Entrecard to Limit Member Earnings Even Further

Entrecard sent out a mail message to its members last evening and posted a new Blog Entry titled:

Solving Entrecard Inflation.

In short, the new EC management believes that the number of Entrecard Credits has been growing too rapidly. This growth, which they call Inflation, will lead to EC's being worth less and less.

To combat this Inflation, Entrecard is instituting a new policy beginning September 1st 2009:

Only EC Droppers will receive 1 credit.

Previously, both the dropper and the Blog receiving the visit received a credit.

Many of those who replied to their blog post were supportive of this move, but we believe this action underscores the EC position: All for Me, and None for You!

Why do we think this way? Consider these facts:

• Previously, EC members received credit for daily blog posts. This has been eliminated.
• While advertising costs has remained the same, EC takes 3/4 of the price of the ads and puts them in their own coffers. For example: if you pay 256 to advertise your blog, only 64 credits are given to the displaying site, the other 192 are kept by EC.

So now, EC is awarding less and less credits to the Customer Members, and building up their own war chest for future sale.

When this new policy is implemented, we believe there will be less incentive for Blog owners to purchase ads since they won't get anything back for advertising!

While EC is still a good place for beginner Bloggers, we believe that these new reductions will pursuade seasoned members into becoming less and less active. Eventually, the decline in EC activity and membership (because of their inherent greed) will have more of a deflating effect on the remaining EC credits than worrying about the inflated growth of a ficticious economy.

What do you think?

Thanks

JL...........

Entrecard Trojans Anyone?

This morning, we wanted to return some of the Entrecard Drops that we received since yesterday. So, we visited our Drops Inbox page, and displayed "Cards you haven't dropped on". We began clicking on member cards.

All of a sudden, we saw an endless number of Tabs being opened, and our computer slowed right down. Luckily, the browser crashed. When we restarted the browser again, our anti-virus notified us that several "Malicious Trojans" were removed.

Has this happened to you?

We haven't determined which EC member card caused this, but have decided to pull back from returning drops until we have time to try and isolate the Bad Guys.

If you have had similar experiences lately, let us know. If so, perhaps we can all work together to restore a safe blogging environment.

Adgitize Increases Point System

Yesterday we read that Adgitize has increased the total number of points a member could earn by 100, bringing the maximum daily credits to 600 points.

This is done by awarding points to those purchasing multiple ads.

In the past, an advertiser could only earn 100 points for the 1st ad placed on the network.

Now, an advertiser will earn 50 more points for the 2nd ad, and 25 points for the 3rd and 4th ads. In addition, the 3rd and 4th ads placements ad discounted to $13 and $12 respectively. (The price of the second ad remains at $14).

We're not sure if this new structure will result in publishers earning more daily income, but we decided to give it a try, and placed our 2nd ad on the system for this blog, AskTheBlogster.

Our Adgitize goal has been to receive enough monthly income to cover our advertising costs. With only one ad on the system, we have continually reached our goal. But now, our costs are $24 per month. So, we will have to wait until next month to determine whether the second ad will pay for itself or not.

We'll let you know.

Anyway, the folks at Adgitize are working hard by trying to help us all achieve our earning potentials.

JL..........

Feedburner Publish Date verses Blogger Entry Date

Last Tuesday, I wrote and published an AskTheBlogster blog entry titled: "Entrecard Credit Value Established at $3.37 Minimum".

However, when I checked my Adgitize statistics the following day, I noticed that I never received credit for the post.

Reviewing my published blog, I saw that it was dated Monday August 3rd, not Tuesday August 4th.

Next I looked at my published Feedburner entry, and it was dated August 4th as I expected.

So what happened? How could the dates be different?

The answer has to do with Blogger. I first began writing notes for this post entry on Monday the 3rd. Then on Tuesday, I wrote the post using the notes that I had previously written. When I was satisfied with the content, I published the post.

What I didn't realize at the time was that Blogger dates a blog entry with the day and time that the post was originally created, not when it was published. Thus, when we read the blog, we see the Monday's date.

Feedburner, however, records the time the entry was actually published. This is what we expect.

So, the lesson learned is that:

Whenever writing a Blogger Post, make sure the entry was created on the date you wish it to be timestamped. Otherwise, your posts may not receive credit from Adgitize or Entrecard (or perhaps others).


PS: I brought this matter up to Adgitize and was credited with the post. Thanks Ken!

Entrecard Credit Value Established at $3.37 Minimum

Last Tuesday we wrote about EC dropping paid ads and the cashout program, thus rendering Entrecard Credits worthless.

However, in that blog entry, we encouraged members to hold on to their accumulated credits rather than spending them because we believe that they have an inherent value.

Well, low and behold, we received another email from EC's Cindy Ung offering to sell us EC credits with a Bonus. The offer:

• 10000 Entrecard Credits - USD$56.00 (get another 5,000 credits bonus!)
• 25000 Entrecard Credits - USD$125.00 (get another 12,000 credits bonus!)
• Available now only until August 1st! Get your Entrecard credits today!

So, we now know that the new EC managment has set a minimum value of EC Credits ranging from:

Min EC Value = $3.378 to $3.733
per Thousand Credits

And, they are encouraging us to transfer our credits as well. But by doing so, they are taking out a huge commission for themselves and intend to cash out on them!

So, again, we advise all members to:

• Keep your EC Credits (don't spend or transfer)
• Lobby EC managment to eliminate taxation and commissions
• Hold a Tea Party???
• Urge EC to reinstate the cashout program.
  

JL............

Enter the Adgitize August Fireworks Contest

During the month of August 2009, Adgitize is conducting an:

August Fireworks Contest

Participating is simple, and up to 4 points are awarded each day for:

• Having an Adgitize Ad group on you blog or website
• Clicking on 10 Adgitize Ads & earn at least 10 Click Points
• Writing an article, and
• Advertizing on Adgitize.

Six prizes will be randomly awarded on September 2nd 2009:

• $75 USD First Prize
• $50 USD Second Prize
• $25 USD Third Prize
• 1 Month Ad for 4th Prize
• 14 Day Ad for 5th Prize
• 7 Day Ad for 6th Prize.

If you're an active Adgitize participant, collecting daily points will be a breeze.

And, if you're not yet an Adgitize member, then Join:

Adgitize - Get World Class Advertising on a Bloggers Budget

We're crossing our fingers and hoping to win. Good August luck to everyone.

PS: You don't have to be an Advertiser to be entered, meaning that you just won't earn a point for that.