ezoic (1)Web giants like Amazon keep tweaking their sites for maximum usability and its revenue. The idea is to try variants, see what the numbers are, then fiddle around further. Even a change in a color of a page might count.

But how about much-smaller sites such as TeleRead? Could automated experiments also benefit them?

cats-teleread-blog-postAs a partner of Ezoic, which specializes in site optimization, we’re about to find out firsthand. And that is why you may temporarily behold strange things as Ezioic’s virtual robots go about their work—for example, more ads or even pictures of cats (thanks, Nate).

Speak up. I’m TeleRead’s publisher, and you can send feedback to me at davidrothman@pobox.com or use the comments area.

But do see if you can’t give Ezoic a chance to do its job in finding TeleRead a great mix of usability and financial sustainability. Ezoic has another partner, too, Google’s AdSense arm. So while Ezoic lacks access to The Secret Sauce of the Google Search Engine, it at least will work within the company’s guidelines.

The goal here isn’t to get rich, just to keep the TeleRead site going and pay our writers. We’re the world’s oldest e-book site devoted to general interest news and views on e-books and related matters, and in one form or another we go back to the 1990s. Ideally TeleRead will be around 20 years from now, unlike another pioneering e-book commentary site which just shut down.

Based on Ezoic’s past track record—ad revenue for partners commonly doubles—we’re optimistic. No gurantees here. But click on the chart for the details and you’ll see what I mean.

ezoic2Along the way, I want TeleRead Editor-in-Chief Juli Monroe and others to be able to spend more time on posts and interaction with TeleRead community members and less time on business matters and on SEO. In a sense Ezoic is like e-books in libraries. Yes, E comes with challenges. But the less libraries have to worry about shelving and other scutwork, the more time the librarians will have to help patrons, one on one. That’s what we ourselves are aiming for—high tech that, if used well, allows for more high touch.

Meanwhile special thanks to Juli for encouraging me to follow through with Ezoic after the company saw TeleRead as a promising partner and reached out.

In the end the new WordPress template could be just the tip of the iceberg. The real changes in the look of the site could come from Ezoic. And as long as the end result is more money for good content, along with better usability, that’s fine with me.

4 COMMENTS

  1. I agree with you, David—bylines on the home page would definitely be good (even if it’s also fun to read the headline and guess who wrote a post). I thought of the same myself. I can check in with the template provider to see if there’s a good solution (although right now I’m pretty swamped). Or perhaps Ezoic can accommodate us.

    Meanwhile please clarify what you mean by “a little wide on the main page.” The text under the headlines?

    One negative, in my opionin, is that the photos are not the same length.

    Still, in loading speed and readability, the new look is a step up. It’ll be interesting to see where the Ezoic experiments take us.

    Thanks,
    David

  2. Nate, thanks. I am busy with today’s here and now. But I’ll explore the documentation to see if perhaps we can make the ads less intrusive through Ezoic’s control panel. Another screenshot or two would be great.

    I’d be curious to hear from others about the whether the ads have become a lot more of a distraction.

    David

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