Weekly round-up #3 - Highlighting the week gone by

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It's been quite a week.  Before I get into the usual news, I'd just like to mention a couple of statistics that I'm rather happy with:

• Right now my site has 93 subscribers.  Not only has this figure increased a lot more quickly than I expected it to, it's even been relatively stable at the weekends.  I'm used to losing a few subscribers over the weekend - it's not that people unsubscribe, more that they don't read as many posts at that time.  Keeping the figure up is a huge boost for me as it encourages me to keep writing high quality content.  Thanks to everyone who subscribes - I hope you continue to enjoy my blog.
• My Technorati authority has broken into triple figures.  This means that over 100 different sites have linked to benbarden.com in the last three months.  The reason why I'm mentioning these statistics is because to me, they are some of the most valuable stats available.  I know that some sites find ways to artificially influence these figures, but I'd never do that - I want them to be as accurate as possible.  Needless to say, I'm happy with how things have been going.

My top post this week

Going by the number of comments, A beginner's guide to StumbleUpon was my most popular post.  But that doesn't give the full picture of how successful this week has been.

Four posts were submitted to StumbleUpon this week, and on consecutive days - Monday to Thursday.  Proof that it is possible to come up with great content every single day.

Guest posts in both directions

My second guest post is now on the Entrecard Blog: Don't blame Entrecard if you're not getting comments.  This builds on one of my earlier posts but I've made it specific to Entrecard, as I think that Entrecard gets a lot of criticism for things that aren't caused by them.  Sure, if the site's down, go ahead and be unhappy about that - but if you're not getting comments, read my post before you have a go at Entrecard.  That said, Entrecard may not work for all sites.

Also, Jason Boom wrote the first guest post for my site: How to use BlogCatalog to gain exposure.  I'd been wanting to write a BlogCatalog post for some time but I never really had a chance to research it properly.  This seemed like a perfect opportunity to get my first guest contributor on board, and what a post it was!  Jason wrote an excellent post that fits well with the style of my site.  If he has time, he'll be writing an average of one post per month.

I have a second guest contributor lined up too, but don't worry, I am not planning to take a back seat and let guest posts take over my blog.  A couple every now and again could work wonders, but I don't want to overdo it.  To ensure the guest posts are worth reading, I'm being very selective about who I allow to guest post on my blog and all posts will be written in a similar style to my own posts.

Honorable mention

I'd like to thank Lightening for profiling my site on Lightening's Blogworld.  Much appreciated!

Great posts on other blogs

Here's a selection of the posts I've been enjoying this week:

• Do you hate working? Start your own firm! (Ramona Iftode) - I discovered Ramona's blog this week through Entrecard.  She is very honest and says she writes a "mean personal blog".  I quickly found lots of great posts, so I'm definitely going to keep an eye on what she comes up with next.  In this particular post, Ramona explains why starting your own firm is NOT the right path for someone who hates working.
  
• I found another site to stay away from (BloggingNotes.net) - First, I'd like to welcome Rod back to the blogosphere after being quiet for a bit.  This is an interesting post - I do prefer full feeds to partial feeds, but if you read the comments, you'll see it's not as easy a decision as you might think.  Do we use full feeds and suffer the consequences, or partial feeds and upset our readers?  Let me know...
• 25000 Entrecard Drops Later - A Full Review (Yimto Affiliate Marketing Blog) - This is a very interesting account of a well-known Entrecard member's journey from joining Entrecard until the point where he dropped his 25,000th card.  As I've said, perhaps Entrecard isn't for everyone, but you get out what you put in.
• BloggerNoob's mega ultra super duper booyah contest. $10,000 (bloggernoob.com) - The Noob explains why it's not worth spending a lot of time on contests.  He raises some very good points.

Site News

Just before I published my StumbleUpon guide, I added a "Stumble This!" link to the bottom of my posts.  If you read my site in a feed reader, you'll already see this link.  The new link appears when viewing a post on my site - it's just about the comment box.

I've also uploaded four new tracks from my fifth album, Forgotten Past.  You can hear them online or download them for free.  Please leave a comment on any of the tracks if you like them.  Thanks!

So, that's all for this week.  Tune in next week for another round-up!  Oh, and don't forget to read the posts through the week...

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