Incredible. It’s the only word to describe the flood of applicants we’re getting for the 54 project.

I had hoped to launch the new site with about 10 writers and add more later, trying to bring it up to about 40 by years end. It would have been a very respectable and exciting start.

As it’s looking now though, we may be starting off with about 40 writers! (Crosses fingers X)

Luckily, the software we’re using has already been tested in the wild under a load of 100’s of thousands of writers and 10’s of millions of daily pageviews and db requests. It’ll no doubt handle a small network without blinking.

Paulie and his peeps are back in business, folks

I’m absolutely blown away by the quality and calibre of people inquiring about writing/blogging positions at my new startup. So far I’ve seen people with Bachelor of Science degrees, people who have written for major online and offline publications, experts in technology and travel. All I can say is “Wow!”

If things keep going as well as they have been for the past 48 hours with responses to the ads I placed here, here, here and here, 54 will be sprinting out of the starting blocks with some killer traction and content under it’s belt.

This is where it starts to get exciting.

54. Remember that number.

Ok, well, I guess I have no other choice but to let the cat out of the bag, or at least let it peek out and look around…

Are you an engaging writer/blogger who’s passionate about any of the following subjects?

Health & Fitness or Sports?
Vacationing & Travelling the world?
Food & Nutrition, Wine or Cooking?
Business & Marketing?
Personal Finance & Wealth Building?
The Latest in Fashion & Trendy Stuff?
Hot Cars, Green vehicles or SUVs?
Family stuff and Homemaking?

If so, and you’re savvy enough to know the potential of breaking in at beginning of the web’s next big startup company, then boy, do we have a deal for you!

If you’re passionate about any topic related to the subjects above, can commit to writing 3, 200+ word blog posts per day, 5 days a week and write consistently with authority, flair and know how to use a spell checker, here’s what we have to offer you…

In mid July, 2007, we’re launching a large blogging startup company & community. We’ll set you up with a blog, take care of the tech issues, find revenue streams for you, drive targeted traffic to your blog and pay you 75% of all contextual ad revenue generated by what you write, for as long as you write for us.

Plus++ As traffic and revenue grows, we’ll be setting up lucrative bonus plans for top performers.

Interested?

Just use the email address below to email me a brief bio about yourself (short resume or CV of your writing talents and niche expertise), the subject you’d like to write about (suggestions are cool), and links to about 3 examples of your writing currently published on the web. Those examples can be on your own existing blogs or sites, or published elsewhere.

Use this as the subject of your email:

PS Blogger Partnership Application

Please email me your Resume/CV and links to examples of your writing only, not examples of your writing right in the email itself.

Contact email: pshort at gmail dot com

——

Because this network is so new and we don’t want too many details leaking out before launch (crunch) time, we’ll be contacting applicants over the next few weeks and giving them more information.

It’s going to be a wild ride and we only want the best, most passionate writers to share it with us.

Join us now.

As an addendum to my previous post on the subject.

I’ll even go as far as to say that collectively, search engines, aggregators, advertisers, scrapers, etc. are actually making more money from blog content that we write, than we are ourselves. Someone, please, prove me wrong!

It’s time for us to take a long hard look at alternative ways to monetize our content. $0.10 clicks just aren’t cutting it any more.

We need to look at ourselves as publishers rather than bloggers. Publishing companies sell a lot more than just ads.

I whipped this up quickly, so please excuse the spelling and grammar errors…

I’ve been watching blogs and blog networks for going on 5 years now and have come to the conclusion that they’re woefully under monetized. Most out there strive to get traffic and send it out through ads, for pennies per click, action or impression. They’re practically giving away the traffic and eyeballs for nothing… compared to what they could be getting if they got a little more creative.

All you have to do is look at some of the products in the AdSense ads that are getting the best conversions - consistently showing up in the top ad spots on these blogs.

I know, the conversion rates from clickthrough to purchase on some of these sites is around 1%, but lets do some math:

Blog visitor clicks on an AdSense ad and the blogger makes $0.10 for the click. If the blog sends 100 people through that ad, the blogger makes a grand total of $10.00.

On the advertiser’s site, one of those 100 clicks converts to a paying customer, who just purchased a $35.00 ebook, whitepaper or special report where the advertiser ‘profits’ $20.00 from the sale, after paying overhead and ad costs.

Essentially, the blogger just lost $20.00. If they had written and offered their own $35.00 ebook they would have profited $30 instead of $10 if you set aside $5 for overhead and processing fees, etc.

Very general and not all blogs would benefit from what I outlined above. However, some blogs, especially ones where premium content on the subject matter (paid ebooks and reorts) is in high demand, could certainly do well with this model.

Another thing I’ve noticed is that most of the A-List blogs out there don’t collect email addresses or send out email newsletters. Balk at this if you will, but email marketing is still alive and well in a lot of mass appeal niches and industries.

Blog reader Ben knows nothing about RSS feeds or Bloglines. He doesn’t even realize he’s reading a blog, but, he knows email. Ben is the type of guy who’ll consume almost any content he knows how to consume.

Ben signs up for that blog’s email newsletter. It can be summaries of the blog content where ne clicks and revisits the blog to finish up an article, or a weekly newsletter containing unique content not found on the blog. In both examples, Ben is exposed to that blog’s content in a format he’s familiar with… and that content contains an ad or two, for the bloggers own product.

In the past I’ve been too close to the blogging industry to see these things objectively. I’ve even spoken out against them. But now that I’ve been out of the game, but still watching closely with an unclouded mind, I see opportunities where I thought none existed before.

Blogging is all about content, sharing content, discussing that content and the overlying or underlying issues… and if you’re into it to make money, it’s about monetizing that content.

Why not get creative and offer premium paid content as well?

If you don’t understand that headline, then try harder.

Everyone has voyeuristic tendencies. Everyone is curious about what their friends are doing and they’re even more curious about what people they don’t know are doing.

Look at reality TV. It was kicked off with the Survivor phenomenon. Millions of people tuned in every week to see what a bunch of strangers would do and react in adverse situations. Look at soap operas before that.

What about all those shows where they lock a group of polar opposite personalities in a house filled with cameras.

Look at the beginnings of blogging as we know it today. People basically keeping an online journal of their thoughts. It caught on quick and now ‘blog’ is a household word.

Now look at social networking sites which are basically a collection of little peepholes into people’s lives.

Now look at Twitter.

I wanna peer into your mind. It arouses mine.