Tips and Tricks After 250 Pages on Wizzley

Over the past few weeks, Wizzley has metamorphosed into a very visual website.  Instead of text-based lists of articles, we now have images lining the galleries.

The picture that is shown is the one beneath the 'basic data' tag, in the top left-hand corner of our writing templates.  It sits on the page alongside the title, tiny and barely seen.  But out on the menu pages, it takes on a life of its own.

It is our shop window.  It entices readers in to discover our written wares.  (And hopefully our displayed monetized products too.) It looks good on sites like Pinterest, when our articles are circulated by readers.  It provides a focal point in an increasingly picture oriented cyberworld.

I've seen articles by a handful of Wizzley writers who do not seem to recognize the importance of this.

They may add an apparently unrelated or poor quality image, and at times, no image at all. Others may apply the same picture repeatedly, in a way that seems to imply lack of attention, or misunderstanding of the impact this image can have on the success of their articles.

But I'm not an artist, I could be wrong.  That is one of the endemic problems with writers.  Unless you are extremely talented, most people are one or the other - wordsmiths or artists.  The direction of Wizzley asks us to be both, or, at least, slightly competent in the latter.

It's not rocket science though.  Websites like Pixabay are full of fantastic pictures, taken by people who know their way around a camera.  All we have to do is choose one and add it. Voila! Job done!

And it will pay dividends when your Wizzle comes to be displayed. Your work will nestle professionally amongst all of the other shop windows, and may well attract a reader or two.

On a related point, I was flicking through the authors' pages and also my referral page.  I noted that there are some writers who haven't yet completed their profile, nor done a Wizzography.

When it comes to adding an avatar (profile picture), then all of the points above stand here too. An image not only adds color to your page, but indicates to the reader that you have some level of commitment.

It just looks more professional.  I'm also assured, by those with experience in these things, that it conveys warmth.  Readers look into your portrait's eyes, or recognize a familiar avatar, and you feel more real to them.  It humanizes you.  It makes you close to being a friend. It invites people to read your articles and be more kindly diposed towards you.

Naturally a single picture can't do all of that alone.  It's akin to leaving the door ajar, with a big welcome sign attached to it.  What they find once they venture inside is up to you.

If an avatar is a subtle 'look at me, I'm lovely, come and read my stuff', then a Wizzography is like taking out a billboard advertizement.

I always recommend, to those whom I've referred to Wizzley, beginning with a Wizzography.  It tells us who you are.  I've read articles and followed people based on what I've read in their Wizzley biography.  That has led to friendships too.

This is a no-follow area, where you can add as many back-links to your own blogs and websites as you wish.  Moreover you are setting out your credentials for all to see.

I've come from an academic background, so I want to see where people are coming from.  Why should I trust what this person is writing?  What do they bring to the party?  The Wizzography is where I find out.

If you haven't got one, then you're just a random person on the internet.  Why should I care what you have to say, or what you have to sell?

I'm frequently surprised when I find that comments to articles remain unacknowledged.

Possibly the author is a newbie and has not yet mastered the skills of interpersonal online engagement with one's readers.

Perhaps they have not had the chance to check to see what kind of response their articles have been getting.

In order to encourage continued activity on your article, you should make sure to reply to those who took the trouble to add a comment to your work. It is good manners and it makes good sense.

Remember, articles on which readers participate actively get recognized by Google.

You can write all you like, but it means nothing unless people are reading. That's always been true, but even more so in modern internet etiquette. 

This is why authors like Cory Doctorow allow every one of their novels to be downloaded as free eBooks.  (If there's no download link, wait on, or scroll down to earlier books. He relies upon fans to convert them, so there's a bit of a time delay.)  If you like what he's written, then you'll go back and buy a copy.

He's not alone here.  Musicians like Grace Petrie do exactly the same. You can listen to every one of her albums and EPs on her website.  Fans then click on the purchase button. 

This is the future of the internet!  This is what our business models now look like.  In times of recession, there's less money around, so consumerism is more focused.  The age of the customer is back. 

Your customers are your readers.  Ignore them at your peril. Treat them with disdain and they will repay in kind.

On Wizzley, this shouldn't even be an issue.  The infrastructure encourages us to respond to each and every comment.  Under the 'comments' tab, on your dashboard, you don't even have to visit the page to answer them.

The SERPs love articles which have created a buzz.  Their algorithms take such things into account, when they are deciding where to rank you.  Conversations in the comments indicate a buzz.  Again this is reflected by the Wizzley team.  What do we call Wizzley articles with lots of comments?  Buzzing!

It should also be noted that more comments equate a higher article rank.  If you want to retain any hope of being on the front page, then you have to answer them.  In terms of pure volume, your response doubles the number of comments.

Just a quick note here to emphasize the importance of quality articles on your personal publicity.

Every article that I write appears on the front page within seconds.  This isn't because I've slipped a back-hander to the Wizzley team, nor that I've done any special favors for anyone. 

It's because I've worked hard and tried to maintain a high standard on all that I write. There really is no substitute for that.

Write often, write well bears the repeating in every one of these Wizzley tips and tricks that I create.  If you do nothing else, do that.

Let me spell out what the Wizzley algorithm does (disclaimer: on observation only).  If the majority of your articles are ranked 100%, then your author rank will also be 100%. 

This is true in a sliding scale down.  If the majority of your articles are 1%, then your author rank will be 1% too.  Without even checking you out, a casual reader will assume that you're crap. Simple as that.

If you are ranked 90% or over, then your articles appear in the latest Wizzles feed on the front page.  There's only three of them at any one time, so it's an ever updating list of the bright and the best on the site at this moment in time.

That's a tremendous publicity boost right at the launch of each new addition to your gallery.  I've come to expect between 20-50 hits within the first half an hour of one of my articles going live. 

Of course, write often, write well is time consuming. It's another way of saying that you're going to spend half of your life sitting in front of a computer writing articles.

Wizzley authors do talk to one another on the forum and, slightly less formally, in private messages.  We do break up that hard work with a large dollop of fun!

I can't take any credit for the latest hidden game doing the rounds. 

That belongs with the irrepressible and cheerfully inventive Jerrico Usher.  But I was there at its inception.  I 'sank his battleship' and a whole new diversion was born.

As previously mentioned, high-ranking Wizzley authors see their newly written articles appear in the topmost front page feed.  As soon as another author posts their Wizzle, yours moves down the list.  Three articles later and yours disappears, until it's gained a large enough article rank to appear in the main section.

This is our game-play board.  It's time to play Wizzley Battleships!

The temptation is to write any old rubbish, so you can get your articles out more quickly.  That tactic ultimately leads to failure, as you lose your author rank and you're out of the running entirely.

You know that Jerrico and I are playing.  You may join us if you like!  Good luck!

The first time it happened, I was quietly amused and quite pleased.  The second time, my jaw dropped; then I ran with it.

I'm a Wiccan.  I'm responsible for the majority of Wiccan articles on Wizzley (at least at the time of writing).

Therefore I'm practically programmed to spot patterns along the lines of the Triple Goddess.  The Maiden, Mother and Crone comprise the Three-in-One, one of the most important deities in our pantheon.

So what has this got to do with the price of cheese?

In our personal Wizzley galleries, the articles are arranged in a very specific fashion, but it can look quite random.  Each new Wizzle pushes the previous one down one place and so forth. After a while, that article will rise again to the head of the middle column; before descending again until its moment to rise to the top of the third. 

Then one day, I glanced at my profile after posting an article, just to check that all was well.  My Pagan sensibilities were pleasantly startled. 

Right at the top of the page, if you looked with the right sort of eyes, were articles about a crone, a maiden and a mother.  The Three-in-One accidentally depicted!

I smirked, told my Pagan friends on Facebook, then promptly forgot all about it.  That was until it happened again.

Once more, I had not predicted nor caused this to happen.  But there it was again.  Unless the Lady Herself had a hand in it, then it was purely coincidental.

Of course, once I'd noticed it, I couldn't forget it again.  Part of me wanted to put it to the back of my mind to see if the Fates would complete the cycle naturally.

Would I have written an article about a Maiden at precisely the right time?  We'll never know.  I couldn't ignore it long enough to find out.  I kept checking so, of course, I knew when the requisite slot would be taken.

What I can say is that I was overdue writing a review of Year of Wonders, and the protagonist struck me as being the first in the Trinity, despite elements of the rest.  However, at the time, I chose to write it then, in full knowledge that it would cause a third Three-in-One configuration.

I'm still doing it.  Look closely at my profile gallery and you'll watch that configuration come around time and time again.

In fact, my penultimate article, before this one, was a 'Mother' one in order to fulfill that Trinity. 

I plan to continue doing it until a) I mess up or b) the Wizzley format changes to stop me.  It will be interesting to see if I can keep coming up with the articles for it!  If you keep watching carefully, you will spot me at it.

The amusing thing is that my Triple Goddess articles appear to have been rather well-received.

I was honored with an Editor's Choice Award for that one about Granny Weatherwax; and another 'crone' one elicited rather a lot of comments (the aforementioned buzz!). 

I have wonderfully kind veteran writers encouraging me behind the scenes.  More than one of them highlighted one of my 'mother' Wizzles as evidence that I'm finally getting how to do sales articles. While the original 'maiden' one has already led to commission from Amazon.

It's like the Three-in-One really are smiling on my hard work here!

But mostly I'm doing it for two reasons.  The first and most important is that it amuses me, while harming none; and an amused Jo is an enthusiastic one, able to write all of these Wizzles for you.

The second is accidentally strategic.  It is so accidental, in fact, that it didn't even occur to me until KatieM2 posted something to the forum and my eyebrows nearly disappeared into my hairline.

These are almost the fabled Grail Questions:  What is the Wizzle?  Whom does it serve?  Or why are we writing Wizzley articles and for whom?

Katie's forum post was entitled Demographics.   It asked if we should be taking into account all that we know about our readership base. Then should we cater solely for them; or seek to expand interest into other demographic groups?

According to Alexa's statistics, the majority of our readers are female with children.  They are college educated and aged 25-44 years old.  They are reading from their homes.

From my point of view, this was perfect.  My cycling through the Triple Goddess was producing a lot of female-centric articles.  I was ahead of the game!

My refusal to treat my readers like idiots was paying off too.  These are college educated. They're intelligent.  This would explain why I had so many hits (and sales) on articles which, by all the laws of marketing and SEO, shouldn't even be getting traffic.

However, the statistics are problematic too.  They rely upon the readers having an Alexa toolbar installed. Have you got one of them?  If not, then you haven't been counted and you don't figure in the demographics.

Common sense tells me that there are many male readers here on Wizzley.  I am responding to their comments!  They're here. 

Also I've just had the biggest boost in traffic ever and it came from one of the most male-populated sites on the internet today - Reddit*.  Where are their numbers in these statistics? 

My thoughts here are that, while we take on board these demographics (and ensure that there are plenty of articles in our gallery to welcome those who fit them), we shouldn't ignore everyone else.  They're around too and deserve just as much content.

_{* Information from Alexa again, which states that males are over-represented there.}

I wasn't even at home.  I knew nothing about it until the 'phone call.

It was September 16th 2012.  The Welsh amongst you will know immediately why I was out and about. 

This is Dydd Owain Glyndŵr. I'd been exploring Sycharth and joining in Corwen's celebrations.  But now I was slaughtering my friend in a game of Risk. (It serves him right for playing me on the anniversary of the day that Glyndŵr declared Welsh independence.)

As I took him down, I was called by fellow Wizzley author Paul, a man who is a keen Redditor too. Did I know that one of my articles was on the main page of the Front Page of the Internet?  No.  But I knew that I was taking Asia and Australasia was in deep peril.

In truth, I didn't grasp the full enormity of this.  I thanked Paul for the heads up and told him I'd check it in a bit.  I won that round of Risk, then began another.  I was soundly thrashed, being over-confident and making noob opening moves.

Then I made a cup of tea.

Finally I meandered around to logging onto Wizzley and checking my stats. That moment will be indelibly seared into my memory for life. Each time I refreshed the page another 10,000 people had had a look. 

I couldn't comprehend it.  My mind couldn't grasp those kind of figures. I stared, refreshed and stared.  My friend, better known for his wise-cracks and giving no quarter to anyone, quietly commented, "Well done."  Then tried to fix these people into my mind by pointing out that I'd have filled Liverpool FC's Anfield Stadium into over-capacity.

And it was still rising. 

Paul has already posted the initial statistics in his Reddit article, inspired by this, but here is the full effect of that surge.

The day that it happened passed in surreal accomplishment. Who couldn't be stunned knowing that tens of thousands of people were reading their words?

But even then, the more experienced writers here were warning me that there was unlikely to be any monetary benefit in this.  Reddit readers are extremely internet savvy and blind to commercialization.

Nevertheless, I did get about twenty-eight Amazon clicks and I made 38c on Chitika!  So yeah, I have no plans to retire on the back of it.  It's all good, I didn't expect to.

The most visible effect is that I'll be unable to really use my Wizzley or Google Analytics statistics easily for a while.  That spike will disappear around February 2013 by my estimation.  It's simultaneously highly amusing and a blow to morale. 

I habitually used those stats to monitor how I'm doing; and to use as evidence in my pep talks to myself.

That shouldn't be interpreted as saying that the whole experience was harmful.  In fact, it's been very useful.  It took me by surprise, caught me on the hop and taught me some very valuable lessons.

Mine wasn't.  It had been written very early on, during a Wizzley push for Valentine related stories.  It had attracted some attention, but its readers numbered in single digits each week.

I'd frankly ignored it, letting it grow a little authority, though I had plans to revisit it before next Valentine's Day.

I'm sure that you can see my error right there.  When this article took me by surprise with such a surge in traffic, I wasn't even at home and in a position to spruce it up! 

None of the little pointers in presenting products were in place.  Nor any of the things that I've learned in formatting.

The top section looked messy.  The articles that it linked to were similarly out-dated and amateur.

The main sidebar link was an unrelated one of Katie's!

In short, it was a little like special visitors turning up, when you haven't done the housework for a week and the washing up is piled into the sink.  I was ashamed; but determined that it would never happen again.

Since that date, I've been on a regime of tidying up my Wizzles category by category.  I've been applying all that I've been taught and rendering them safe to go viral. 

This is naturally a very 'just in case' kind of thing, but also necessary for more run-of-the-mill, passing footfall kind of visitors.  Any updating automatically gives a boost to your article's ranking too.

So are ALL of your Wizzley articles in a position to go viral right now?  If not, you really should do something about them, or end up knocked as off balance as I was.

If you're anything like me, then you have a passion for writing.  You're here because you love crafting words into meaningful articles.

But that isn't putting the bread on the table.

I'm British.  I find this whole consumerism thing a little distasteful, but it has to be done.  At least it does if I'm ever going to make a living out of this. 

What I can say is that September has been a bit of a turning point for me.  I've always had a lot of interest, especially with Amazon and Zazzle affiliate products, but not a lot of bites.  I'm suddenly getting them now, still only a trickle, but more frequently than before.

Moreover, it's not the 'sales' articles, that I've been experimenting with recently, but the 'information' articles that have been around for months that are providing the purchases. Time really is a major factor here, as people have been telling me from the start.

Here's a list of what I'm keeping in mind, as I present items for potential revenue:

• Is the product relevant to the article?  Shoving in any old crap just to monetize your writing won't do anything.
• Are you actually selling anything?  This one came from Katie, who pointed out that I'm very good at setting up sales for everyone else. But then not writing sales oriented articles to capitalize on it.  Her example was my Bigfoot obsession, which tells you all about Sasquatch, but then leaves it open to sales vultures to plonk a perfectly monetized article in the middle and 'steal' all of my potential revenue.

My response was to quickly write some 'sales' type articles about Bigfoot.  I do listen!

• Are you focusing on the product too much?  If you're keyword stuffing fluff around the edges, your readers will know.  They are intelligent people (see demographics above).
• Can people find it?  Sam has led the gang of people extolling the virtues of Market Samurai. It's one of the best (possibly actually number one) programs out there for finding keywords and key phrases. These are the things that people actually search in order to find articles like yours, and the products linked from them.
• Are you publicizing it?  Humagaia is the greatest advocate of more traffic equates more potential customers.  It sounds like pure common sense doesn't it?  Yet you'd be amazed how few people promote their articles in social networking and other areas. Get the word out there, so that you can attract readers.
• Humagaia was also the first person to tell me about a product presentation formula, which has since been repeated by others:  Say what it is; tell people to buy it; tell people why they should buy it.  Others have called this 'presenting, then solving a problem'. 

Let me demonstrate.  I'm going to sell you a game using this method.  Bear in mind though that, if this was for real, there would be a whole article around it telling you about its virtues (or lack thereof).

Wizzley monetizes using four main affiliate links.  They are Amazon, Zazzle and AllPosters. Then we can throw into the mix the trillions of sites on the VigLink database.

So you've written a glorious article and now you're looking for relevant products.  How do you find them?   I have no idea, but I know how I find them. 

I use Firefox as my browser.  Amongst the Add Ons for that is a free program called 'Add to Search Bar 2.0'.  Mine is optimized for Wizzley.

You can find it by following these steps (if you're on Firefox; if not, awww.)

• Click on Firefox, in the top left-hand corner of your toolbar.
• Click on 'Add Ons'.
• Select 'Get Add Ons'.
• Search 'Add to Search Bar 2.0 by Dr Evil' in the search bar located in the top right hand corner.
• Install it.

Alternatively, go to his open source page and download it from here.

Then any site with a search area can be added. Just click in the place where you'd search, right-click and select 'add to search bar'. 

As you can see, I start with the default searches that come with a Firefox installation anyway. 

Then I've added YouTube and Pixabay.  The one that says 'Amnesty - Google Search' is actually Google images, but with advanced settings showing only public domain/free for commercial use images.  That's my video and picture content for my articles sorted.

Below come the big affiliate sites on Wizzley, followed by the VigLink merchant search.  The stores after that are all ones which I know are affiliated by them. 

I merely type my product search in once, then click down the list to see what everyone has got on offer to match it.

The second freebie solves a problem for Google users outside the USA.  We want to check its shopping pages, so we can locate stores which stock the items that we wish to display.  But Google refuses point blank to let us search outside our own countries.

For example, my Traditional Welsh Dress article was starting to lack viable places in the USA to buy the costumes.  Unusually, I had no joy hunting through the stores that we generally use, so I wanted to look further afield.

I clicked on Google's shopping search and typed in 'Traditional Welsh Dress'.  I got loads!  Well, I would.  I'm in Britain, which is where this outfit comes from!  But could I find it in America? 

I had no idea.  I could type in Google.com, but the coding would throw me back into Britain.  I would try searching 'Welsh dress in America' and it would only show me British stores which shipped to the USA.

There was only one thing for it.  I had to stop Google knowing where I was located, so that I could actually get search results meaningful to me.  I used Proxify to conceal my IP address from Google's cookies, forcing its search engine to look at my query instead of myself.  It worked.

Incidentally, that will work on any site. Not just the big one.

I'm not sure how helpful that would be with that spike skewing the results.  I think of it like a Tolkienesque landscape.  There are the mountains looking out over the plains of Mordor; and the Towers of the Teeth caught in cross-section, so it looks like there's only one.

I'll have to describe what you can't see.  I've recently been hovering between 600-800 visitors a day, until the Reddit spike.  For the week following, traffic remained over 900, but only twice hitting the 1000 mark.

During the last couple of days, it's decreased slightly.  I'm currently around 800-900 readers per day. Nearly at the golden consistently 1000 mark!  I doubt that this is STILL the Reddit effect, as we're over a fortnight away.

Though I did get a lot of other sites linking in based on that Reddit link.  Therefore it is possible that the aftershocks are still rippling out.

Even now that the dust has settled, that still looks like a great level of traffic growth to me. 

If you're not already here, then I do recommend that you join us at Wizzley.  It's fun and has all the hallmarks of a very informative AND lucrative writing platform.  See you here!

PS  In publishing this Wizzle, I sank Jerrico Usher's battleships.  *smirk*