Nerve Endings Firing Away

You may or may not have realized but I am trimming all the fat from this blog’s sidebar. Although I don’t agree with Google’s arm-twisting ways, I plan to get rid of Text Link Ads soon as well because I understand Google’s point of such ads disrupting quality of organic searches. I have unsubscribed from a whole lot of blogs that only talk about monetizing blogs or focus heavily on making money online; John Chow, for example. We rather enjoy blogging, right? If we make some money on the side then that’s not bad either. Most of us are not really looking to becoming full-time professional bloggers so why try, eh?

However, this post is about one service that makes it possible to achieve both objectives. I joined BlogBurst about a year back. I had a personal email exchange with one of their founders who invited me to add my blogs on their network. Now this isn’t one of those online syndication services but instead a service that attempts to bridge the gap between mainstream media and the blogosphere. Both these mediums have often been labeled as being in direct conflict with each other although it never was true. I have always believed that the mainstream media and the blogosphere work symbiotically often filling the information gaps that each medium individually can never close. We still need the professionalism and fact-checking abilities of the mainstream media but also love the spontaneity and instant-news, personal accounts and opinions of the blogosphere. Many mainstream media outlets have already recognized this and seek reader inputs.

BlogBurst helps put your blog content on major media sites. Nope, it doesn’t pay you when it does but your content gets a wider audience. Don’t real bloggers who blog for the love of it enjoy that attention? This blog’s content has been featured occasionally on Reuters, Palm Beach Post, Austin American Stateman, and Coxohio.com. My Urban Planning Blog is now regularly tracked by the McGraw-Hill Publishing company blog and DesiPundit’s links are also regularly featured on Reuter’s blog feature.

So how does this help you financially, some might ask? Well, it doesn’t. At least not for all. I wasn’t aware of BlogBurst’s Leaderboard feature when I joined the site. So I was pleasantly surprised when I got an email that this blog was ranked #76 last quarter in terms of headline impressions (thanks to the Harry Potter leak post). That ranking entitled me to a $75 cash reward. Considering that I had joined BlogBurst only to promote my blogs and get my word out to mainstream media outlets, this was a welcome and pleasant surprise.

So why should you join BlogBurst? Because, it brings your blog content to the attention of top mainstream media publishers like Reuters, USA Today, Fox News, Gannett, McGraw-Hill, etc. If some of your posts are relevant, well-written, and offer a new insight not covered by the mainstream media, it might go viral on multiple media sites and garner you new readers (and subscribers). If you end up in the top 100 blogs at the end of the quarter, you get paid at least $50 ($1500 for the top dog..err…blog). Even if you aren’t in the top 100, you have the satisfaction of being featured in those newspaper websites (SEO junkies, you get link-love from highly-ranked domains). After all, content rules and that’s what matters, right?

PS. Nope, the BlogBurst link above is not an affiliate link because there is no such thing. Thankfully.