in the middle. To that extent, bigger sites can have a slight advantage over smaller sites. Look at the daily RSS movements of any site with over 10,000 subscribers. It can go up and down by the hundreds or thousands every day.
If you dip on the last day….well, thems are the breaks. If the last contest is any indication, it probably wont matter. Also, the new rules don’t make it as big of a deal.
Even if someone is faking their RSS numbers, it is only 1/7 of the total score, and it is pretty obvious to tell when someone is faking their numbers. (which people never figure out when the go down the road of faking numbers) and I’m sure it will doom them in voting.
@techzoomin If something was wrong, you wouldn’t need to check to know it
Yes, yours looks normal. It has an upward trend, but goes up and down. The hits are greater than the subscribers.
@Gray,
Yes the “1/7″ is good here. and as you said its not a big deal about RSS readers.
Dang… mine reduced today
Hope to pick up in the next couple of days as I have requested a few ppl to subscribe 
cheers,
Ajith
Nice to see that another 6 members were in.
Mine is 14 now, but it was still 10 on the scoreboard.)-:
Long way to go…
My design blog surely doesn’t stand a chance in front of these great other blogs :p. Anyway I’ll do my best and try everything.
Thank you for the great contest Daniel !
Good luck everyone! I would be pretty excited to know who will be my follower in winning Blogging Idol contest!
I’m super confused…I have people who were subscribing to me prior to the contest…why are they not counted by the RSS feed? Secondly, I know that at least one person has subscribed to me since the contest began…why is that not counted on here or on my homepage either?
::sigh:: I just don’t get it. =0(
@Colleen, sometimes the timing of subscription matters… If it’s an email subscription, for example, based on the actual delivery of your next blog/post update it will be counted as one subscription!
Feedburner delivery by mail happens only at a particualr time of everyday (which obviously you can change)
Even I had a few email subscriptions (that I can see in the feedburner account now) but not reflected in the feedcounter.
Cheers,
Ajith
@Gary, yeah same pattern as we had in the first competition.
I will start checking with Raghdun to run a cheating test on his account. Will require screenshots and stuff to see where the subscribers are coming from.
Daniel can u also add another column with current rank.so we would get a clear idea..
AroJoy
@AroJoy, I am not really sure how to do that on PHP. Do you?
Content is the key to getting more subscriber.
You can make as many of them to subscribe but they wont read your feed as long your content is “What your reader expects?”
So I am paying more attention on content. Better the content more the subscribers.
That’s my perspective to the whole thing.
I am quite eager to know what strategy others are implementing?
Hope the post about it will come soon.
@Daniel I Too Dont Know…
Heh, I’m really interested in what Happyschoolsblog is doing …
If he doesn’t cheat, then it’s gonna be a really great way to get subscribers, but I wonder why he had only 1400 subscribers when he can get almost 500 in 2 days
Hey guys, I definitely have to say what I’m doing, since 2 days 410 subscriber will raise all sort of cheating questions.
I missed out Idol 1 and when Daniel said about Idol 2 with different rules first time, I created a domain, but I was glad when rules changed back to increasing RSS Subscribers.
Reason, I’m gaining so much was coincidence of 4 things.
1) My blogs’s niche
2) Targeted Audience
3) Timing
4) Content is King!
I will send a write up of my strategy to Daniel by this weekend, so everyone can know how easy its to gain subscribers, but again my niche happened t be like that.
My target was to add 2000 subscribers in 30 days, but even I didn’t expect to get 410 in 2 days. There is no cheating involved. It’s pure coincidence of my strategy, content I provide and target audience.
If in doubt, I can provide access to any site traffic stats, subscribers sign up details to Daniel.
HappySchoolsBlog had ~7000 pageviews in Jan 2008 and Oct 2008 its was 150,000, so I will let you know how I was able to increase the traffic too.
Again, even I can’t believe 410 in 2 days.
@Raghu, you are a genius! Come on!
I See that not the only one to have its current feed in “0″
My feedburner not working… Someone know if there is some problems in feedburner?
(Sorry my english I am from Argentina)
I think you could just paste the table on to Microsoft excel and do a Z->A sort on the gain field… I am at #6 as of the current state…
@Happy school, go slow buddy
cheers and good luck to all…
Ajith
First Top 10
#3
#119
#6
#13
#8
#115
#16
#72
#83
#29
Thanks Ajith!
=0)
@Gary, I checked Raghu’s feedburner and Google Analytics, and it looks legit.
He is using a clever strategy, with a really good conversion rate.
Then I would like to cede the competition now and hire him as a consultant.
Wow this is excellent and great timing to as I have just finished my websites redesign woo
Good Luck everyone.
@Gary, there is no need to, after the competition I will tell what he is doing. Today his Feed count lowered, so it is not a magic bullet anyway.
I would also like to know what is this secret recipe to obtain such a high number if rss subscribers in such a short time. However from the figures I think this trend will not be continuous. Well if it does then…I think Raghu must sell his formula at a high price
Daniel maybe you could post on a PHP forum or something, so the pros there can help you out with the rankings thing, if you give them a clear description on what you want, they’ll probably come up with a solution in a few days, and it would be very useful for everyone. And it shouldn’t take longer than a few minutes.
Just an idea…
Ooops, I saw you’re tweaking the script, if you’re working on that, I said nothing
All I could have found is that he is promoting his newsletters on most searched posts. Nothing to special, but that’s how Romeuy got so many subscribers also.
And like Raghu said, if you have the content visitor is looking for, conversation rate is always great - put there some ads or link to newsletters and you will see difference.
I better shut up now, less people know better hehe …
HappySchools 190 down at 1688 today… What was the initial count? :o) He’s still leading a big way…
1468 was the initial
He also uses this pop-up window thingy, but it’s kinda annoying for me, so I don’t think I’ll ever use it. I saw it on Darren Rowse’s Photography School too. The idea is that it doesn’t disturb you more than once, because it uses a cookie, but I often delete them, so it can be very annoying that big pop-up into my face every single time I visit the site…
I guess, the popup once per user (cookie based) is kinda okay. However, it should be for the niche blogs - probably it fits Raghu’s blog and Darren’s but not mine for sure
I somehow feel that the rules of this competition is not completely fair for all blog types. For example, if somebody has an established blog with say 3000 visitors per day (and an initial RSS count of 1500), it may be a lot easier for him to increase the RSS subscription by 500 or even 1000 in a month via some campaign. Where as somebody with 100 readers per day (and 50-100 RSS readers) may take an year or more to reach that kind of a target.
So based on the initial RSS count, probably there had to be some kind of slab system for this competition. Otherwise one could have considered the % increase (and not absolute difference) in RSS subscription. Slab system would be like the following. If the initial RSS values in ranges such as 0-25, 25-100, 100-500, 500-1000,1000-2000, there will be absolute increases in that range considered first and then % increases at a all level.
Hope I am making myself clear. What do others feel? Just my thought though I am completely abiding by current rules!
Cheers,
Ajith
Daniel, just want to make sure you know that some blogs are still not listed up here, like mine
Ajith, I think the contest is fairly balanced. If you don’t feel like you can win the RSS part, then go for the others.
By the way, note that you have some truth in what you’re saying, but starting from 1500, you can easily loose much more too.
@Matej, I know the list is not update, I am working on it.
Anyone know why my feedburner stats would suddenly fall 62 subscribers from 102 to 33?
Its never gone in to this sort of minus before it has been minus 4-5 but not 62!
Anyone?
@ajith I wouldn’t get too worked up over blog niches and readers and such at this point. Do what you can. You are correct that bigger blogs have an advantage, but remember that raw increases are only 1/7 of the contest.
I don’t think there is a chance in hell that I can get the most RSS subscribers, but I think there is a good chance I can be in the top 5 or 10. (I think I’m currently #5)
Do your best to get on the radar and then when it comes to voting, hope that certain things will be taken into consideration. I’m not sure I would sacrifice my user experience with a pop up window, even if it got me more readers. The long term health of my site and my brand are more important than the contest. That is also something judges and voters will have to take into consideration.
In the end, winning would be nice, but getting more subscribers is a reward in itself. If I can hit 1,000 subscribers by the end of this contest, the prizes are secondary. That is what I like about this contest. You really can’t lose if you try. It is sort of like the Biggest Loser
i accept with Gary a pop up window for subscription would be good for contest but users would be irritated seeing the window pop up.I feel it is not a real good strategy to increase readers…
happy i am not in minus
@seogenuis: I think you should not bother about it. Yesterday I saw that I had ZERO subscribers from 30!! lol. But this morning it went back to normal and i got 3 more to 50.
However if you see the decrease for some days then its worth bothering.
@Gary and AroJoy, remember that even Darren Rowse (on his photography blog) and Shoemoney and John Chow are using popup to encourage newsletter subscription these days
.
Hello everyone, there’s been so much buzz about pop up strategy. I’m using not just pop-up strategy to get conversions and I’m getting atleast 4 times more conversion in other strategies in play.
So, is this updated now? Because the feedburner on my site says I have 6 subscribers, but this still says -1? Maybe it just takes a little longer to register within this site…
@Daniel That really doesn’t impress me. Pop ups are annoying no matter who does it. If John Chow jumped off a bridge, I sure wouldn’t follow. Anyone who subscribes to find out what John Chow had for lunch or to watch videos of him talking about bowel movements, probably wont mind a popup. Developing a reputation of doing anything to milk money from my readers is the last thing I want to develop.
My long term plans for my site have a significant off line component, and I don’t want to ruin that by trying to get an extra tiny advantage online.
@Gary, my point is, sometimes the drawbacks of the popups could be lower than the benefits.
Darren is getting 350 new daily newsletter subscribers with the popups.
I am not sure if the annoying factor for the visitors weighs more than 10,000 new subscribers in the end of the month.
@Daniel: I’ve noticed the pop-up on Darren’s photography blog, and though that site is my favorite on subject, it really ruins the user experience, it pops up even after I subscribe. And I don’t think mere numbers can weigh more than its downside.
Maybe it would be a wiser idea to remember IP instead of a cookie, so it won’t bother you again. (Although I don’t know how much space and/or speed loss would that induce on a large blog like that…)
@Daniel : even though if we get more reader at the end of month its not fair to show the user who comes for some information and get a pop up in just seconds…
Would anyone else prefer the scoreboard to be in ranking order? Or is there a reason why it isn’t? I’d be interested in looking to see where I am in the pecking order so to speak.
I suppose I could cut and paste the table into excel and sort it myself…
The scoreboard says I have negative 3 but my feedburner displays 22.
I never lost any readers :p
@Clare, that is a technical limitation we have.
Daniel I’ve taken a look at this php scripting thing, and it seems to me it wouldn’t be such a big trouble to rearrange the list in order with using an array containing the numbers and some “for loops”, although I certainly don’t know the details and how it works with the SQL database, but I can check that too if you want, just let me know if there are any more “technical limitations” I’m not aware of…
I don’t understand why my numbers dropped all of the sudden. I bet it is those stupid Adbrite ads I tried out!
D3so - I’m having the same problem! My feedburner says I have 10 but the scoreboard says I’m down -1. =0( Maybe it’s just slow…
To everyone who finds issues with Feedburner numbers:
- make sure the Feedburner chicklet isn’t stuck in your cache. Actually go to Feedburner.com to check what it says is your number that day.
- Don’t worry about day to day. It will go up and down. Focus more on the trend.
@Daniel Benefits and costs to who?
I’d be more inclined do something like that for a one week run or something, rather than have it be a permanent feature.
http://Everything-Everywhere.com/contest/
I’m at 204, but the scoreboard has said 0 for the last couple of days?
Can you arrange the table by increase? You might want to have a look at this http://www.kryogenix.org/code/browser/sorttable/ or something similar.
@Joel, I will try, though it is not that easy since there are php codes on the table on the backend.
Update from Known Issues for FeedBurner Count
5-NOV 2008: If you use our Site Stats product on feedburner.com, you may notice that your numbers for today, 5-Nov, are much lower than usual. We had a reporting process fail that normally reports numbers during the overnight hours. This process has been restored and visitor stats are being recorded again, although the daily total will not be complete for 5-Nov. Starting with 6-Nov, you should see site statistics that are closer to your usual daily totals.
Source - http://groups.google.com/group.....orkarounds
@Daniel, check out my score card which is sortable… 16 of those feedproxy.google.com feeds need manual updating.
Cheers,
Ajith
@Ajith, awesome. What php function are you using to parse the feed count on each feed?
Good Work Ajith. Lets see what Daniel thinks. I have Private Server, I can increase the resources and host it.
@Ajith, check my email about it.
@Daniel,
The logic is like this:
1. I keep a small mySQL db with 125 feeds (this was the time cons