In my case it appeared three times at the end of each day (since 27th November). I think the person behind this ad drops especially on the TOP 300 blogs to get as many clicks as possible for its purposes.Big Daddy Richard and Eli think it is a trick of EntreCard as the same ad picture appears three times in your inbox.
But the solution is very simple, no trick by EntreCard but the member tricked EntreCard and its members.
And in this case it means, the member uses THREE DIFFERENT accounts for three blogs. As i read now the comments on some of the mentioned blogs (description below), it seems he setup these blogs in the past for other persons (or under other names) but they have the same appearance (blog templates). Some are not updated since August 2008!
If you hover with your mouse over the three pictures you can see that they are linked with three different member accounts
http://entrecard.com/t/oc/54360
http://entrecard.com/t/oc/53839
http://entrecard.com/t/oc/33411
To access now the user profile you have to take the number of each link and add it to
http://entrecard.com/user_details/
If you click on these three links, you will be taken to the three "different" accounts
http://entrecard.com/user_details/54360 --> http://entrecard.com/details/142085 Software Blog
http://entrecard.com/user_details/53839 --> http://entrecard.com/details/142089 Jennys Personal Blog
http://entrecard.com/user_details/33411 --> http://entrecard.com/details/141888 Reahsblog
The Software blog seems to have a redirect to the -for all three same- targeted web site http://blogproduction.blogspot.com/
If you click on the given URL in the Blog details it takes you to the above mention Blogproduction website (without any EntreCard widget).
Have a look at the MOST RECENT POST and click one of the posts, this will take you to the REAL Blog behind the picture (and all except the SOFTWARE BLOG and ReahsBlog which you can only access by the below mentioned Blogroll listing!) have an EntreCard widget.
If you look on this Blogproduction website you can see that in the Blogroll "Jennys Personal Blog" and "Reahsblog" is mentioned (there is the connection that it's the same user with different accounts, perhaps he wants to cash-in the referral ECs as linked blogs wouldn't be allowed to receive additional free ECs and so on?)
EntreCard System is too easy to abuse!
You just have to go to your Dashboard:
- Take a look at the section "Your Blog" in the middle of the page
- Click on "Edit"
- Change the website URL to any other website which you would like to promote :)
- Save it, EntreCard doesn't look any more if this is a page with EntreCard widget (otherwise these THREE blogs would have been already deleted!).
- In case we report them, EntreCard might get active and sent a message to their Dashboard to place the EC-widget on this blog within a specific time frame (24 to 72 hours)
If these are what you say they are, the redirects should have been discovered by EC administrators. At any rate this is a cheap trick just the same and should be exposed and stopped.
ReplyDelete@BigDaddyRichard:
ReplyDeleteAlready reported ALL 3 websites as the current website doesn't have the EC widget.
Let's wait and see which reaction we will get. The person will stop by at our blogs in the next hours, too.
Might be now a warning for him!
Very good post, as usual. Your analysis, as always, is remarkable.
ReplyDeleteI still think that the blog is question is like a spam, and a scam in that it redirects to a lot of CPC ads and without an EC widget. I'm annoyed to see its ad 3x everyday on my drop inbox.
If the person behind has 3 blogs with a redirect to the subject blog, his / her 3 blogs should have been removed and deleted by EC out of the system, to protect the legitimate bloggers.
Ok, let's wait and see EC Admin action on this joke.
Thanks for posting.
This is one reason why I've begun to not be so dependant on EC for my traffic.
ReplyDeleteEven Graham was better than this.
But maybe that's just me.
Sincerely,
Mike
I agree with you
ReplyDeleteI reported this to EC also yesterday. When I read the stories on this I went to my inbox and found the widget there a bunch of times and got pretty irritated, but, it didn't take me very long to figure out that it wasn't EC but a member who was cheating the system. Lets see if they fix the problem we definitely don't need members like this.
ReplyDeleteThat's pretty interesting. I've had some like this, but they are not the same picture so I would assume that more than one user has figured out how to do this. However, I did not realize that this was something I should be reporting!
ReplyDeleteDogsDeserveFreedom
The SOFTWARE blog has been deleted by EntreCard, the other two blogs are still active and dropping cards on us!
ReplyDeleteMmmm, No longer a mystery and almost sorted.
ReplyDeleteGood work - Detective cornyman
ReplyDeleteI second John Lottery's motion. Cornyman is really good, especially in analysis, accounting, blogging and whatever. The reason why I follow his blogs, plural, not only this blog.
ReplyDeletethe EntreCard system is easy to abuse. I have scripted things out to do random generated card drops and even make it look like it was being done by clicking. Wasn't extremely hard.
ReplyDeleteSomeone running 3 account to get more traffic is spending 3 times the EC to get that traffic.
I am barely using entrecard, only intermittently. I review all the sites asking for approval. I only approve ads which relate to my subject matter, so I haven't noticed anything sneaky. I guess I need to be more diligent about dropping. Interesting posts here. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteI thought it might be something like this, but thanks for taking the time to figure it out, Martin.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how diligent anyone is about checking blogs. There are dozens in the system with no widgets.
I never hear anything when I report blogs for pop overs or unders or other infractions. I suppose I should follow up and see if something actually is done.
whew! great idea! this really helped! thankie for the info Cornyman.
ReplyDelete