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Blogging Up A Storm With BlogStorm

written by John Chow on July 5, 2007

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blogstorm.png

As you all know, I’m am currently not ranked number one on Google for my name. This has raised a bunch of questions, with the main one being where did I go? As a matter of fact, if you do a Google search for my name, you’ll see a Google sponsored ad asking that very question. I reproduced the ad on the left. Feel free to click on it. It’s a screen shot and not a real Google ad.

The ad was placed by a UK blog call BlogStorm. I must admit, that was pretty creative marketing on their part. However, the funky Google ad was just beginning. In order to extend their reach even more, BlogStorm saw fit to order up this ReviewMe review as well. Some may view this as adding insult to injury. I’m calling it smart marketing.

Who Is BlogStorm

BlogStorm is the creation of Patrick Altoft, an internet marketing consultant & full time blogger from Yorkshire in the United Kingdom.

BlogStorm teaches blogger how to make money online (where have I heard that one before?). Their Google ad seem to claim they know a lot more about linkbaiting than me and points to a really cool beginner’s guide to linkbait article. I really like the idea of suing somebody as linkbait. Being as evil as I am, you would think that I would have come up with that one.

A Mover And A Shaker

Patrick sent along this note with his review request.

We have launched a new blog helping webmasters build traffic and earn more money. Today is the start of a new series about affiliate marketing. The blog is two weeks old and has already make number five on Alexa Movers & Shakers and Time magazine. You can find all our posts at: http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/all.php

I did a check of Alexa and BlogStorm is not longer on the Movers & Shakers list. However, getting on the list is a pretty high achievement. Add in the fact that Patrick did it within the first two weeks of the blog’s life and it’s pretty amazing. BlogStorm offered some extremely compelling content and one nice piece of linkbait (more on that in a bit) to drive all that moving and shaking traffic. Besides their linkbait article, some of the other must-reads include:

30,000 Visitors In The First Week

BlogStorm was launched on June 7th and managed to pull down 30000 visitors in its first week. However, that traffic didn’t came because of the blog. Patrick created a cool tool call the BlogStorm Tracker that received a lot of positive press and links from other blogs.

The BlogStorm Tracker allows you to track the number of websites linking to your blog posts or news articles. BlogStorm monitors your RSS feed daily and offer free statistics so you can see which of your posts are the most popular and how you can improve. Anyone is allow to add their site for free.

Patrick used the BlogStorm Tracker as his linkbait. As you can see, he achieved great results with it.

Built Traffic First, Then Make Money Online

For a blog that shows readers how to make money on the Internet, BlogStorm hasn’t done much to make any money themselves. With the exception of four ad buttons on the upper right side of the blog, BlogStorm features zero advertising. You won’t even see a Google ad. It’s pretty obvious that Patrick is trying to build traffic before monetizing the blog. A very good strategy in my opinion.

BlogStorm offers a full feed RSS. Their blog is updated two to three times per day so I highly recommend subscribing to it. You can also subscribe to BlogStorm by Email.

Now, if BlogStorm would only accept Google AdSense advertising, I can send them a “John Chow is over here!” Google ad. :twisted:

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{ 97 comments }

Eastwood July 5, 2007 at 11:09 pm

very interesting review, john. I like their creative marketing ideas; taking good advantage of the “situation” :P

Jack Book July 6, 2007 at 2:29 am

Hey.. I emailed you first.. and now they ordered reviewme :(

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:35 am

pretty cool site, worth a read

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:52 am

question:

since john chow dot com is penalized by google. Would it lose its pag?erank during the next google pr update

i’m curious to see

Goob July 6, 2007 at 7:01 am

It possible could be, since hardly anybody knows for 100% how PR works. But if backlinks are are heavily weighed as the general consensus says they are, I’d say he won’t be losing any PR soon.

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:12 pm

No, I highly doubt it.

Jack Book July 6, 2007 at 6:56 pm

well.. iwebtoll predicts this blog pr will decrease to 5.

check it here

Mybloggo July 7, 2007 at 3:50 am

Maybe will

ritchie July 7, 2007 at 6:10 am

wasn’t there a time when google was proudly claiming that they don’t manually tweak the algorithm?

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:35 am

Money making information is exactly what I’m looking for. Thanks for the post John.

webd360 July 6, 2007 at 2:44 pm

Yes, basically anyone searching for “John Chow” will know who he is so they will get clicks for almost all of the searches.

Linky Love July 6, 2007 at 6:10 pm

John,

Are you working by example that the new “cheap paid to blog advertised websites” should not be ranked first in Google?

Terra Andersen July 5, 2007 at 11:20 pm

Wow! I’ve never even heard of Blog Storm before.. :roll:

Michael Kwan July 5, 2007 at 11:43 pm

Sarcasm over the Internet is a very strange thing, especially when you throw in a smiley.

Interesting site and it’s achieved a lot in its infancy. Good stuff.

ritchie July 7, 2007 at 6:11 am

Yes, even getting in the focus of the big G is a whole lot of work.

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:45 am

neither have i, but the site looks good

Goob July 6, 2007 at 7:02 am

Thirded that I’d never heard of Blog Storm before. But at least they’re trying to get their name out and it does look like a pretty cool site.

ritchie July 7, 2007 at 6:12 am

Yes, they did a nice job. Let’s see how it develops.

free website traffic July 6, 2007 at 7:52 am

Sounds like a superhero name — very catchy indeed. I’m a fan of Brit humor and it certainly shows in their marketing strategies. Looks like Patrick’s success is imminent.

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:35 am

This is the first I’ve heard of it too.

webd360 July 6, 2007 at 2:46 pm

I’ve heard of it because the owner is a member over at Digital Point

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:14 pm

First time I’ve heard of it as well.
Nice design though.

Mybloggo July 7, 2007 at 3:51 am

Same As me

Michael Fultz July 5, 2007 at 11:23 pm

I like the concept of building traffic before monetizing the blog. It seems that a lot of folks have forgotten that the only thing we are competing for is someone else’s time. We have to compel that individual to take time out of his/her day to visit our blog. The only way that will happen is if we provide something of value to them. Excellent article! Keep up the good work!

Marc July 6, 2007 at 6:20 am

While I would never say that this is a bad strategy, it’s certainly not the only approach.

Regular visitors don’t click ads.

That’s a truth we all have experience with. That means we’re trying to capture the foragers, those who haven’t yet found what they’re looking for.

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:45 am

good point

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:14 pm

Indeed.

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:38 am

I’m not sure how many people actually click on the ads. If you look at John’s stats only about 6.5% of the income came from this source.

The real secret seems to be in getting a huge readership then sell reviews.

free website traffic July 6, 2007 at 7:54 am

It’s a well-worth investment. Sometimes you just have to put revenue at the back seat for a little while.

cooliojones July 7, 2007 at 11:57 am

I think some regular visitors will click on the ads, it just has to be something new and appealing. Also, this makes you keep your pages fresh by playing around with the placement of ads and also the overall look from time to time.

Paul B July 5, 2007 at 11:40 pm

Looks like I’d better get my coding head on, cool tools are the future I tell ya.

Is there any better form of link bait out there?

dacranleycode July 6, 2007 at 3:16 am

You are bang on Paul.
Applications no matter how cool or even gimmicky are fantastic link bait. Also there are lots of high pr software directories that you can upload your applications to. The page rank from these sites is great and you also get bucket loads of traffic.
I’m getting over a hundred visitors a day to one of my sites after I payed a programmer to write a simple screen saver app and submitted it to a few software directories.

Stumble Upon could send you hoards of traffic if you submit a funky application. Software directories coupled with smart social bookmarking techniques will be a huge payoff for anyone that creates simple FREE applications.

I just put on my programming hat but its a brand new hat :) . I will be posting posting php and c# lessons and quizzes on my new site as I dirty my programming hat.

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:47 am

that’s the thing

most of us are not good at writing an application

i’d love to see something a lot easier to deal with

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:39 am

Anyone know of an affiliate application developer?

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:15 pm

That would be awesome… but I don’t know of one :( .

cooliojones July 7, 2007 at 12:13 pm

Or are there any applications that can create applications? You select what options you want and it makes it for you? That would be really cool and facilitate the process.

Zac Johnson July 5, 2007 at 11:40 pm

Thanks for the blog post, will be looking through this one thoroughly… hopefully we will see you back on Google soon too!

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:47 am

john is badly missed on google

Goob July 6, 2007 at 7:04 am

He can’t be missing on Google for much longer, can he?! I mean, it’s his darn name!

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:17 pm

Yeah, that’s what I was shocked about. Google should at least give him #1 for his own name!

AsiaPartTime July 5, 2007 at 11:41 pm

Sad to know that John chow is out from google ranking. So, do you still continue with your linkbait promotion?

Michael Kwan July 5, 2007 at 11:44 pm

He’s only out of Google ranking for his name. As far as I know, John is still doing just fine for other key phrases like “make money online”

abdalla July 6, 2007 at 4:13 am

he is definately first!

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:19 pm

I see Bidvertiser #1 for the term “make money online”.

John Chow July 5, 2007 at 11:47 pm

I will always be doing linkbaiting :twisted:

SEO Optimization July 6, 2007 at 4:52 am

I bet now that you got penalized by Google and everyone speaks about that you are doing super great with linkbair :P . You just earned a new link on John Chow keyword and John chow dot com from me.

Don’t know actually what exactly inspired me to write about your penalization and to touch other topics of your blog on my post, was it the “rank higher for john chow on google” or was it “he did a good job, and he merits a backlink at least with his name as anchor text” :evil:

Cheers John.

a video a day July 6, 2007 at 6:50 am

john chow dot com is not ranked no.1 anymore with the term of “make money online”

sad…sad…sad…

Marc July 6, 2007 at 7:40 am

Indeed, links are worth more than Google juice. People often forget that a link will normally bring in traffic on its own, without the input of Google, or any of the other engines.

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:40 am

Most of the blogs I read are from referrals from other sites. I’m sick of all the junk that turns up in searches.

cooliojones July 7, 2007 at 12:17 pm

He HAS to continue to do that, because it was one of the keys to his success. One thing that people do is stop the very thing that made them successful in the first place, so then they live a yo-yo type lifestyle. Work for a while — stop — then work some more. But if you keep it constant, your lifestyle will also be constant.

Hawaii SEO July 6, 2007 at 12:12 am

It’s a great blog. I’ve read every single post. One thing you didn’t mention was his briliant WordPress plugin that helps generate links to your website when people try to hot-link your images.
http://www.blogstorm.co.uk/blog.php?cat=plugins

Real Estate Editorial July 8, 2007 at 9:02 am

I’m going to check that out. Thanks

Linky Love July 6, 2007 at 12:19 am

At this very moment in google.com

JohnChow.com is still ranked number 45 for John Chow

JohnChow.net is ranked 9

…. very evil indeed

Linky Love July 6, 2007 at 12:25 am

On the Other hand, what did yo do different lately John?

I see your meta description changed and you told us before you are using allin one SEO changing your titles.

Hard to get a kickback of 44 positions, yet we all know that age is important in Google, so I suggest: sit back and earn some extra money ;-)

Ryan July 6, 2007 at 1:14 am

So this site seems to be popular, and I do see advertising on the site, but what does this equate to ad revenue opportunity? Thousands per month?

Marc July 6, 2007 at 7:41 am

$12K last month… Go through his archives, John provides monthly reports on his earnings.

Ryan July 6, 2007 at 3:37 pm

I meant the Blogstorm website, not John Chow’s.

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:21 pm

I’m curious to know as well.

Patrick Altoft July 6, 2007 at 1:16 am

Thanks for the review John.

Out of interest since I started showing the advert it has had over 3,200 impressions just from people searching for John Chow.

An interesting post we have coming up is an interview with some affiliate managers giving away some tips on making more money, being accepted to programs and not getting caught cheating.

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:22 pm

How many hits has John gave you? :P

cooliojones July 7, 2007 at 12:36 pm

Wait, if you do a post/interview on how to not get caught cheating, won’t that tell the people out there how to look out for your cheating ways? :mrgreen: :twisted: Unless it’s some sort of super secret stealth method, then do tell! :mrgreen:

Webmaster Money July 6, 2007 at 2:05 am

That is very good traffic for few weeks old blog.
Can you do it with any site or you need to have always some special tool or special idea and spread it over Internet firs?

free website traffic July 6, 2007 at 8:01 am

It has to be a mix of good ideas, content, marketing, and other available online tools. I mean, I haven’t even heard of Patrick Altoft from the UK until last week.

shman July 6, 2007 at 2:43 am

Nice beginning, 30,000 in first week…

Mybloggo July 6, 2007 at 3:13 am

Waa…. 30,000 is a very pretty good beginning

webd360 July 6, 2007 at 2:47 pm

It was on Techcrunch too, which I am sure helped a lot

Nomar July 6, 2007 at 3:17 am

hehe, smart idea from the google ad :twisted:

Goob July 6, 2007 at 7:05 am

Yeah, that’s one of my more favorite ones I’ve seen recently :)

Marc July 6, 2007 at 7:42 am

I don’t know how I feel about it…

I noticed it when it first came out, looked at it, but didn’t ultimately click on it…

free website traffic July 6, 2007 at 8:04 am

John, you aren’t the least bit ticked off about this bright and evil marketing strategy? :shock:

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:25 pm

Haha, looks like John has a new evil partner. If you search “BlogStorm” (which Patrick’s site doesn’t rank first for, that was kind of funny), you should see a nice John Chow Google ad on the right side XD.

Matt July 6, 2007 at 4:23 am

I agree that is some great marketing and the fact that he’s not monetizing the site overtly from the start definitely adds some credibility (at least for me).

Personally I would have been a touch annoyed if someone had done that to my name (at least initially)… great review.

Vijay Teach Me July 6, 2007 at 6:05 am

Let the johnchow train rolling….

Vijay

free website traffic July 6, 2007 at 8:06 am

With that Google ad paired with an actual review from JC himself — it will only brew the perfect blog storm.

VeAn July 6, 2007 at 8:53 am

New Blog about “How to make money online” is to much … I want to make money online.

ME? — I don’t want and, yes I want.

I’m almost done with my study. (for mechanical engineer) and my biggest wish is to succeed in that.

AND THEN, I have 2 website. First is one of my club which you can find under my name and second one is website of my “apartment in Lopar” (guess which one)

My plan is not to live from website money but I will like to earn enough to pay hosting, marketing promotions and similar things for club and apartments.

BUT, people which are visiting my websites aren’t interested in earning online so they will not help me to earn something from google or someone else.

SO, it seams, (for me), monetizing a blog or website which is not about “how to make money online” is nonsense.

ALSO, making one more website about monetizing a blog is also nonsense when we all have 100000000000… of websites on same subject.

so…

PLEASE, ANSWER ME ON THIS(or make a post), JOHN:
How to make money online with website which IS NOT about, “hot to make money online – or offline”?

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:45 am

Quality content. Many of the blogs I read are about things completely unrelated to making money online.

Real Estate Editorial July 8, 2007 at 8:55 am

I agree, if you have quality content and are passionate about what you write, people will realize that.

If you build it they will come. I might be the only one who hears those voices in my head though.

Jimson Lee July 6, 2007 at 11:23 am

Check out http://www.stevepavlina.com/

Steve is passionate about personal development, and shares his knowledge & experience on how to make money with a blog.

You *may* even see a John Chow advertisement here and there on that site. That’s how I stumbled upon this site (no relation to StumbleUpon)

cooliojones July 7, 2007 at 12:57 pm

Yeah, this site is awesome. it’s one of the first ones I found this year, and I used his resources for some good inspiration. He’s also a very humble guy. I think if you observe the qualities and traits of the top people online, you will notice a trend or correlation, and THAT’S the key to success.

simon July 6, 2007 at 9:13 am

I’ve seen that ad before this review. That’s very smart move.

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:27 pm

Yes, so have I. Actually, I think I mentioned about it in a post. I also saw another ad about “The New John Chow” or something like that.

Scott Hayne July 6, 2007 at 9:56 am

I thought the Intraweb felt empty today…

Good post, checking out the site now.

A Tentative Personal Finance Blog July 6, 2007 at 10:23 am

Hmmm… I’ve been open almost 2 months and I don’t even have 15000 yet. Then again, I’ve been dead the last two or three weeks.

Lewis Empire July 6, 2007 at 10:42 am

Hey John, is there any issue with telling people to click on a google ad even though it’s not an actual google ad? I’d hate to see you lose your $800 per month!

Coop search July 6, 2007 at 11:15 am

I dont think it should matter, as its only a image and will not be equal to creating false page impressions

webd360 July 6, 2007 at 2:50 pm

Yea, it shouldn’t matter because its not an actual ad and no one is getting paid for receiving clicks

Wahlau.NET July 6, 2007 at 11:38 am

trying to steal your traffic on making money online :twisted:

chrisblogging.com July 6, 2007 at 11:56 am

Nice review as usual. I am going to keep an eye on this one…

Ryan July 6, 2007 at 2:56 pm

I don’t get how the blogstorm tracker works. Can someone please explain?

MrGPT July 6, 2007 at 5:30 pm

You place a script on your site and when your site gets really “hot” and receives lots of traffic, you will appear on top of the Tracker page at BlogStorm.

Ryan July 6, 2007 at 5:52 pm

Yes, but how does it know your site is “hot”? That’s what I haven’t been able to figure out. There is some hook with Yahoo, but I don’t understand what yahoo adds to it.

cooliojones July 7, 2007 at 1:06 pm

Trust me, you WILL know when your site is hot. Do you have a way to track your traffic? Look at your Technorati authority, Alexa rank, Page Rank and Google thingy (sounds so professional doesn’t it? :mrgreen: ) I think when your Technorati authority gets in the three digits, and you rating in the four digits, you’re HOT!!

Don Simkovich July 6, 2007 at 8:20 pm

Hey, I’m #1 when my name is put into Google!!!

I did some posts on people for my blog who aren’t household names, but people did search for their names and they came up on my blog. I learned this thanks to statcounter.

Hip Hop July 6, 2007 at 11:46 pm

I think i will check them out later on tomorrow

SELaplana July 7, 2007 at 3:41 am

now, i think, you’re a real evil :-)

“Now, if BlogStorm would only accept Google AdSense advertising, I can send them a “John Chow is over here!” Google ad. :twisted:

Deelip July 7, 2007 at 6:17 am

Haha, yeah.
Like the last line.

Jack July 8, 2007 at 10:39 am

You will be back soon, I have no doubt about it.