The Economics of Dropping cards, Or Why Entrecard can be a Waste of Time and Money
Posted by
eli
on 6/11/10• Categorized as Consulting
Since I left Entrecard on February 10, 2010, I still receive e-mails from some blogpals who are EC users, asking when I would be coming back, or if I’m still planning to return to EC. 
But I feel that Entrecard, that free advertising / networking site for “40,000” blogs and websites using a virtual currency called entrecredits (EC), could be a waste of time and money in exchange for untargeted traffic.
Everyday thousands of EC members (users) drop cards by visiting a maximum of 300 blogs and sites to generate EC to be used to advertise on some other blogs.
Entrecard users have been told that dropping cards daily helps increase their web presence and accumulate EC credits to buy more ads, thus growing their web traffic.
That’s true enough, but at what cost? I know for a fact that members who drop 150-300 cards daily spend at least 1 hour to 2 hours everyday, depending on internet connection speed.
However, in economics, time has alternative productive uses. You use your time doing one thing, like dropping Entrecards and you forego doing other things, like selling, reading, marketing, adding content to your blog, earning a living or even making love.
So, let’s assume your time costs $ 50 an hour and that you spend a total of 2 hours daily dropping cards. That’s $ 100 a day or $ 700 a week, or $ 2,800 a month. That’s the cost of dropping cards to you, which you could use in doing other productive or income generating activities.
You really must calculate the amount of time and its value to your dropping Entrecards to gain visitor to your blog. Does your blog gives you $ 2,800 a month in income?
If your dropping Entrecards daily does not earn for you sufficient income, then you’re wasting time and losing money by it. For many EC users, dropping cards is actually robbing them of their precious hours, but they are not aware of this because they are not looking at it from the economics point of view.
True, as Entrecard claims, “every members (sic) in the Entrecard network has seen huge increases in traffic according to Alexa.com”, but having high rating (lower is better) in Alexa is useless if your visitors from Entrecard do not read your content other look for that yellow widget with the “Drop” button.
It is a fact that many EC users who visit your blog are there just to drop on your EC widget, then bounce away, hence, the drop and run traffic resulting to high bounce rate.
If you are dropping Entrecards to gain traffic, but have not calculated and valued the time that you spend for it, you could be wasting your time, money and effort.
Is Entrecard’s untargeted traffic with its attendant high bounce rate worth your valuable time? My own answer is No, the reason why I am not coming back to Entrecard, now or ever.
Whilst your calculations may be true in some cases, I doubt they’re true for quite a few others.
For example, I usually drop at work (sssh! Don’t tell them!), and don’t really have anything important to do then. (Lol, what does that say about my work ethic? hahaha Okay,it’s usually at lunch time.) Basically my time ‘Opportunity cost’ is pretty much zero. I’d likely only have been playing a game or randomly browsing anyway.
Also I don’t spend anywhere near an hour dropping! Admittedly, I don’t drop 300 a day, but usually from 70-130 (so about 100 on average). This, alongside my Adgitize clicking, only takes a max of about 20mins, and that’s with China connections. Of course, this is when I’m in a hurry. I do enjoy reading (and commenting on) blogs along the way, but is that wasting time? (Okay, perhaps you could say it is, but that’s a whole other argument! lol)
Finally the bounce thing. Well, can’t really argue with you there, but bounce is measured, so I’m given to understand, on the number of visitors that only look at one page. Hence, on a blog, most people* are going to be ‘bouncers’ whichever way they arrive.
Come to that, you’re still with Adgitize, and that, in terms of bounce, probably works exactly like Entrecard.
Whilst I do believe there will be a time where I stop dropping daily, I still think EC, along with Adgitize, is a valid way to drive traffic to my blog.
Luckily I still visit yours without it!
*Of course, you can do as you and many others do, and have to click to read the whole article, which is one cunning trick I suppose.
absolutely agree with you. I left and wouldnot be coming back as well. Not to mention that they still owe me $20… LOL!
You have unarguable points here hence what you have written is based on a personal experience and knowledge of economics. But in spite of every thing you mentioned I believe that there should be a balance to it.
I still drop 300 but not the same as before that I would dare not miss a day. Well if something is more important then I sacrifice my EC dropping. Aside from the traffic it generates to your blog, one reason why I have not left Entrecard yet is that it is where I found great blogs (like yours). It is the first avenue where I gained supportive blogging pals, regular readers and avid commenters. I have placed all the links of the special blogs on my Recommended section in my sidebar so I won’t miss visiting them everyday as time permits and your blog is one of them. There are still some nice blogs out there in EC that are yet to be discovered.
I’m beginning to explore other blogging networks and I have created my recent series about blogging communities. I know perhaps one day I would leave Entrecard but not for now.
Thanks a lot for accommodating this lengthy comment and just to remind you I am always here everyday at Business Sphere.
God bless and have a great weekend to you and your family!
That is good information from everyone. I have been trying to decide to leave EC or not. Are there other places to get traffic to our blogs??? Of I should say, places that will bring the traffic and not the bounce. I have also heard lots of people say that they get virus’s off of EC. I usually only visit the sites that I know.
Have a great week end.
From an economist’s point of view, you were able to vividly get your points across, Atty. As the cliche goes: TIME IS GOLD and a man who dares to waste one hour of life has not discovered the value of life (Charles Darwin).
In September 26,2009, I have published an article entitled Some of the Reasons Why More and More People are Leaving Entrecard.
It’s here:
http://www.lainyonline.com/entrecard/republished-some-of-the-reasons-why-more-and-more-people-are-leaving-entrecard
In the aforesaid article, I mentioned I used to drop 1, 200 cards/ day for my 4 blogs without fail. Having recalled that, I do not know how I was able to manage it and how much time and money I’ve wasted from your calculations in this post
Honestly speaking, EC got me hooked up, LOL! Doing my daily dropping chores can be very addictive. And yes, I am sometimes guilty of doing the drop-and-run phenomena. However, it is through Entrecard that I have developed quite a handful of beautiful relationships amongst its members. These beautiful people is the main reason why I am still here and for a while longer I will be.
Marcia Wieder once said and I quote:
“When we are doing what we love, we don’t care about time. For at least at that moment, time doesn’t exist and we are truly free. “
I totally agree. That’s why even though I never totally left EC, I just remain as a passive member. I was a “drop addict” too I remember and there came a time dropping was more important than posting relevant content. That’s the past now, I post relevant content on my blogs everyday rather than “drop”.
BTW, adgitize seems to be better than EC. ~_^
Entrecard is a waste of time. The only use I can find useful for that system is the possibility to get some back links from bloggers.
Once a website start reaching a certain amount of organic (SE) visitors per day, the webmaster removes the Entrecard ad so the main purpose of the widget lose its purpose. In conclusion is a real waste of money.
Hi, this is Source Blogger. I have been with Entrecard for some time with a number of different blogs.
My impression of Entrecard is that it is not meant for “mature” blogs.
When you are new to the system, you receive the initial exposure to the Entrecard community – which is great… Upon new Entrecard users discovering your blog, they will either subscribe, comment, advertise… or in most cases… nothing but drop and run.
I have never dropped 300 times in a single day. I think the most I ever dropped was 120. And as far as Widget placement, I keep the widget at the footer – far from the fold!
If you are receiving the same number of reciprocal drops, that would be one thing, but if you are dropping 300 times only to receive about 1/2 or a 1/3 of the percentage of your drops as returned visits by other Entrecard participants, then it becomes even more of a waste of your time, doesn’t it?
Your reply would be that you have EC credits for advertising, but, as you know, the click-throughs from advertising on someone’s EC widget can be non-existent. So, you could say you are dropping for…. NOTHING! Think about it.
The same dropper visiting your site 10-30 times a month… would they continue to return if you were not involved in the Entrecard program? If not, what is the point…really?
My goal is to “favorite” blogs targeted close to my niche category, who receive a lot of traffic outside of Entrecard, Adgitize, and CMF Ads, have a low Alexa Rank (low is ideal here – meaning lower the number) and a high Google Page Rank. These blogs require less EC credits to advertise on, since they are not as popular on Entrecard, yet, if I can advertise on there 4-7x times a month without really spending a dime out of pocket, I have won. I do just enough to keep enough EC credits for advertising on these blogs as their site comes available again.
Since I migrated from Blogger as source-blogger.com to WordPress as sourceblogger.com (yes, the dash missing makes a big difference!), I decided that I would stay with Entrecard for about 3-4 months until My site was receiving more search engine traffic.
What do you think?
Source Blogger
“Determined to make you a better blogger!”
(Source Blogger is listed in the “Blogging Resources” section of Entrecard.)
Entrecard has been a great way to generate some traffic onto my site. Although it is not alot, it is still traffic. When I’ve got some free time on my hands, I usually just drop a few cards here and there. Basically, dropping cards can be done in a way where it is convenient to you.
I can’t win! My traffic is up, Alexa ranking way up, PR holding steady for now at “4″ – but the BOUNCE rate is off the map! I wish I had read your post sooner!
http://dave-lucas.blogspot.com/2010/07/blog-bounce-rate-blues.html
I used to drop about 50-100 a day for two different sites.
Now I just leave the entrecard on my sites and if I get 10 minutes I’ll drop a few using the firefox toolbar.
for me, entrecard serves its purpose of driving traffic to your blog, in fact i consider it very effective. to make the traffic count, depends on your blog. the blog must be interesting and informative, may it be by design or content. neat well designed layout and catchy titles may make the visitor to stay longer and read the articles.