The most common question I get (well, after “Have you ever heard the MC Hammer song? Really? You have?”) is “Isnt Lijit just a search tool?”

I always reply the same, “No, we are a publisher advocate.”

Which is always greeted with one of three responses: 1) a look of bewilderment; 2) a look of amusement; or 3) a look of agreement.

Perhaps the strangest response I get is: “Why?”

For Lijit, the answer is simple. Because our entire existence is predicated on publishers. Not our business model mind you (although thats part of it) but our core value.

Our belief about publisher widgets is that there are two types: Widgets that exist to make publishers better publishers and seek to develop a true partnership and widgets that provide some value extension to the publisher.

The first type are publisher advocates, they have to improve the entire experience, both for the publisher and the reader.

The second type either is successful only on a high traffic publisher, or only for one consistuency, the publisher or the reader.

Our guiding principle when we add features to Lijit is simple: “Are We Being Publisher Advocates?”

In other words, does this feature make a publisher a better publisher by providing better service or increased engagement to their readers?

This also limits our focus to three areas:

1. Content Discovery / Reader Engagement

By indexing all of a publisher’s social content and trusted sources, Lijit allows content that may have been buried in a general search engine search to bubble to the top. Why? Well, we only index the things that are important to you; general search engines index everything. So, our base value proposition is that a publisher’s readers should find everything that a publisher trusts and wishes to expose.

In addition, when a reader comes from a general search engine, our “Re-Search” box proves additional implicit white-labeled results that tend to have a relatively high click through rate, effectively keeping a reader on the publisher’s site versus clicking the back button to the search engine.

Our stats also provide a variety of information for a publisher including results that returned zero results, providing a clue as to what readers are looking for from the publisher, potentially helping to inspire future posts or articles.

2. Optimization of Monetization

Publisher monetization is a noisy, competitive field, and currently we are loathe to produce a sub-standard ad experience for publishers. We cannot just be Yet Another Google Adsense Clone. We have to be better.

Lijit has to create an experience where publishers are optimizing revenue from an under-monetized section of a publication, namely the search results.

Everyone knows that search can be monetized effectively, but we believe because the results driven through Lijit are more contextual and relevant, the resulting revenue should be higher for the publisher. So, we are spending a lot of time developing an effective user interface and experience. Its hard and takes a long time, and we are close.

Besides search results, there are two immediate things that occur when using Lijit search. Your current social content gets better promotion increasing your overall pageviews, driving additional revenue now.

3. Cross Promotional Traffic

This is really effective if a publisher has multiple blogs or a blog network. With Lijit a publisher can use a high volume publication to help drive traffic horizontally to lower traffic blogs through cross-promotion in the search results. On average, our blog networks find that almost 30% of the results clicked in a search result are to another network blog, rather than the originating publication.

Each of these three functions: Content Discovery/Reader Engagement, Optimization of Monetization and Cross Promotional Traffic are all examples of how we feel that we are being publisher advocates, helping publishers be better publishers and helping them serve their readers.

After all, at Lijit we know one thing to be an absolute truth:

If publishers didnt provide social content or trusted sources, our results pages would be empty.

Here it is, the third day of a three day weekend and (perhaps because it is Monday), I have Lijit on the brain. This holiday weekend has been a good one for us, with new publishers such as Chris Pirillo, Duncan Riley and Dave Zatz (who runs a great TiVo blog. Todd, you can thank us later) giving us a whirl.

Side note: For all you aspiring business development people out there, getting someone to try your stuff is the easy part. Making sure they are happy with the product and feature set is the hard part. We like the hard part at Lijit.

We even got mentioned in a couple of blog posts, with a real comprehensive review from Louis Gray himself.

And, in all the flurry of activity, one line of Louis’ post seemed to sit in my brain:

[...] essentially acting like FriendFeed in reverse, not looking for one site to track my activity, but instead a search point to analyze all my activity around the Web.

One of the hottest spaces online right now is the social aggregator space, with companies like FriendFeed, Socialthing, Profilactic and others taking the lion’s share of the buzz.

Friendfeed, who is the clear leader offers a multitude of ways to slice and dice the aggregated social data from yourself and your friends, including a search function that can drill down by service or relationship (friend or yourself).

But still, its like drinking from a firehose.

I get an RSS feed of the ~150 people’s feeds (plus my own) that I monitor. Even with Twitter “hidden,” I still get an average of 500 updates to that RSS feed daily.

Frankly, a firehose of data.

And I love it. I am a consumer of data. Robert Scoble (another Lijit user) is THE example of a person that can drink from a firehose of data and pull out the pieces that are inherently interesting, not only to him, but to others as well.

Which brings us to Louis’ comment.

What if instead of passively looking for information (which is what watching FriendFeed is really doing), I want to know everything that one person (and his trusted sources) has written about a topic? Enter Lijit.

Lijit is a social aggregator like FriendFeed and the rest, we just dont open that data to the end user. Rather, we say, “Know someone you trust? Come to them with a search query, and we will find everything they and their trusted sources have blogged, photographed, videoed, or said about the topic and return only those results to you.”

In essence, what Lijit does is drink from the firehose for you, and return just a glass of your favorite information to you. (Yes, with no backwash.)

Want an example? OK, here we go…

I want to know about Link Baiting. I know Micah (being that I am Micah) was a pretty good SEO back in the day, so I go to LearnToDuck (my favorite blog of course) and using Lijit, do a search for “link baiting.”

Turns out that I havent written much about linkbaiting, only one article which is really not that interesting, so I click on the My Network tab…and what do I find? Gobs of results from people Micah trusts:

And for comparison, here is the same search done in FriendFeed:

At the end of the day, FriendFeed is a wonderful tool that I use daily.  I find it feature full and informative, especially when I want to understand what is going on right now.

But, when I want to see the photos that Robert took on his last trip to Yosemite, or that one YouTube video Chris made a few weeks back, or posts from people that Micah trusts around linkbaiting, Lijit is really the best utility out there.

The punchline? Well, it depends on what you are attempting to do, but my general rule is:

When I want to drink from the social media fire hose RIGHT NOW, FriendFeed is where it is at; and when I want to sip [find relevant data] from the social media fire hose, I find Lijit is the right utility for the job.

And, yes, I cant wait until we launch FriendFeed support (coming soon!) so you can get the best of both worlds…

Jay is one of those Lijit publishers that has been with us from the beginning. With each new blog he starts, he installs our search application and continues to amuse us with his variety of antics. Besides his personal blog, Jay also writes about Denver’s finest dive bars on The BarDiver and about the worst that Netflix has to offer on Flix Flops. (Our own Derek Greentree helps Jay with the movie reviews occasionally.)

Jay was kind enough to answer a few questions and shed some light on his motivation for blogging. Enjoy getting to know Jay, better known to his Twitter posse as Skabber.

How long have you been blogging and what got you started?

I just looked back and found a post from October 24th, 2002. Before then I had a “personal web page” but I don’t think it was considered a blog. I started to blog because I got this new phone called a Sidekick that could send email and attach pictures. I thought it would be fun to write a script that would catch emails sent from the phone and post them to the web.

What is the greatest thing you’ve gotten from blogging?

Meeting people who have read my posts. It’s rare, but on a few occasions I have met someone and had them say, “Oh, I know you. I’ve read your post about…” It’s always shocking when I find out that there are really people out there who have read my posts.

What’s your favorite post ever?

This is really hard to answer. Aren’t posts like your children and you’re not supposed to play favorites?

I just finished a post about my experience building a fixed gear bicycle out of an old 10 speed. It was fun to be working on a tangible thing and be able to write about it. Most of my blog posts are about programming or software, so this was a new experience for me.

And since we’re not playing favorites, can I choose another? This was a post I wrote about an idea I had for the Django web framework. It got a great response and in less than a month was officially part of the project.

You’ve established an entire site devoted to Denver’s dive bars and the people who frequent them. What’s your favorite dive bar?

OK, so maybe we are playing favorites. This question is one of the reasons I created BarDiver.com. I wanted people to be able to let others know about their favorite bars and discover new ones. My favorite bar is The Whiskey Bar, a great corner bar 2 blocks from where I live. They have lots of whiskey, friendly bartenders, a relaxed atmosphere and a great location (for me). You can see the other bars I visited here.

How has Lijit helped you as a blog publisher?

I love the Lijit search wijit. It is so much better than using the default search feature that comes with most blogging platforms. It allows people to not only search for posts on one blog but through all of the content I have posted on all the other social sites that I use. Plus, as someone who has written my own blog software in the past, it saves me the trouble of coding the search feature. Another favorite of mine is the Re-Search feature. It’s so cool that people can come to my blog from a Google search and see a list of other posts relevant to what they searched.

We appreciate Jay’s support and the fact that he is our first drinking widget. Perhaps, after seeing pictures of Jay, you’re thinking that he seems awfully familiar. Well, if you’ve ever flipped through a SkyMall on a flight, then chances are you have seen Jay before. He is none other than the famous Slanket model extraordinaire. So, if you’ve ever been tempted to purchase a hands-free blanket while at 35,000 feet, remember to thank Jay for making it look so good.

A big part of what I love about working for Lijit is the tech startup community that we belong to here in Boulder. I may joke about having our investors in the same building, but it’s amazing how much support we receive from everyone in the area. Case in point: Kary and Gerhard Rivera

I met Kary at a local women in tech meetup and her husband at the second Boulder Startup Weekend. Besides just being awesome people, the two of them have teamed up to start their own venture, Fling it Girl, which is a cool way of sharing online finds. They understand the value of the Lijit search application and it was one of the first things they installed on their new blog.

After our meeting, I made sure to get them outfitted in Lijit shirts so that they could help out with our evangelism efforts. Seeing this picture made my heart flutter in appreciation. (Now that we have a Rockies picture and a Broncos picture, I’m wondering who’s going to step up and provide us with our next sporting Lijit shot.)

Big thanks to the Riveras for their support. With a community like we have here in the Silicon Mountain, it’s exciting to think just what they might accomplish with Fling it Girl.

[Full disclosure: I'm helping the Riveras out as a beta girl, testing their new site and providing feedback.]

In January, Orli Yakuel, one of the authors of the Go2Web2.0 blog wrote a post about the value she sees in Lijit. As someone who checks out a lot of web apps, Orli’s opinion and feedback meant a lot. I thought it might be interesting to hear more about her thoughts on blogging and what she’s learned from her experiences online. Fortunately, Orli was game enough to answer a few questions and I’m proud to put the spotlight on one of our Lijit publishers.

• How long have you been blogging and what made you start?

I’ve been blogging for 2 years now. When I first started my blog, I didn’t know if I was going to keep blogging but somehow, I did. I was always good with discovering interesting links and offering them to my friends, but I didn’t think I was good at explaining about those link’s essence. Well, I guess like in any other issue in life, practice made perfect…

My first blog post wasn’t actually a text post. It was a post with bunch of Web 2.0 services on it. My dream at that time was to create a web page that gathers all those wonderful Web 2.0 applications, but I didn’t have the skills to make such a page, so I added them onto one post. But I was lucky to have a friend (Eyal Shahar) that took my dream and made it fly, and now both of us are the co-founders of a pretty successful Web 2.0 directory. So basically, I can say that my dream to have a site made me start a blog. I was also inspired by TechCrunch blog, and since Mike is a good friend, he was very supportive and gave me the strength to carry on with blogging.

• What’s the greatest thing you’ve received from blogging?

The answer for that would have to be: exposure and recognition. If it wasn’t for my blog and site, there are lots of things I couldn’t imagine in my life that I am able to do. My entire life has been turned upside down from this blogging experience, and I’m very thankful for that. But I really have to say that I didn’t expect this, and for me, I’m still just a girl that likes to explore the Web and to get the word out to everyone who doesn’t have the time, or desire, to do that themselves.

• Of all the posts you’ve written, what has been your favorite?

That’s a tough question. OK, I can think of two right now:

The announcement on the launch of Go2web20 Directory
The post about web-based tools that you don’t need to sign-up for I REALLY worked hard on this one

• You write about Web 2.0 apps and services. What’s your favorite and/or the one you get the most use out of?

Since I really test lots of services, this list of favorites is changing every day. However, I do have some services that I’m currently using on a daily basis:

Google Docs - I can honestly say that I don’t use WORD or any other office software since I’ve started to use them.

Facebook - I guess I don’t need to explain why.

Twitter - Because if friends following you, it must be because you have something interesting to say. So for me, it’s one of the most real places on the web today.

Flickr - Using the service since May 2005, I think it will be very hard to move me from there (even if they close).

Blogger - What can I say, with all the problems that I had with this blogging platform, I stayed.

Bloglines - Because you need for at least one RSS reader…

Del.icio.us - My main search engine.

And these are only few from many that I’ve chosen to list.

• How has Lijit helped you as a blog publisher?

The reason I replaced the Google search engine with Lijit was the social results it gave while searching. I just love the way it not only searches my blog, it also searches my community as well. In this case, it is almost certain that people who search will get an answer to their need. Moreover, the stats that Lijit gives helps me to see what people are really interested in reading. Bottom-line, Lijit simply provides added value to bloggers.

Big thanks for Orli for her time, support and for understanding the value of Lijit. If you’re interested in finding out more about anything Web 2.0, make sure to check out her blog to get the full scoop!

One of our publishers took a trip and was kind enough to bring us along. Here is Calamity Jen strolling around the International Market Place in Honolulu. It helps us all to sleep at night knowing that someone is doing the hard job of evangelizing in Hawaii when our CEO isn’t there.

On April 1st (no foolin’), Lijit celebrated a milestone around our office. We hit a million page views that day and couldn’t wait to share our success with the rest of the Boulder startup community. At our CEO’s insistence, an impromptu party was thrown together to fully commemorate the event. Tweets went out and at the appointed time, we had about 20 people gathered in our office to help us with all the extra alcohol that we had sitting around the kitchen.

We marked the occasion with a shot and it was decided that when we hit 2 million, there will be two shots. Yikes. After the fact, we realized that it was also a very informal office warming, since we never actually had one of those. (You can see a video of the office tour that Todd gave to Colorado Startups here.) It was a fun time and good chance to say thanks to the folks that have helped us along the way.

And a big thanks go out to one of our newest Lijit publishers and the bearer of delicious tidings…Cupcakes Take The Cake. Besides posting pictures of amazing cupcakes, they also have a directory of where to buy cupcakes all over the country. You won’t find too many recipes, but I don’t find that problematic because sometimes, you just want to look at a cupcake. (Tends to be the lower calorie option as well…) We are excited to be helping out cupcake aficionados everywhere by providing a valuable search tool that serves up relevant and tasty results. Check out their blog for immediate help with sweet tooth cravings!

(This post was crossposted at I Quit for Lijit.)

The BlogHer Business conference consisted of information, smart women and lots of discussion surrounding marketing to bloggers. One of the (many) multi-talented people I met at the conference was Nichelle Stephens. We first started talking at the sk*rt meetup and then continued our conversation over the course of the next two days.

Besides being wicked smart, Nichelle is also busy. She maintains three blogs and is involved in many projects. In her spare time (??), she hosts a stand-up comedy show and offered to represent me if I should ever decide to schedule an East Coast tour. A mere eight hours after we finished talking, she had installed the Lijit wijit on two of her three blogs. (I told you she was smart!)

The first is Keeping Nickels, a blog about business, accounting and finance.With tax tips, business ideas and fun suggestions to improve your productivity, this blog is chock full o’ knowledge.

The second blog that Nichelle maintains is Ladies Who Launch. As the name suggests, this blog “provides content and community to help women start and expand their businesses and creative ventures”. Full of information for and about female entrepreneurs, you can’t help but be inspired after reading it. (Nichelle was very excited that Lijit came in pink!)

The third blog that Nichelle helps with is one of my favorites, Cupcakes Take The Cake. While she hasn’t installed Lijit on that one yet, once she does, you know I’ll be doing an indepth post about it. I mean, considering my ongoing love affair, could there be anything better than a Lijit cupcake blog?