An unofficial review: Blog Curry

This isn’t something I normally do, but after reading about an opportunity for a free review of my own blog in a post by Becky S. of www.preblogging.com I figured I should take a few moments, get my butt in gear and write a review. For those of you who have read some of my past reviews this will seem a little foreign to you as I am going to keep this as simple as possible.

First things first, Mr. Blogcurry (James Allen) has requested that all reviews be honest, and that makes me feel good about things already. It means that he wants to get real feedback and not simply a few extra links. Though no doubt a few links won’t hurt anything and I’m sure he’s very aware of this.

I always check the whois data on any blog I am doing a review on (and often on those I am not reviewing) simply as a matter of curiousity. According to the ICANN registar data the domain name www.blogcurry.com was registered on 6 September 2005 and will expire on 6 September 2007 (friendly reminder - don’t forget to renew). Anyhow I looked back into the past as best I could but only found content dating back to 7/31/07. It is entirely possible that I just didn’t see the link to go further back, but if not I can’t help but wonder what the blog was being used for before now. A quick check for blogcurry.com on Technorati reveals the blog is indeed fairly new. Apparently however while the blog might be new it seems that Mr. Allen knows his way around blogs. At least from a monetization aspect.

Word for word from the “about” section:

I operate many blogs in niche markets and realized I needed a way to keep up on all the latest tips and techniques on the process of blogging itself.

It’s not that I don’t believe him (I really have no way to know), but I’m wondering why some of his other blogs aren’t linked to this blog? I may be wrong, but it seems like it would drive some traffic to the other blogs? I suppose it could be an issue of inappropriate content. Readers please take note - I am NOT stating that his other blogs have inappropriate content! I am simply speculating as to why I’m not finding links to his other blogs.

Despite the apparent lack of links to his own blogs I notice on his blogroll he has 15 blogs listed and a few of them are the so-called A-listers of the blogging world. I mean what blogroll is complete without the likes of Darren Rowse and John Chow (not to mention a few others)? I really think he should cutback on the number of links in his blogroll. 15 is a lot and I can’t help but think some links simply don’t get as much attention as others by virtue of overcrowding. When I first started I had a blogroll that number about 20 links on it. Basically any and all blogs I would put on there. According to my research via Google Analytic’s overlay tool only one or two of my blogroll links would get clicked a day. Inevitably it seemed that the most likely to be clicked were the ones that needed the traffic the least (and yes I realize this is a relative statement). At that point I did away with the blogroll altogether and went to a weekly highlights link list. Basically it is a list of 5 blogs that I have found something interesting on and in most cases I link directly to the article of interest. They stay up anywhere from 5 to 12 days at which point I rotate another group in. I’m not suggesting getting rid of the blogroll, just that you whittle it down a little bit to maybe 5-8 links on there. I think if you do some checking you’ll find that it becomes much more effective if people aren’t overwhelmed by choices.

Something I really like is that he comments back to people who comment on his blog. Building community is always a good idea and nothing says community better than open ended communication. I myself could better learn this lesson and be better about commenting back when people comment on my blog. This isn’t to say that I or others don’t comment back, but I notice a lot of newer blogs that get a comment or two but there is no response to the comments. That’s like calling someone on the phone, saying “hello” and being met with dead silence except for the occasional inhalation of air. At first you’re puzzled but in short order you get annoyed and likely hang up. Same idea at work here. If you don’t answer you blog (phone) why would anyone call (visit)? As I said however that is not an issue with this blog.

That’s pretty much all I have to say at this point. I encourage everyone to go and check out Blog Curry and get yourself a free review for your efforts! If you’d like me to do a review of your site please take a look at this page and it will tell you exactly what needs to happen.

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