I’ve been using Google Analytics now for around one month on I’ve been using this service to monitor my sites growth and I thought I would let you know about it if you are not already using it and what I think.

Google Analytics is a free service run by Google which provides you with detailed statistics of your websites growth. With the simple installation of JavaScript Google Analytics offers many interesting statistics that help you find statistics like:
Which country you are receiving the most visitors from.
How long people visited your website for.
Find out how your adverts are performing.
Where your traffic is coming from. This helps with your AdWords campaign if you have one (I personally don’t), you can find out how people are finding you by search as it will show you the keywords they are searching.

Google Analytics shows text statistics as well as providing you with a visually appealing graph that shows a line graph that is easier to look at. There are over 80 distinct reports in Google Analytics for you to view and you can start monitoring your site within minutes with a simple account setup within minutes. Once this is done you can add up to 50 websites to your account with the ability to add another account and monitor more websites.

It does Miss a Few Visitors
Some ad-filtering programs do not allow the JavaScript that Google uses to track visitors so you can not get an accurate amount of people visiting. Also if other people do not allow JavaScript to run on their browser additional visitors can not be tracked. I suggest using statistics like Awstats that are provided with some web hosts. HostGator has this with their low-cost plans.

Don’t forget, there is a contest running to win 400 Entrecard credits with simple entry methods!

If you don’t know what Entrecard is then take a read of this post here.

I am giving away 400 Entrecard credits to a lucky person who enters the competition. Some more credits to add to your account and buy advertising for your blog!

How to Enter
To enter the contest I am running a ticket system, the more things you do the more tickets you earn which equals more chance of winning. There are many ways of winning so take a choice or you can do them all.

1. 1 Ticket - Write a blog review about Thatblogsite. Any length you want, but must contain a link back to Thatblogsite.com.
2. 1 Ticket - Subscribe via RSS (provide link to screenshot) or by email to this blog.
3. 1 Ticket - Leave a comment in this post.
4. 1 Ticket - Write a recommendation on my Entrecard details page.
4. 1 Ticket - Write a link in one of your posts to my competition.
5. 1 Ticket - Drop your Entrecard.

Contest Run-Time
I will be running the contest from today (25/01/2008) until the 10th February 2008. This will give people enough time to enter and for me to advertise the competition properly.

This is my first contest since I have opened Thatblogsite and I will be holding more Entrecard competitions in the future, so make sure you stay subscribed to be notified.

Edit: Increased the prize from 300 credits to 400 credits.

With all this talk about Entrecard I decided to get myself an account and see how things went. Entrecard is an advertising network for bloggers and is an excellent way of gaining traffic especially for new bloggers.

How It Works
After you have submitted your blog which is a very simple process and have your 125×125 card to show others, you’re then ready to start dropping and receiving drops. The whole idea is to drop your card on other websites you have to visit that blog. The same goes for people dropping on your blog, this brings you traffic. Entrecard is entirely free; you gain Entrecard credits for the following:
1. You earn 1 credit every time you drop your card for someone else.
2. You earn 1 credit every time someone else drops their card for you.
3. You earn credits every time someone advertises on your widget.

With the credits you earn you can buy advertising on other blogs that are in the Entrecard network. If you get the chance and a position comes available at e.g. JohnChow.com you can advertise on there for a day for absolutely nothing, just your Entrecard credits!

You can learn more here.

My Experiences
The whole Entrecard dashboard is very easy to use and set out spaciously. It takes a while each day looking through people that have dropped a card on you and then dropping your card on others websites but its quite fun. The traffic that you receive from Entrecard though is very nice, the more you are active, the more you are promoting your blog.

I have only been using Entrecard for a few days but I have received near on as much as traffic from it as I have from other sources.

Drop Your Card
You can drop your card at my blog by simply clicking ‘Drop yours’ on the widget to the right hand side. I will visit your blog.

Competitions all over the Place
Entrecard gives bloggers the chance to help there blog grow not only by the advertising network but by the fact that if you gain large amounts of credits and do not buy advertising you can give them to others. A popular way of doing this is holding a competition for your readers. The winner then receives the set amount of credits you wish to give away and in return you should get a buzz around your blog and more traffic, RSS subscribers. The possibilities are endless.

Lately I have been working hard on my blog, writing blog posts late at night and making sure my website is the way I want it before I log off (to be honest I try to be a perfectionist and I won’t leave until something is the way I want it). I decided to leave a day of blogging and come back to it after a while. I was loosing sleep working on my posts and the next day I did not feel good at all. Sleep is such a simple thing, but Wikipedia does not think so, look at that text.

The Importance of a Break
When blogging it is important to have a break and not post at all for a day or to, you may think this will affect your blogs traffic and RSS Subscribers, but it should not really affect it at all. A break will allow you to think of new ideas for increasing your traffic and RSS subscriber amount. If you loose a reader or two, in the long run you will gain more. Taking a break will allow you to re-charge your batteries, concentrate on something else, complete other work or go for a walk for example.

How will not having a Break affect You and your Blog?
- You will not be able to concentrate whilst writing posts.
- You will make more mistakes than usual.
- You will be continuously writing and not having the chance to look back on what you have done.
- You will feel drained; you will have to get out the caffeine.
- Other ideas will overtake your head when you write and you will be overcome with what to write.

How a Break will help You
- You can order things in your head for when you return as well as write them down for you to start working on.
- The break from blogging you have will generate new ideas and give you plenty to do when you return.
- You can take a reality check and see how things are performing and make the necessary changes.
- You can do something else that needs doing in the time you would usually blog.

You could timestamp posts for the days that you are not going to be blogging but either way you want to do it you will want to take a break to click the refresh button in your head.

Interesting
Some People don’t need Sleep
I can’t believe some people do this, have a look at this page. That would be pure torture if you could not sleep!

Being a new member of Entrecard I decided to enter a few contests and one which I entered was this contest by Blogging4cash. The contest run until Tuesday 22nd January 2008 but I did not think I had a chance in winning as I never usually win anything.

I logged off the Monday night and logged in on the 22nd to find a nice email showing that I had been sent credits, I was like “where did they come from?” and then I checked my personal messages and see that I had received one from Jason at Blogging4cash. I then checked the blog post that confirmed it and to have a link and a mention was great. It certainly helped with some subscribers and traffic, welcome to my blog and I hope you enjoy my content in the future.

I now have some Entrecard credits to try and advertise my blog, or maybe in the future I will hold a contest of my own once I build some credits up so stay tuned.

If you see any contests popping up, or know of any, enter them, you may even have a chance.

Posts Coming Soon
- Review of Entrecard and my experiences.
- How having a break and lack of sleep affect your blogging.
- My Google Analytics review and experiences.
- Series, Setting up your own blog.
- Earn Entrecard credits by writing guest posts.