Relationships = Hype = BlogRush = Success?

Why is BlogRush having such a huge amount of immediate success?

One common answer I’ve read is that BlogRush is about the power of HYPE.

This is certainly true but “Hype” is often not the first part of the equation. It’s about building RELATIONSHIPS!

Lets face it, BlogRush really isn’t anything revolutionary and it’s NOT going to send a flood of traffic to the average blog. It simply can’t live up to the hype and promises plastered all over the web. Nevertheless, the network’s growth has exploded in just a few days. If the average John Doe created the same network, the success of it would likely have been much different.

John Reese, founder of BlogRush, is an internet and affiliate marketing legend. He is in the elite few that make millions of dollars a year doing so. He has been online marketing since 1990. And how about this:

On August 17, 2004, John Reese shocked the Internet marketing world and pulled in over $1,000,000 in sales in less than 24 hours (18 to be exact) for the launch of a new product — and he did it without spending one penny on advertising!

One million dollars in less than 24 hours! I suspect this was done with a mixture of gigantic email lists and viral marketing but I’m sure a huge part of it had to also do with the thousands of relationships he has forged through his years of success online.

Now there is more than one way to forge these relationships. Sometimes you can BUY a relationship. For example, the “million dollar wiki” basically purchased a relationship with John Chow via a review but it’s been beneficially successful for both of them. ShoeMoney later ended up writing a post and buying a page about the wiki after reading about it on John Chow. ShoeMoney helped make this guy an extra $40,000 over the course of a few days.

My relationship with John Chow started with some Google Adwords Site Targeted advertising on his website which he blogged about on his website but we have continued to work together in a few ways up to this day. I may write a new post about different ways to build relationships and it certainly does not always have to involve money (leaving comments, leaving pingbacks, blogrolls etc.)

I have to admit that it’s often tough to create good relationships with A-List bloggers. I think many times you have to prove yourself in some ways but other times it just takes some luck. Maybe I’m wrong but it seems like I never heard a mention of John Chow by ShoeMoney until his RSS really started booming and he was making more and more money online. ShoeMoney just recently allowed John Chow to guest host his radio show. A-Listers cater to A-Listers because they can help each other make even more money than they already do (and lots of it). It makes sense.

On the other hand don’t neglect building relationships with those on the D-List. Just because someone is not on the A-List of bloggers yet does not mean they are not in the A-List of affiliate or internet marketers and highly successful. You can usually figure this out on your own.

John Reese has a lot of friends in high (and low) places and these relationships are, in part, a huge reason for the Hype with BlogRush. Lets use the highly successful ShoeMoney as an example. In his initial post about BlogRush he starts with “Earlier this week internet marketing superstar (and also my good friend) John Reese launched Blog Rush. ”

BlogRush’s long term success is still unknown and I have mixed feelings about the program. Hype does not always = Success.

Take Agloco for example. While it still might be a little early to declare Agloco a failure, right now it’s beginning to look like a million member flop. I’m not saying BlogRush won’t be a long term success or that it was a bad idea but the real success of the network is what happens when that hype wears off. For those that don’t like the referral downline aspect of the BlogRush program, I guarantee the network would not have been successful without it.

Ultimately, BlogRush’s long term success comes down to one thing:

The Clickthrough Ratio

Blogs that have managed to build a huge downline don’t have to worry about this much. They can just remove the widget and still continue to get traffic without doing anything. They won’t need to use there own blog’s impressions to gain thousands of daily credits.

However, what about blogs with low to mid-level traffic or those with a small referral network?

Will adding another widget and giving up valuable real estate on your blog be worth it?

I’m certainly NOT counting BlogRush out and it would be premature and dumb to do so. The network is still in the Hype phase and brand new. The “My BlogRush CTR is abysmal” posts are already starting to appear throughout the blogosphere.

I do think they will have some tough times ahead of them but I think they will make the changes that need to be made to pull through these tough times. Keep in mind that your own CTR may have a lot to do with your post title among other things. Andy Beard has written several great articles about Blogrush that you might want to read through.

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