Hold the front page: BlogRush sucks. In the last 30 days, BlogRush has sent a grand total of 0.19% of this site’s visitors, or 1% of the traffic it received from StumbleUpon. BlogRush, you’re fired.

Want to compare your BlogRush traffic stats? Contact me and I’ll add yours.

Blog	Visitors/Month
Moneyblogger.org	0%
CSS Tricks	0.00003746%
Krillz	0.0005 %
McGrath.ca	0.00126%
Mobile Marketing Watch*	0.0013612%
MoneyMoose.com	0.007%
Malignition.com	0.003%
Sabahan.com	0.010506961%
SwollenPickles.com	0.0189%
Terabell	0.03%
Novak’s Blog	0.032%
BlogPond	0.0334%
Chocablog.com	0.04%
Pointless Banter	0.0597%
GoldenGod.net	0.068%
EyeFlare	0.073%
Plain Beta	0.079%
Fat Man Unleashed	0.08%
FamilyRelationships.org.uk	0.17%
Quality Nonsense	0.19%
EpicEdits.com	0.2%
Easy C Tutorials	0.22%
Conversion Matters	0.23%
The Comp Zone	0.38%
SMOblog.com**	0.46%
Negative Smart***	0.5%
NHL Digest	<1%
Conversation Marketing	<1%
Shirt Ninja	1.3%

* Vic says: “Nearly all [of the visitors] came before I was even a BlogRush subscriber so they were up to something to try and get my attention.”

** Mark says: “I do think however, that Blog Rush traffic is a bit better than some other referral
sources as BlogRush visitors are a bit more targeted due to the way they categorize blogs. I think this ups the chances of the visitor becoming a recurring visitor or RSS subscriber. I’m hoping to experiment with this further.”

*** Candice says: “However: out of all referral sources Blogrush ranked 7th for average time spent on my site, and out of the few people who comment on my site, Blogrush has added at least two that I know about. So I’m not really prepared to say that Blogrush sucks just yet”

Update 1/11/07: Memo to self: don’t blog ill. I realise I’ve not explained this terribly well, so here’s a little more detail and a few answers to some questions I’ve received by email.

My intention was to look at how BlogRush performed for a broad of typical tech-savvy bloggers. Not, for example, just SEO blogs (ie, adept at driving traffic) or copywriting blogs (ie, skilled at writing headlines). I believe most bloggers will decide on the balance of probabilities that the pitiful amount of incremental traffic is not worth the space BlogRush takes up or the visitors you lose via it.

Q: What kind of control are you using to compare stats?
A: Total visits from BlogRush divided by visitors (not uniques) * 100 for the previous 30 days. Of course, different stats packages/methodologies (log file based vs web based etc) will lead to some minor variance. Think of it as a ready reckoner, if you wish, and take the stats as ‘order of magnitude’ accurate - they still suck.

Q: But BlogRush traffic is targetted. How do you factor this in?
A: In an age when you can target online ads by age, gender, day, time, income, interests etc, billing what BlogRush offers as ‘targeting’ is rather over-selling it.

Q: How are you tracking visitor actions from BlogRush traffic?
A: For most bloggers, I believe the traffic volumes are so pitiful that the screen real estate could be better used for… well, just about anything else, since you ask. If anyone has empirical evidence that BlogRush visitors instantly whip out their credit cards/evanglise about a site/subscribe to RSS feeds or email, I’ll happily publish it.

Q: How many of these bloggers were writing headlines suitable for BlogRush?
A: Tailoring one’s copywriting to a six week old blog widget would be a highly suspect decision. Headlines are for readers, not Google, BlogRush etc.

Q: This is just linkbait.
A: It’s a sorry day when calling BS on a dud product gets a knee-jerk dismissal as linkbait.

NB. I shamelessly pinched this headline from Mashable.

Ever meet someone who got rich referring other affiliates? They’re few and far between.

Many two-tier affiliate programmes suck, but occasionally you get lucky. A friend referred me to one of my merchants and has earned $7396.20 by my calculations.

There are often lots of reasons *not* to tell other affiliates about decent programmes. But if you work with a decent two-tier programme you’re happy to share, I’d love to hear about it.

If I get some decent suggestions (read: no poker, pills, smut, MLM scams or ‘get rick quick’ nonsense), I’ll post a roundup Chez Nonsense. If I take your tip and post about the programme, I’ll signup as an affiliate underneath you and throw a link to a site of your choice.

Suggestions via the contact form, please, with your affiliate link and site URL.

(NB. First person to suggest each programme gets the referral/link, my judgement is final etc).

I’m looking to expand my roster of contractors (designers and HTML monkeys, since you ask) and got a few dozen decent applications c/o the Gumtree and Reed’s Freecruitment site.

But I also got a few corkers in the ‘what not to say’ stakes. So, for the benefit of those with no idea what employers want to hear, here’s five things not to do when applying for a job:

1. Address me as ‘dude’ on your cover letter
2. Ignore the sole non-negotiable in the ad: “Copy and paste applications will be deleted”
3. Use the phrase “thinking outside the box”. Do I need to explain the irony of using a cliche to illustrate the concept of creative thought?
4. Explain you “managed strategic delivery of client-lead solutions”. I’m not ashamed to say I’ve zero idea what this means.
5. Tell me you “participated in a 24 hour silence for charity”, you are “practicing being free” or “play the piano for your local Cambodian youth group”, instead or what skills you have and why you might be suitable.

But full marks to the gentleman who ended his cover letter with “I can sp34k 1337 t00″.