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Launch of the Lijit Stats iPad Application
Oct 13th
by Todd Vernon in Community, Company, Lijit publishers, release announcements
This week we are launching version 1 of Lijit Stats iPad application for publishers. In the coming weeks the iPhone and iPod versions will launch (the code isn’t quite done yet) with similar functionality.
I got the idea for this several months back when we were talking with some of the early adopters of the Lijit Ad Platform. A good number of publishers using Lijit to monetize their site are one man shows. They spend most of their time writing or curating great content for their site. It’s their full time job and they are keenly aware that when they stop, so does their livelihood. One publisher I spoke with mentioned that he was often concerned when he left his house for extended periods of time that he was losing situational awareness of what was happening with his traffic. For instance, one time one of his posts was featured on the front page of Yahoo. While this should have been a great event for him, it was bad because he didn’t know it and his site ended up crashing without his knowledge.
Another individual told me that it was a matter of knowing what was trending so he could take advantage of it. For instance, when he starts getting a large number of referring pageviews for an older post, that usually means that subject is hot in the news again. He would like the opportunity to re-address the subject to capture those readers.
All these comments resonated with me. We had a full development queue so I decided to pull the CEO/founder card and light this project up as a skunkworks project. As these things go, it grew to a roar of development in the last week trying to get it done for BlogWorld this weekend in Las Vegas. Thanks to our committed development team and the promise of the 12 pack of Bud for its safe delivery we got our final build done this last Friday and submitted it to the App Store Sunday. Our previous build was from a week earlier so we are in a dead heat to see if the latest gets released by Apple before this Friday!
As Chief Beta tester I used the app all weekend to track the traffic on my blog. My blog is pretty small but receives a fairly constant stream of pageviews around the clock. This summer I saw several stops on the RUSH Time Machine Tour which I have documented on my blog. All summer I have watched my Lijit stats tell me that my main referral is from Google for “rush time machine tour”. As the weeks passed by I watched my traffic shift from city to city as the tour progressed through the US.
This weekend as I watched my real-time stats on the iPad I started to see an increasing number of pageviews coming from locations in San Paulo and Rio De Janeiro Brazil, the tour’s final stops. This weekend is the last show of the tour in Buenos Aires, Argentina and now I have started to see page views from there as well.
Another cool feature of the Lijit Stats iPad Application is the integration of automatic IceRocket queries for my blog URL. One of the reasons I receive so many hits for RUSH is due to my mention in another more heavily trafficked site, RushIsABand, that linked to me after the opening night in Albuquerque, NM. The ticker along the bottom of the app shows the last chronological mentions of my site.
While my use case for the Lijit Stats iPad Application is certainly less mission critical than our devoted publisher base, it’s awfully fun to watch readers hit my site in real-time. I am super excited by the way this turned out and I think it makes a great platform to build on as we add more situational awareness to the world of publishing.
Give it a try with your Lijit account, it’s free in the App Store and super cool. If you are at BlogWorld this weekend, stop by the booth (#324) and register to win an iPad – we are giving one away each day. Get a demo and if we are lucky we will have the beta iPhone and iPod versions to see there as well.
Tags: Lijit publishers, lijit stats, publishers, release announcements | View Comments
Here at Lijit we get asked all the time whether we have a referral program that rewards our publishers for helping us grow the Lijit Network. Well, we finally have one and we would love to tell you more about it!
In a nutshell, the Lijit referral program provides monetary compensation, marketing support, cool Lijit schwag and other incentives for letting us tap into your network of peers. You’ve already seen the benefits of Lijit’s free site search and content discovery tools so why not get paid for spreading the word?
Publishers interested in the program should contact their Lijit Publisher Services Manager or Sonya Caprio, Director of Marketing: sonya@lijit.com. We look forward to hearing from you soon.
Tags: Lijit publishers | View Comments
Congratulations to Best Blogs of 2010 via TIME
Aug 30th
by Grace Boyle in Community, Lijit publishers
We love bloggers. We love bloggers and our publishers even more.
Recently, TIME release Best Blogs of 2010 and we want to highlight and congratulate every blogger on the list, as well as the Lijit publishers who made the list, as well.
BEST BLOGS:
- Cake Wrecks: When professional cakes go horribly, hilariously wrong.
- Everything Everywhere: Around the world travel blog
FailBlog made the list (as an Overrated Blog) – but we collectively and strongly disagree. FailBlog is one of our favorite sites – they receive a daily visit from everyone in the Lijit office. You can always guarantee a laugh and the best part is that it’s all real – maybe it makes us feel better? Either way, we’re giving FailBlog a Best Blogs of 2010 list, right at the top. They’re worth featuring, without a doubt.
You can read the rest of the list here.
Congratulations and high-fives to all the winners!
The 3 R’s : Recurring Payments, Real Time Status, and Referrers
Jul 16th
by Daniel Weiss in Company, Lijit publishers, features, release announcements
We just finished rolling out yet another software release packed with new features . This release has new functionality and improvements to just about every aspect of the Lijit product. There are advertising account updates, search result updates, new stats, and much more.
Automated Recurring Payments
Let’s start with Automated Recurring Payments. If you haven’t checked out Lijit Ad services yet, you should. This new feature makes it even easier for you to get the money you earn by placing Lijit display ads on your site. Instead of requesting a payment each month for your outstanding revenue, you can now provide us with your payment details and we’ll automatically pay you at the end of the following month. If you happen to forget to update your payment information, we’ll send you a friendly reminder.
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Lijit Is Sponsoring the SavvyBlogging Summit
Jul 8th
by Grace Boyle in Community, Lijit publishers, events
We love to connect with our publishers which is why we find conferences, meetups and events so gratifying to meet face-to-face with bloggers and Lijit publishers.
This weekend Doni, Perry and I will be attending and presenting for Lijit as one of the sponsored partners for the 2010 SavvyBlogging Summit in Breckenridge, Colorado.
I never cease to be amazed at what Lijit publishers have accomplished and how cool they seem to be. Take, for instance, today’s profile about Lisa Lubin. She’s a three-time Emmy-award-winning Television writer/producer/editor. But that was before she decided to take a sabbatical to travel and work her way around the world. Lucky for us, she has written about the (mis)adventures that ensued as she traipsed around the globe on her blog, LL World Tour.
In addition to sharing stories from her time abroad, Lisa also posts about subjects closer to home like her love for Chicago and thoughts about her hometown in Jersey, along with tips for those women traveling solo and best practices for booking airline flights.
How long have you been blogging and what made you start?
I have been blogging since the summer of 2006. I had decided to quit my job, chuck all my stuff, and travel around the world for a year (which later turned into 2 1/2 years). I was going to simply send ‘email updates’ to friends and family. But a good friend of mine who worked in the crazy interweb world at what was once a small startup in Chicago called Feedburner (now owned by Google), convinced me to start a blog…and off I went into the blogosphere cringing at the awful name every time.
What has been the greatest thing you’ve received from blogging about your travels?
It truly has been amazing. I have ‘met’ so many new friends this way–some that were also traveling and others that were just living vicariously through my adventures. I truly loved helping inspire others and the feedback I received from total strangers was heartwarming.
In your world tours, what has been your top three destinations and why?
This is always a hard question to answer as what I love about traveling is the interaction with people all over the world and I was lucky enough to meet some damn fine people. But besides that, my favorite places were as follows:
- Berlin–hands down, a cool, progressive city of now. It’s a young city and Berliners are open and artistic. They look back and acknowledge their history, but at the same time are racing into the future. It’s an edgy city with great architecture and art pushing boundaries everywhere you look. I’d live there in a second and you’d find me at a cafe, drinking a beer in Prenzlauer Berg.
- The Galapagos Islands–Stunning. This was definitely a once in a lifetime place. Each island you visit is different and unique with its own landscape and flora and fauna. The animal life is amazing and with no predators, they simply could care less that you are walking right up to them. I loved my days there of learning, snorkeling, and drifting around at sea without a care in the world.
- Turkey–I went there on the recommendation of many saying it was their favorite country. I planned to stay two weeks. I stayed three months. The people are universally warm and generous. So many took me in and in a few weeks I was giving private business English lessons, cat sitting at a great flat near Taksim (the center of all nightlife/restaurants), and had a mobile phone with twenty new friends in Istanbul that I hadn’t even known just a few weeks prior. Besides that…the country has an amazingly diverse landscape-from the beaches of the Aegean and Mediterranean to the jaw-dropping ancient Roman ruins to the mountains, lakes and of course, tasty food-it’s a wonderful place.
What has been the greatest challenge you’ve encountered in your journeys?
The greatest challenge? Probably making time to ‘work’ and keep my blog updated. I tried to dedicate days to just hanging out and working wherever I was, but sometimes it was hard to spend the day on my laptop.
How has Lijit helped you to become a better blogger?
I have just started using Lijit (as recommended by that same cool friend who got me blogging in the first place) and am feeling my way around it. The wijit was easy to install on my sidebar and allowed me to remove a clunky section I’d put together of ‘where to find me on the web’ as Lijit already had this as part of their widget.
In addition to being recognized for her travel blog in various places online (like being a finalist in the 2008 Weblog Awards), her articles and photographs have been published by Sunset Magazine, The Boston Globe, Go Nomad and The Savvy Gal among others. She’s lectured on traveling solo and will be teaming up with Whole Foods, REI and Hostelling International for ‘Travel and Food’ seminars this summer. Keep an eye out for Lisa because if you have any questions about traveling, chances are she has your answers.
I love indulging my wanderlust by reading Lisa’s blog and am honored that she’s chosen Lijit as her blog search tool of choice. Thanks for taking the time to answer our questions Lisa and for inspiring us all with your adventures!
There are four kinds of people that work here at Lijit*: those that race cars, those that run, those that bike, and those that do other things**. I’m of the opinion that bikers make up the second largest majority around the office, being slightly beaten out by the overall geek population. When I got word that there were a couple of self-proclaimed geeks that were riding their bicycles across the US to raise awareness about bike-commuting, I knew they had to be Lijit.
Meet Carlos and Joe, the two geeks behind Real Geeks Ride. They started their cross-country cycling adventure on May 20th and are chronicling their journey via blog, tweets and pictures. We’re honored that they’ve chosen to use Lijit on the official RGR blog but reading about their travels just wasn’t enough. After a few emails (and one phone call he took from the side of the road in Nebraska with big trucks whizzing by), Carlos was happy to answer a few questions for us.
How long have you been blogging and what made you start?
I have been in the blogging world on and off for the past few years. It tends to be event/travel oriented, rather than opinion or news based. I started blogging in high school but dropped it when interest was lost. I picked it up again when I traveled around the world with a ‘worldly singing and dancing group’ to keep my parents and friends up to date.
What has been the greatest thing you’ve received from blogging?
During this bike ride, blogging has given both Joe and I hundreds of people looking out for our safety and health. They ask about us and offer suggestions when we write about our health issues. Knowing that we have moms across the country expecting our safety is uplifting.
What has suprised you on your cross-country bike trip and why?
It is most surprising how different each state reacts to cyclists on the road. We are currently in Nebraska and receive a wave from every other car (not exaggerating). Our experience here is that people give ample room when passing, and are willing to help at any moment. This differs greatly from our experience in Iowa, where we were screamed at, almost hit a few times, and given the finger more times than waves.
What has been the biggest challenge you guys have encountered on your trip so far?
The biggest challenge has been keeping up with the blog. After biking 100+ miles and arriving at our destination at 8 pm, the last thing we want to do is edit photos and write about the past few hours. However, we gain so much push to do ‘work’ when people send us messages of inspiration. It has been the hundreds of messages we have received that allow us to overcome not wanting to post.
How has Lijit helped you to become a better blogger?
Lijit has allowed me to become a better blogger by making it easy to search for people doing similar things. The more I read within a certain field, the more it gives me the ability to see the different writing styles of that field.
If you’re interested, you can follow along with Carlos and Joe on their blog, on Twitter or through their Flickr pics.
Additionally, if you’re in the Denver/Boulder area, you’re invited to meet the guys this Friday, July 3rd, as they make a stop in Boulder. We’ll be meeting up at the Boulder Draft House, from 4-6 pm, to enjoy some happy hour beers with the guys. (Look for us in the back room!) Ride your bike, stop in, and let us show Carlos and Joe just how much we love our bikes around here.
*A very sweeping overgeneralization, of course.
**Other things include: rugby, hiking, parenting, photography, playing video games & tweeting.
Tags: bicycles, community events, Lijit publishers | View Comments
I first met Jason when he had installed our widget on his blog…four times. We always appreciate enthusiasm like that, but one widget is normally enough. Turns out he was having problems with his advanced Typepad template and we grew to be close through many tech support emails. Imagine my surprise when, just a week after we had solved his problem, he sent me an email saying he was going to be in Boulder for business.
Since we have an “open-door” policy around Lijit, I told him to stop by…
and he did! We spoke for a half-hour and it reminded me, once again, just how spectacular it is to meet our publishers in person. Jason was incredibly energetic, full of questions, and loved the idea of Lijit. In my opinion, this makes him an ideal candidate for a Publisher Spotlight profile.
Jason is a productivity consultant and does a lot of work in helping people to be more efficient and effective in their work. Not to mention he’s an incredible triathlete and really nice guy. Let’s find out more about Jason’s thoughts on blogging…
How long have you been blogging and what made you start?
In early 2002, I had lunch with Robert Scoble in Seattle, Washington, and he suggested I “just get started.” In fact, his advice fit hand-in-hand with my own coaching philosophy…Get Started.
My current blog is titled “Your Best Just Got Better”, Jason Womack Blog, and has been “in action” since March of 2004.
What has been the greatest thing you’ve received from blogging?
As an executive coach and triathlete, I dedicate my life to performance, in both theory and action. To perform means: To carry out, bring about, accomplish or achieve. Blogging serves at least two purposes for me as a consultant and practitioner of this methodology:
1) Writing about what I learn about, my experiments and the results gives me the opportunity to slow down and reflect on the lessons I experience on an “almost” daily basis.
2) Recording those lessons in a blog gives me a reviewable “resource” to demonstrate my growth over time.
I am a “fortunate blogger” in that I have a few people who read what I write, and I’ve made more than one group of friends around the world because of the community we’ve been able to build via online, on phone, and in person meetings. Here’s an example: A group of us put together the “bloggers’ bike ride” several years ago. (You can read about it here.)
Of all the posts you’ve written, what has been your favorite and why?
Over the years, I don’t know if there is a “favorite” post, but I tend to spend most of my time contributing to two categories: Perform (at work) and Competing.
Both of these sections collect my thoughts and suggestions on the “time management” problem we all face: Too much to do (well) and not enough time to do it (at our best.) My job-really, my life-is to research practice and share the world’s best and most sustainable answers to questions like: “How can I be effective at work?”
With so many things available to distract us, can you share some of your tips for being the most effective while at work?
For some answers, visit the blog! One idea to get you started is: For the next 5 days, separate EVERYthing you get into one of two buckets/folders/stacks on your desk/in your email/within your notebook.
1) Action materials/action reminders: Everything that when you see it you think, “I have to DO something about that.”
2) Reference materials: ANYthing you see and think, “I might need this later on.”
How has Lijit helped you to become a better blog publisher?
I’m a Lijit fan and continue to talk about them in our seminars because:
1) They care. While working in Boulder, I was invited to “stop by”, and I got a tour of the office as well as a tutorial on how to best use their service.
2) They are there. Now, when I go to my blog I can search (and find) something I know I wrote about.
3) They are there (part II). While I’m on the phone with a client, I can ask THEM to go to the blog, do a search, and find what it is they’re looking for, or what I want them to see.
4) They get it. These days, its not just about capturing information; it’s about pulling the information BACK that is in there “somewhere.” This is a reason I recommend all bloggers at least “experiment” with Lijit.
As a blog publisher, knowing that Lijit is there by my side, I am really thinking through my blog posts, asking myself, “Would this come up in the way I would like it to if someone searched my blog for one of these terms?”
Thank you to the Lijit “family” for doing all you do to keep us moving forward.
You’re welcome, Jason. 
Thank you for your support. And if anyone out there needs help accomplishing more, be sure to check out Jason’s blog and follow him on Twitter for even more helpful information about how to make your best even better.
Tags: Lijit publishers, productivity, publisher spotlight | View Comments
Part of my job is to check out the bloggers who sign up for Lijit every day. This is always one of the best times of my workday because I get to see such an interesting cross-section of what people are blogging about and how they go about conveying their passion to others. Of course, when I see a URL that pops out at me, I become even more intrigued. This was the case with PJ. His blog is called Real Men Drive Minivans and he’s a proud daddyblogger. (Hey, if real men can eat quiche and wear pink, I’m pretty sure they can drive minivans and use their kids as blog content…)
In addition to blogging about his son, PJ shares a Wordless Wednesday series and writes extensively about his adventures in the kitchen. I reached out to PJ and asked if he would be kind enough to answer some questions for this profile. Read on to find out what real men think of blogging…
How long have you been blogging and what made you start?
I’ve been blogging since January 2008 with an NFL football blog, but kind of dropped the ball on it shortly after my son was born a few months later. For a number of reasons, I didn’t attempt to revive that site, but rather launched my current blog, Real Men Drive Minivans, as a creative outlet while being a stay-at-home dad. Initially I wanted to get into blogging to learn more about web 2.0 and social networking, and now I’m using it as a way to learn new skills for an eventual return to the workforce.
What has been the greatest thing you’ve gotten from blogging?
I’d say the relationships I’ve managed to develop in a short period of time with some other dad and mom bloggers out there. As a new parent trying to find my way, there is a ton of information out there and some anecdotal evidence that the decisions we’ve made so far have been good for our son.
Of all the posts you’ve written, what has been your favorite and why?
Recently I’ve been participating in Fatherhood Fridays over at Dad Blogs where us daddy bloggers link up our individual blogs with posts relating to fatherhood every week. As part of my contributions I’ve been writing a series of posts examining whether or not fathers matter anymore. Aside from the generalizations made about stay-at-home dads, there are a lot of poor characterizations of fathers in the media. I’ve already posted two times in this (number to be determined) series and I have at least two others planned for upcoming Fatherhood Fridays. My first post “Don’t fathers matter?: Kneeling on concrete” that I published on March 20th is kind of what got my fire going to discuss this issue, so I would have to say that, at least for now, it is one of my favorite posts.
With all the media attention surrounding mommybloggers, what are your thoughts about the future of daddybloggers?
I think we’re still trying to find our voice. There are a lot of stereotypes being perpetuated about dads–that we’re dolts, we get lost in the supermarket, we don’t know the difference between a frying pan and a Santoku. The rhetoric is even worse for stay-at-home dads–we’re lazy, we’re unemployable, we’re destroying the family dynamic. While this may all make for a funny TV commercial, the dads I’ve met through blogging are highly focused on the very important role they play in their families. I really enjoy reading some of the mommybloggers as well and they deserve all the accolades they receive. My hope is that in time, we daddybloggers can take the momentum we are building to fight these stereotypes.
How has Lijit helped you to become a better blog publisher?
I’m still pretty new at this but I really like interpreting the stats and looking for trends. I spent nearly twelve years in the financial services industry, so I’m a bit of a numbers geek. My blog is still pretty new and I’m just now expanding my focus beyond the content to capturing my target audience.
Thanks for your time PJ and if you’re interested in searching for more of what PJ has to say, please use the Lijit search on his blog and follow him on Twitter.
Tags: daddybloggers, Lijit publishers, publisher spotlight | View Comments
JEM is the mastermind behind AdminChronicles and an expert in all things office/work-related. What better way to share her expertise than by starting a blog? On AdminChronicles, she provides advice on telephone etiquette, lists some interview don’ts, helps with how to handle criticism, and offers ways to master Outlook. (Who couldn’t use information like that?)
How long have you been blogging and what made you start?
AdminChronicles was on the “launchpad” for approximately a year prior to its official launch in July 2008.
I started AdminChronicles to share my knowledge. I have had a very diverse and progressive administrative career. As the Office Manager for a direct report to the chairman of a Fortune 500 company, I mastered the “unwritten” rules for providing support at that level–tools that were far beyond the traditional typing, filing or scheduling meetings. The science of providing support to a senior-level executive is much more nuanced than people would expect and I wanted to share my first-hand knowledge with my peers in the hopes that it would help them achieve career success.
What has been the greatest thing you’ve received from blogging?
The greatest thing that I have received from blogging is the relationships that I have established with other bloggers in my niche. The opportunity to avail myself of their expertise has been invaluable to me as the editor-in-chief of AdminChronicles as well as to me as a “working” member of the profession. In addition, blogging has allowed me to sharpen my communication skills (both written and verbal)–I’m confident that there’s a book in me somewhere!–and develop skills in the areas of web/blog design, marketing and social networking.
Of all the posts you’ve written, what has been your favorite and why?
My favorite post is a two-part series titled, What is a Board of Advisors and Why Every Smart Professional Should Have One. This post is my favorite because it is somewhat of a blue-print of my own career. My success is without a doubt owed to both my ability to partner with other administrative professionals as it is my own desire to succeed.
What online services or tools do you recommend to other admins and why?
One of the tools that I would most recommend to my peers is CEO Express, an internet interface for executives. The site filters and organizes the content executives need on the Internet while adding features to the site to make their lives even more streamlined and efficient.
My other favorite online tool is AdminSecret (where I am a featured writer). AdminSecret is one of the premiere social and career networking site for admins.
If I had to make just one major recommendation for my peers it would be to READ. Reading not only helps me to sharpen my writing skills, but it helps me to frame my thinking in a way that allows me to partner successfully with executives. On my nightstand this week is Cathi Black’s (the president of Hearst Magazines) book, Basic Black: The Essential Guide for Getting Ahead at Work. My other favorite book for admin professionals is written by Rosanne Badowski (the assistant to Jack Welch), Managing Up.
How has Lijit helped you to be a better blogger?
My association with Lijit has allowed me the opportunity to guide the progress of my blog by allowing me to understand my readers interests. Lijit serves as a “real-time” view of what is working and what isn’t working. It helps me to tailor my offerings to meet my communities needs.
A big thank-you to JEM for sharing her thoughts on blogging and what it takes to be successful doing it. If you want to dig deeper into her admin knowledge, be sure to visit her blog and use the Lijit search to find out even more.