Since my last post I’ve had a great number of entrecard droppers visit my site (over 300), and I have been to a few hundred of their sites. Viewing that many blogs you start to see patterns. I’d like to share some of what I have learned.
For Publishers
Tip #1. Make sure your entrecard is being displayed on your front page. I’ve found several sites with no entrecard code at all. Worse than the slow loaders, you wait and wonder “what was this person thinking?” Sometimes people think they will lower their ad price by keeping you from dropping cards, but they simply discouraging advertisers who visit.
Tip #2. Put your entrecard above the fold. This means when someone views your page, they should not have to scroll down to find your entrecard. I violate this rule sometimes myself on tech.turnipofpower.com because the site is designed for a widescreen browser. If someone views the site in a low-res non-widescreen monitor, the ads revert from double to single and go below the fold.
Tip #3. Put your entrecard code early in your template. Don’t load your entrecard script after your slow javascript ads. People will become frustrated and leave. The faster a card loads, the more likely I am to look around the site. A couple of times I even checked to see who their webhost was.
Tip #4. Don’t Put too many ads and widgets on your site. Besides making your site load slowly, it looks like crap. For WordPress, get the AdRotator, a plugin that will allow you to rotate any amount of ads that fit the same dimensions. Alter the code so that you host the image file on your server instead of having to load it from the merchant.
Tip #5. Boost your alexa rank as well. You can make your url something like http://redirect.alexa.com/redirect?turnipofpower.com/ and you will slowly increase in alexa’s rankings. I’ve seen a few others do this, so unless it is forbidden, I use this type of link for most ads. (Note: Tip #5 no longer works, which is why it is crossed out)
For Card Droppers
Tip #1. Drop a card on everyone that dropped a card on you. That way you show up on each others top dropper list. Eventually you will become familiar with their site, and might even bookmark it along with other sites.
Tip #2. Bookmark sites that load quickly with entrecards above the fold. This way you can hit them daily. You could even open them all at once in new tabs.
Tip #3. Leave recommendations without being asked. Offering to trade recommendations is forbidden, but when I get one, I say thank you by reviewing their site and returning the favor.
Tip #4. Click on Campaigns and browse the “Most Recent” category. This is where you will find the newest blogs and the cheapest ad rates. Pay the 2 credits and book every ad you can. Then go back and drop a card on all of them, bookmarking the fastest loaders.
Tip #5. If you like a site, leave a comment, add them to technorati favorites, stumble them, or subscribe to their feed. Small blogs will notice, and be very thankful for your help. Some blogs like this one get very few readers, and we read every comment.
*Bonus Tip: Put adsense or another pay per click below your entrecard. Card droppers tend to be a careless bunch, bleary eyed from all their mad clicking. One of them just might miss the box and give you a little adsense boost.
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49 users commented in " Top 5 Entrecard Tips and Tricks "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a Trackback **********Great list, I’ve been chatting with a lot of bloggers about this, and these are always the most talked about points.
Just a quick note about your bonus tip about PPC around the card drop. There is a chance that you could get into trouble with Google Adsense for this.
I had an old blog that I use to participate in a similar sort of “blog traffic” exchanger (credits etc.) called blogexplosion. I actually recieved a warning from them because apparantly they don’t like those kinds of impressions.
Anyways, no idea if this is the case for Entrecard, but it does sound similar to me. So be careful
Let us know if you discover anything about this 
As long as you don’t mislead people into thinking the ads are something they are not, like putting pictures around them or having arrows pointing to them, I think you will be ok. Google intentionally adds space around their ads to try and prevent my suggestion from working. But I will post here if I find out anything new.
Thanks for these tips. I will surely try them. Cheers.
[...] expressed here and endorse it wholeheartedly. Take a gander and you’ll probably agree too. Top 5 Entrecard Tips and Tricks - Turnip of Power - Another great Entrecard related post. The tips are very helpful. I’ve [...]
Great points! Thank you! I’m brand new to Entrecard so having these tips is very helpful to me.
Excellent tips. The folks who put their widgets Way below the fold are foolish. If the EC widget And the beginning of your most recent post are Both visible as soon as the blog loads, I will inevitably begin reading the latter while waiting for the former to change from “Drop Yours” to “Thanks!” and if the post is interesting and well written I may well read the whole thing before realizing the widget has long since updated and I can move on to the next site. And I do digg, stumble or comment IF the post inspires me to do so.
The people who make the widget hard to find are fooling themselves. It doesn’t force me to read their posts. It just annoys me and insures I won’t be back very often.
Good tips! I also like the way you modified the Talian theme. I use the same theme, I have thought about modifying it also.
Hello there!
Nice write up of the 5 Tips and Tricks for us fellow Entrecarders!
Gosh, I never knew about the Alexa redirect thingie!
I know now! Time to spread the word yarghhh!
Cheers!
Thanks!
Alexa rank has no value in itself, because it is very inaccurate if your site isn’t in the top 100,000 sites. Since most people don’t install their toolbar, they only measure a small sample of total visitors. It does have value if a potential advertiser looks at your site. I used it today when booking an ad on another site. They claimed 47,000 visitors a day, but had no alexa rank, no google pagerank, not even a single google linkback to them, so I cried foul.
I tried number 5 for a while and actually watched my Alexa rank seem to go down. I’m not sure if they where related to me changing the code or just because I did have a decrease in traffic so I removed the redirection from my entrecard link.
I only left it up a couple of days so maybe I should leave it that way for a couple of weeks and see what happens.
[...] of my favorite posts so far: Top 5 Entrecard Tips and Tricks 5 good tips for publishers and card droppers Becoming An Entrecard Click Master The best card [...]
Fantastic Tips!
yea … that’s the way it should be
Great post. Thank you.
Great post and good tips for people new to entrecard, although I’d probably split tip 5 in card droppers, to give more emphasis on commenting on blogs as I try to find something of interest to comment on when I visit a blog.
[...] Source 10 Basic Tips for an Entrecarder Advanced Entrecarding tips Even more Advanced Entrecarding Strategy http://turnipofpower.com/2007/12/30/becoming-an-entrecard-click-master/ http://turnipofpower.com/2007/12/27/top-5-entrecard-tips-and-tricks/ [...]
I love your bonus tip. I almost want to do that one, but I think I’ll pass.
It doesn’t pay off as much now that adsense changed the clickable area of ads to the link only, and not the whole ad. Still, it is something to remember if there is a box you’d like readers to click.
Also subscribed to your feeds.Entrecard bookmark me.
Or.. you could get the top droppers widget for entrecard. Check out how to use the widget:
Last droppers widget
Great tips here for newbies.
Drop a card on everyone who dropped on you but also leave a comment or two - to start networking.
Gee, If only I had read this instead of learning as I go. LOL!
Great read, Thanks!
really nice tips i think this would really help me to increase my entrecard credits .thnx i am going to be a subscriber of your blog
This is a nice post for getting EC’s. Most is stuff i figured out a couple days after doing EC. What the sphere needs more of is less clicking and more reading and commenting. If the two can meet in the middle then I am for that. I am afraid this sort of “tip” post doesn’t help get my blog noticed and read, in fact, in a way it hinders the process. No offense but I was hoping for more when I clicked this link.
Hmm, by any chance did you look at the date of this post? Sorry if someone linked to it recently since Entrecard has gone through many changes. Actually, this particular post is somewhat historic in that is was the first of it’s kind. Thanks to this article, every other “tip’s and tricks” post followed on other blogs, along with much discussion in the forums over it.
I still like the post, wether it is ancient like dinosaurs or not. Thanks!
You are a blessing :p
Very informative tips you have here. Greatly appreciated especially by entrecard newbies.
Thnx for this tips. I’m new in EC, I want to test it, to get amount of traffic what I can get with EC.
Like you, the faster a card loads, the more likely I am to look around the site. I’m new in Entrecard and that was my experience, yet when I added my PPP widgets I placed it ahead of my Entrecard widget till it cannot be seen. I’ll put it back where it used to be. Thanks for making me realize I was right.
Why is the point about Alexa cutoff , is that illegal ? There are many other ways you can use EC , the shop provides a great way to generate back links etc through review and stuff.Check out my post , http://rumblinglankan.com/how-to-get-maximum-results-through-entrecard/
Although bit out of topic are you getting decent amount of traffic from BlogUpp ?
The alexa stuff is crossed out because alexa changed their system and it no longer applies.
Thanks for all the tips. I have enjoyed reading your information. I wish you great continued success.
Your right about tip #3, i myself is frustrated whenever i encountered a site that load very slowly thus making me leave the site at once.
[...] These some tips for Entrecard Publisher i got from Turnip of Power : [...]
Excellent tips about entercard
I’ll be doing a post soon about entercard and it builds inboud links : http://optimizingsearchengine.blogspot.com
i use entrecard too, thank’s for the tips..
nice tips, thanks for sharing
Thanks for the tips! They’re very useful.
Especially the bonus tip! Wahahaha!
Hai!
I’m owner of ovan.info.
I have a blog with english content and I’ll try your advice.
Thanks for sharing
This is really good tips. It helps me understand more about entrecard. Thanks
Great tips, I am going to download the Ad Rotator now.
STUMBLED!
What determines your popularity number or the number on the top right when searching ad campaigns? Mine dropped 100 today despite my site getting more card drops than ever?
thanks
Your popularity number it a 5 day total, so 5 good days in a row is what it takes to really change your ranking.
I just signed up today and wish to thank you for these great tips. Very helpful.
haha, i like the one about putting adsense under the entrecard link
.. shame my adsense txt ads are 5ft wide 
Great Tips
Thnx . i’ll do later
Great tips! I just signed up for Entrecard and I”m trying to figure it out! This helps!
thank u, it’s good tips for me
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