Suitener

Time to shift gears.

Suitener is a project I've been working on for a few weeks. The idea is pretty simple: you have an audience of people trying to build backlinks to their articles to increase exposure. Suitener helps the community do just that, and build momentum via search engines as well. Its an SEO no-brainer.

As well, it ties in nicely with Boostpost. Suitener has an EVB, which allows site owners to link to their Suite101.com articles with a "resweet" button. Tres cool.

Suitener

I'm becoming a huge Pligg Fan

(And in an unrelated note, a huge NOT fan of IE8 and Windows7...but that can be for another post)

Pligg.com is an open source Digg clone software package that is super easy to set up, and lets you get a Digg clone running quickly. About the only real challenge is working on your own template, which is something I have to do yet myself.

But here's why I'm such a fan:

Remember radio? It was cool and you could listen to all kinds of things on it, from news, to music, to live hockey games, etc. What made it so accepted was the range of options you had. You could listen to a station you liked, and if it was playing something you didn't like, you could change the station.

Well, Digg.com is a kind of radio. Or more accurately, its a radio station. The concept Digg introduced is the radio. But the problem that Pligg fixes is that a radio is kinda useless if there's only one radio station. What Pligg enables is a world of opportunities where Digg clone sites can sprout up for specific niches. For example, Squidoo.com is a place where people write how-to articles. SquidUp.org is the Pligg-based site which allows Squidoo readers to know more about which articles are popular, and to participate in determining that popularity. I see this type of model applied to things like geographic locale, newspapers, and even smaller groups like band fans, or - my classic example - zombie fans. Digg for zombie fans...its such a natural fit. I'm kind-of joking, but the point is, there are many ways to interpret an internet posting. Digg asks readers "Do you like (dig) this?". The Zombie site might ask "How appealing would this post be for a dead person who has risen from the grave?" Niche sites could ask:

"How cold is this?"
"How hot is this?"
"How picturesque is this?"
"How does this sound?"
"Do you think the article accurately supports the xzy political agenda?"

And on and on.

Already, Pligg sites have surfaced which have begun this process of reaching out to serve a niche audience. SquidUp is a great example of this. But so too is BizSugar, a site devoted to small and mid-sized businesses. And there are many, many more.

At Boostpost, the aim is to help publishers increase the readership of their work by giving audiences a chance to spread the post across those vertical lines - or radio stations. The benefit of an extra Digg vote may pale in comparsion to being added to BlogEngage. And for Pligg site owners, Boostpost offers a tremendous opportunity to expand their audiences. You never know how many zombie fans there are out there!


Reference Material:

http://www.boostpost.com/createaservice.php
http://www.pligg.com/gallery/
http://pligg2u.com/
http://digg.com/
http://www.squidoo.com/
http://squidup.org/
http://blogengage.com/
http://www.bizsugar.com

Defects and growth

So far the site has grown (incrementally) every day. About 280 people viewed Boostpost today, which is up from 200 yesterday. I'm looking at it as a good sign...it is not being totally ignored.

A couple of things changed today: now the link to See a Boostpage takes you to an entry screen where you can type any URL (or choose one of the 2 pre-fill urls) to see the boostpage.

And a minor defect in the Contact form prevented the form input from being saved properly. Fortunately, in reviewing the page stats, there has not been any activity in the contact form so far.

Another minor development was that I submitted Boostpost to DMOZ.org. Hirtorically, DMOZ has been good for a few (~50) visitors a day. The category was link popularity. I have this sneaking suspicion there will be a reluctance to include Boostpost...but if you think about it, link popularity is exactly what Boostpost shows. Its the perfect category for Boostpost. I only make this suggestion because there are no other services like addthis, sharethis, or addtoany in DMOZ. Maybe they never tried to get added, but I doubt it. DMOZ is fantastic...virtually every SEO reference on the web recommends you at least try to get listed there. And from my experience, I can definitely vouch for it.

Next project for Boostpost is a firefox addon. No promises on when (if?) it will be complete. But without question, that's another gimme in terms of perfect fit. And you know, the overwhelming traffic I'm seeing is from firefox browsers....maybe I'm out of the loop, but that is very different from any other work I've done in the past. Maybe Boostpost has some horrible defect with IE? Geez, I hope not...

Squidoo and a brave new world

(Well, for me anyways...)

Its funny how when you don't pay close attention to the world unfolding in the internet, you quickly lose track of things. For example, Squidoo is a site that never made it onto my radar. But I have now used Squidoo, and I tend to think its a pretty decent site. I like it both for the fact that it can be a useful respoitory for how-to documentation, but also for its promotional capabilities. Ig uess that's basically the point of it.

Another juggernaut is twitter. I tend to resist new ideas as being crap, and long felt twitter fell into this category. But I've tried twitter, and although I'll never be a wild and crazy twitterer, I can see how it is beneficial to those who use it. To a lot of people, that will mean things like keeping in touch with loved ones, or friends...but the real thrust of the site is that it is a quick and painless way in which to build backlinks. Really, the internet tends to boil down to that. Offer an ability to build backlinks, and people will use your service. Just ask Digg. Or Delicious.

Back in the Saddle

And I can't figure out why I ever got off the horse in the first place!!! Look, the internet is fun! And since I don't play golf - or at least not well, and also I don't enjoy it - creating sites is my hobby... my golf.

SoarPort sadly died a lonely death. It is sad, because it wasn't that bad an idea. At least it did have some good technical content. And it also worked. But I do now see how more slick developers have introduced ways to out-soar Soarport. And I suppose there is also the reality that the idea was never equal to its inspiration: Mapquest and Google Maps.

In any event, I plan to return to the fold for more fun and excitement. I've learned and fermented my ideas and I believe there are some improvements I can make this time around. Also, time off has provided some much needed room to save up some $$ to pay for the initial startup costs.

So look out world!