The $50.00 blog challenge
November 14th, 2007 | by Brook Durant |
Contest closed winner will be announced and contact on 12/5/07
A few days ago Darren of Problogger wrote a post asking if you would blog differently if you had money. It got me to thinking about the issue, but up until now I’ve not had a clear answer. I finally realized that an answer isn’t exactly what I’ll come up with, but instead I have a question of my own.
In Darren’s post he asks if we would blog differently if we had one million dollars. Reality is that the vast majority of us do not have that kind of disposable income to throw into blogging. Most of us do however have fifty dollars to throw into our blogging addictions. So if someone were to hand you $50.00 and tell you the only condition for its use is that it must go towards your blog, how would you spend it?
As for myself…
- First things first
- On the day it came to spend the money I would make sure my “house” was in order by taking some very basic steps
- Making certain my best post(s) are displayed prominently on the front page
- Ensuring that all of my links works with a dead link checker
- Using No-WWW, a Wordpress plugin to ensure that all links go to the non-www version of pages. If you don’t use wordpress you’ll have to check around and see what options are available for you
- Making sure that everything displays properly in a variety of browsers at a variety of resolutions
- Having a week, possibly even two weeks worth of posts written and scheduled out
- I would setup real time statistical monitoring so I could make adjustments on the fly if need be
- Spending the money
- The way I see it $50.00 is not very much money at all. So the only reasonable thing to do as far as I’m concerned is to put that money to work for me earning more money by bringing in highly targeted traffic. I’d spend some time deciding what method I would use but it would likely either be Google Adwords or a Stumble Upon traffic campaign. Either way I would spend a pretty decent chunk of time attempting to monetize the blog for that particular method.
- Final thoughts
- I would give it about a month and a half before I decided the overall benefits of the $50 I just spent. Of course I’d keep track of the day to day minutia, but I don’t think it would really paint a clear picture until about 6 weeks into the whole thing. Hopefully by that time traffic has evened out and what remains are faithful readers for the most part. I’ve seen other blogs do analysis’s of how much each reader is worth and that is something I would also do in order to determine how successful I had been.
Regardless of the short term success this is the type of thing that would benefit you the most by treating it as an ongoing project. It doesn’t matter if you have $20 or $100,000 if you don’t make it work you might as well just throw it in the toilet and flush.
How would you spend $50.00 on your blog? One lucky and creative winner will get a check for $50.00 from me in order to spend on their blog however they wish. In order to enter just
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By Blackysky on Nov 14, 2007
good question .. mmm.. an $50 ad word campaign a $50 stumbleupon campaign or do a contest about what you will do with $50 for your blog … which one is the best choice to push a blog
By A Blog about Nothing on Nov 14, 2007
Blacky - I’m pretty sure the worst way to push a blog is a contest on the subject. Especially in todays day and age where anything under $1k is petty change in regards to blogging contests. But hey I can afford $50.00 which means I’ll pay whoever wins. If I offered more I don’t know if I’d be able to afford it.
By mcbias on Nov 15, 2007
I’d use the $50 toward a web-cam with a built-in mic so I could do video blogs, personally. Or, I’d use it to buy me admission into some sort of live-performance event so I could write about the experience. Interesting idea.
mcbias’s last blog post..Blog Hiatus
By Zone from ZoneDate.com on Nov 15, 2007
I think I’d definitely put that $50 into a StumbleUpon campaign but not in the way you’d assume. In order to magnify the return on my investment I wouldn’t promote my blog directly. I would instead create a solid StumbleUpon blog that asked for people to review my SU blog and to stumble my actual blog in return for me stumbling/reviewing/digging and sphinning theirs. Once that StumbleUpon blog was set up, then I would use that $50 on a StumbleUpon campaign that promotes my StumbleUpon blog. Whoa…. Wait a minute - I already have $50. I’ll let you know how it works out…
By BloggerDollar on Nov 15, 2007
I would spend 25$ on alcohol and make a what would you do with 25$ blog contest with the rest
BloggerDollar’s last blog post..Google Adsense - Making No sense?
By A Blog about Nothing on Nov 17, 2007
McBias - I think the video cam/mic is a great idea personally
Zone - Yes, please do let us know how it works out.
Bloggerdollar - Man and I thought I was cheap
By Xstamper on Nov 20, 2007
Cute puppy!
By A Blog about Nothing on Nov 21, 2007
Xstamper - Yeah it is. No idea who it belongs to as I swiped it from the internet when I looking for images associated with “sorry”.
By Zybron on Nov 26, 2007
I’ve posted what I would do with the $50 at http://zybron.blogspot.com/2007/11/how-i-would-spend-5000-on-my-blog.html
By A Blog about Nothing on Nov 26, 2007
Zybron - Interesting, you’d basically use the $50.00 to fund another blog platform. At this point you’re the only entrant and therefore are obviously in the lead
Assuming no one enters between now and the 1st of December I’ll be getting your information and shipping a $50.00 check your way.
Anyone else wanna try?
By Marnellie Dolor on Nov 27, 2007
I have made my post here: http://homelife.blogsome.com/2007/11/27/how-do-you-spend-50-for-your-blog/
I hope to win this contest. Hahaha. I understand there are two of us now. Me and Zybron. All the best to the two of us. Blessings!
By A Blog about Nothing on Nov 27, 2007
Marnellie - Thanks for entering… It seems I can’t comment on your blog. Shame…
By Robert on Nov 27, 2007
I’d buy another years worth of hosting so that I can forget about it for an extra year.
Or maybe I’d buy some business cards or flyers with my blog address to distribute to friends, colleagues and family. You can always rely on those sort of people to promote your blog.
Robert’s last blog post..I hate Facebook
By ROTUS on Nov 27, 2007
Maybe I should hire someone to write a decent post or two for my blog. Anyway, I’m in.
ROTUS’s last blog post..$50 Blog Challenge
By Beth on Nov 27, 2007
Nice contest. As for what I would use $50 for on my blog? A header image. An artist I’m not and I have spent the last 3 years trying to find the perfect representation for my blog. I mean-where do you find a frog and a geeky princess kissing, with money floating upwards instead of hearts? Exactly-no where
Beth’s last blog post..Nyquil Usage: Up. Grouchiness Level: 10/10.
By blackysky on Nov 27, 2007
50$ and I will start doing something on facebook… the future is maybe there….
blackysky’s last blog post..Facebook UK Universities and make friends
By BlogContests on Nov 27, 2007
Hello,
Just blogged about your contest. Check it out at the url below.
http://www.bloggingcontest.com/win-50-dollars-from-ablogaboutnothingcom/
By MyBlogContest on Nov 28, 2007
Don’t forget to post your blog contest information at MyBlogContest.com let more people know it.
MyBlogContest’s last blog post..Win The Coolest Lanyard In The World
By Karen on Nov 28, 2007
I didn’t read the other entries, so I hope I thought of this first!
http://antigrammar.com/node/99
By Steve O (gswd) on Nov 28, 2007
I have posted my entry in the $50 contest. It can be found here:
http://www.windowonlife.ws/blog/?p=36
Steve O (gswd)’s last blog post..The $50 Blog Challenge - an entry
By Laura @ Laura Williams' Musings on Nov 28, 2007
I honestly don’t think I would spend the $50 on my blog because it’s a blogger blog and well it’s hosted free. I would however apply the $50 towards a new vacuum because our new one we just bought in February is now shot.
blogged ya: http://laurawilliamsmusings.blogspot.com/2007/11/wednesday-edition-of-contests-galore_28.html
Laura @ Laura Williams’ Musings’s last blog post..Shop Early, Shop Online, and Use Discount Codes
By Blake on Nov 28, 2007
Great contest! That’s not really what $50 in dollar bills look like.. is it? that’s a big pile lol!
Blake’s last blog post..Can you see the face?