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Tit For Tat Carnival February 2008 - Part 1

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Blog Carnival
Thanks For The Carnival
I have introduced my Fake Tit For Tat Blog Carnival in January as a means of saying “Thank You” to those editors that have used my posts. I thought it's time to do this right now. Therefore, I split February in 2 parts and will list the rest of the carnivals at the end of this month.

The main benefits of being present in the Carnival-O-Sphere is that you get more exposure easily. I just made up that term Carnival-O-Sphere. It doesn't take long to submit your current post to Blogcarnival.com. The Pro-Bloggers actually outsource that part and have their assistants do that rather simple task.


1. You get new readers.

Although this heavily depends on the quality and popularity of the Carnival. There are basically 2 types of carnivals in my opinion:
  • “Quality ‘Handpicked’ Carnivals ”
  • “Long Link Lists”
  • The 3rd would be anything in between the 2 above.

I have had many readers from long lists, because the particular carnival was very popular and vice versa.

I did not crunch the numbers and do the statistics, but I have the feeling that there is a strong tendency in the Carnival-O-Sphere towards “Long Link Lists”. I might be wrong, but I saw many quality carnivals disappear.

I have hosted 3 carnival editions myself on this E-Biz Booster Blog and I know that it can be a lot of work weeding out garbage, and it is even more difficult to select the top articles. However, it is very simple to publish the “Long Link Lists”. It is very nicely prepared by the carnival platform. I believe they call it Insta-Carnival and you only need to copy, paste, and press a button. Perfect for the “lazy man” (or woman).

Gaining more readers actually relates to getting more traffic to your Blog. Also, you get the occasional comment and social bookmark. But as I said, I see the tendency of carnival hosts and carnival contributors to care less and less about interaction and relationship building.
  • Authors: Submit to as many carnivals as possible and forget!
  • Hosts: Press the Insta-Carnival Button and forget.

Rarely I get a notification of a carnival host, letting me know that my post is accepted together with the request for social bookmarking. I have sent out those emails in the past, too. As far as I remember the response was moderate.


2. You get ‘nofollow’ backlinks

That increases your Technorati Rank, the authority of your Blog, and your visibility in the search engines, which in turn can bring you more readers indirectly. I believe this to be the main goal for most carnival hosts that are active.


Conclusion

A couple of month after I have started to participate in the Carnival-O-Sphere I have the feeling that it seems to change into a rather “yet another impersonal SEO technique”
  • Many quality carnivals have disappeared
  • Many quantity based carnivals have been started.

This trend is definitely not favorable for blog carnivals as useful resource. And people will start to get turned off by everything that smells like a carnival edition. Look at an average carnival issue and count the number of Diggs, Stumbles, etc., and comments. The numbers are low, very low.

So I am closing with the questions,
“Why the hell are you still hosting carnivals?”

Probably some of those folks on my list will answer that question. I might be totally wrong, but as I have written above. It's a feeling.

What do you think?
Leave a comment, let us know.

Yours
John W. Furst


P.S.: Now, here is just my “long list” of the Carnivals, that featured my posts:

Thanks to the editors.

Posted by in Blog Carnival, Miscellaneous on Monday, February 18, 2008 has got 8 Comments.
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Tit For Tat Carnival February 2008 - Part 2
Thanks For The Carnival This is the second part of my Tit For Tat Carnival February 2008. It's a short one. I just apend to the list. In Part 1 I wrote about the advantage of participating in Blog Carnivals. You might want to read it (if you haven't alrea
Weblog: E-Biz Booster Blog
Tracked: Mar 05, 07:49
Tit For Tat Carnival April 2008
Thanks For The Carnival As usual I am posting my fake carnival of carnivals which have used my posts in their editions. You have guessed right, it's just about rewarding them with a backlink. In previous posts about blog carnivals I have mentioned that
Weblog: E-Biz Booster Blog
Tracked: Apr 21, 01:49

Comments

*Hi John,
Thanks for link back in your nice and interesting blog.
#1 Jirel from positivensuccess.blogspot.com on 2008-02-18 11:22
*You're welcome. I value Blog Carnivals higher than just being an instrument to dump your posts to. :-) Your comment shows that you care, too. Thanks for that.
#1.1 John W. Furst from www.fcon21.biz on 2008-02-18 21:44
*I have participated in several carnivals, looking for exposure for my site to increase readership. I find many of the carnivals are so full of articles that some have not shown up at all in my stats--there have been zero views from them. There may be just too many links there for anyone to get to one they have not heard of before. Others, such as the current carnival at thenext45years, have instantly shown readers on my site.
Some day I would like to host one, but I have not done so yet. This article gives me more to think about before I seek one out to host.
Regards,
Jeniffer
#2 Jeniffer on 2008-02-18 20:11
*When you host a carnival it's on YOUR terms. You can start doing it now. No need to deals with 40, 50, 100 submissions. Just make clear what YOUR RULES are on an extra page that you put on the Web. (The mass submitters won't read that anyway and you can weed them out rather quickly.)

Check out other Carnivals in your market to see
+ Who is submitting great posts on a continuous basis, and who supplies remarks with their edition?
+ Who leaves comments, and does social bookmarking for the edition?
+ Who organizes or hosts a carnival (a traveling carnival).
+ Check the Alexa, and Technorati Ranks of the corresponding Blogs.

Then think about it for a minute or 2, go to blogcarnival.com and do it. I would go for quality, because that's what I think is needed right now. Think about YOUR readers. You want to give them additional value. Create a Carnival that would give a unique view, selection of posts (not just another list of 200 posts, ...)

You actually could write to those folks, whose submissions you are seeking. Tell them of your idea to organize a "Quality Carnival" and quite frankly ask them, if they would help you promote it, and probably host the traveling carnival at some point. You'll see what type of response you get.

Anyway, you can do it just for your readers, and if you don't get any submission that fits your guidelines, just write a post by yourself, ... Doesn't cost you anything.

I am not at all focusing on my Blog write now, so I won't organize a carnival soon. Also some bloggers that I corresponded with, told me they stopped their carnivals, because they need to focus on more profitable activities. However monetizing your Blog or a Carnival is quite a different issue. If you are only out for the exposure, hosting a carnival might not be the best thing you can do.

Either way, you also could build relationships with other bloggers and do reciprocal guest posts, ....

Just my 2 cents.
Thanks for sharing your thought.

P.S.: I'd love a comment from someone who organizes and hosts a carnival. What do you think?
#2.1 John W. Furst from blog.fcon21.biz on 2008-02-18 22:14
*Hey John,
Firstly, I would like to thank you for participating in the Work at Home Carnival as often as you do.
Secondly, I would like to admit that I am one of the "lazy man" type of carnival hosts.
Frankly, I just find it easier and it looks really good the way they have it laid out.
I really do read each and every post that is submitted to my carnival and weed out anything spamish or unrelated to the subject of home business. I think that is important to keep the integrity of the carnival , my blog and my reputation in tact.
I think running a blog carnival is helpful not only to the host and participants, but, if run properly it can be benificial to your readers. And as far as I'm concerned that is the most important thing.
If you would like to get a better idea of my feelings regarding Carnivals you might want to read a post I wrote not long ago. http://workingathomeinternet.com/WP/2008/01/23/is-hosting-a-blog-carnival-worth-the-effort/
The short answer is Yes.
Thanks for being a part of the carnival and thanks for the link.
Joe
#3 Joe from workingathomeinternet.com on 2008-02-19 02:18
*Thanks Joe for your detailed comment.
#3.1 John W. Furst from www.fcon21.biz on 2008-02-19 02:37

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