Do blog carnivals work for you/your blog?

[Ali from The Office Diet]

Hey all,

Quick question for you: do you use blog carnivals? Do you regularly get users finding your blog through these?

I submitted an article to a couple of carnivals in my field (health, fitness and weight loss) about three weeks ago. Both were published and the links were fine etc. But I've had, literally, 2 hits -- according to Google Analytics -- from those carnivals.

Steve highly recommended submitting to carnivals in http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/200...rom-your-blog/ -- but I suspect that either the net culture has shifted away from carnivals, or that carnivals just aren't used by readers in my niche, or that I'm doing something wrong (which is very possible!)

So what's your experience of carnivals? Have they helped you build traffic?

Thanks, and all the best,

Ali

[Peter S C]

Hi,

I have my own carnival (Personal Stories of Change) and also regularly submit to other carnivals.

Blog carnivals have helped me to establish an online profile and also to break the ice with a number of other self improvement bloggers (who I have since gone on to become friends with). Also, they provide links to my articles which is good for SEO. In terms of traffic, though, I notice very little (if any) extra traffic directly related to blog carnivals.

Hope that helps

Peter

[Ali from The Office Diet]

Hi Peter,

Thanks for that; the point about links is a good one. I think I'll persevere with submitting to carnivals!

Also, I came across iwillchangeyourlife.com (I think from another post on the Steve Pavlina forums) a few days ago, and have been dipping into it and finding the content extremely worthwhile -- thank you :-)

Best,

Ali

[jamestl2]

I've submitted about 5 times or so (each different posts to different carnivals), for just my current blog.

But so far none have been accepted (not that I'm relying on carnivals for traffic, but it still would have been nice to see some more people take an interest in what I have to write).

[InterfaceLeader]

I try and submit articles once a week or so, and I've had quite a few accepted. The main plus is the SEO/links though, rather than from direct traffic.

[Ali from The Office Diet]

Well, after my gripe above, I have seen a couple of users appearing via carnival links. :-)

I've been accepted for all the carnivals I submitted to ... perhaps the standard wasn't very high!

Ali

[Jonathan Mead]

I have yet to submit my blog to any carnivals. Can anyone recommend some good ones?

[Ali from The Office Diet]

Hey Jonathan,

I've been using http://blogcarnival.com/bc/ to submit mine to various carnivals. The main drawbacks I've found:
- There are lots of old carnivals which are no longer running, cluttering up the list
- There's no way to know the "reputation" of a carnival; it could be very well-established or Joe Newbie looking for easy content (a set of links) for a post.

On the plus side, it's very easy to submit an article (you just fill in a short form) and it seems to have worked very smoothly so far for me!

Best,

Ali

[prasunsen]

There is *some* use of submitting your blog, but don't expect rivers of traffic.

[evelynlim]

Hello Ali,

I've been wondering too and have only participated in a handful. To be honest, there ain't no truckloads of traffic coming. I wouldn't channel too much of my energy into this since there are also other ways of building links.

Evelyn