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[monica odenwald Contribution Level: 3]

I realize what gift Mike Dillard's fourth article is (check out articles posted in his profile) stating that finding leaders to work with is the first step to building your business.

Then he went all the way to create Betternetworker so we can do this successfully. What an enjoyable process!

So as I priviledged BN member, at least that is how I feel about my membership, I want to understand how BN members are helping each other by using the VOTE link after reading articles, blogs, videos, etc.

I looked at the hundreds and hundreds of people who read my articles but only two voted. Then Iooked at Mikes articles and the thousands and thousands of readers who didn't VOTE, as well.

So here is my post: The two headings under our PROFILE photo are Contributing Member and Community Rank.

If you click on the tiny blue "What's This?" link under these and you'll see that Contributing Member is about tracking - get it - (not a fan club motive) but a clear point system helping others track the time you've spent submitting articles, connecting with new friends, posting forums, videos blogs,etc.

The Community Rank, if actually used is another very important gageometer for looking at the quality of work we contribute. Some positive outcomes may be creating new partnerships and determining quality leadership. This system was designed to work SOLEY ON YOUR VOTES. Yes these ongoing votes (summed up by determining the average)is a significant interactive system that was chosen by BN for a reason.

So please look more closely at this reason with me:
Doesn't SOCIAL VOTING and COMMENTING increases your postings to a larger audience when you use this during your networking campaigns or sales funnel building? I am a newby here so sorry if I am not bang on but I think if we practice voting on our favorite networking sites and forums, our articles and other important content receive greater presence with Google search engines.

Okay, all I know for sure is that the VOTE links are not being used very much...and that is an understatement. I just feel like if you are going to track results as a marketer, and learn to build optimization in search engines, helping others through this Community Ranking system needs to start TODAY and continue on and on. In my mind, this visual system also helps us to practice and get real good at networking and relationship building.

Please let me know why you chose to use the VOTE link system or why you don't. I have heard people defending themselves about not just "trying" to get points to look good because they are posting and responding to so many forums!. As if the less you have, the more honorable your intentions are.

Isn't this missing the point of the whole exercise!

Thanks for sharing your views.
Monica

[Roy Clinkscales Contribution Level: 2]

Thanks for your post Monica. I've been wondering the same thing. I'm going over to your profile and if I see an article on the same subject, I'm going to vote for it.

[Jan Shimano Company: ASEA, LLC Contribution Level: 3]

Hi Monica:
I agree wholeheartedly! I think sometimes there is the mentality of "no one is voting on my stuff, so why should I vote on theirs" type of thing. This is crazy.

Please everyone, when you read an article or watch a video and you get something out of it, go ahead and vote for it. I have also noticed on my articles and videos, there have been many views but nothing in the way of votes.

Let's get trigger happy and start voting for good content folks!

[Richard Bravo Company: Life Force International Contribution Level: 9]

Hi Monica,
Don't be frustrated.
Something I've been watching very closely is the reach that BN content has on the web.
And what I've found is that it's vast.

So with that in mind, something to consider is that not all views are from BN members.
Yes I would agree that for the amount of active members we do have, there is a relatively low vote ratio, however, if you watch the bottom of a forum post while you are logged in you will also see that the "bots" and "guests" are very active here. Something that doesn't show while you are reading articles, blog posts and videos.

Bots = search engine spiders crawling and indexing the content of the site. Extremely active. My guess is those "hits" are counting as "views."

Guests = members not logged in cruising around and also outside people browsing and reading the content. These are just everyday readers not engaged in the "community" but reading the site as a resource.

So take it personal or anything.
A good deal of the visitors here are just that - visitors.

Something else to consider is the placement of the voting, tweeting and sharing functions on the page. They're all at the top. Most people get to the bottom of an article when they've finished reading and move on to another page. Basic user interface fubar. Instead the reader is given the option to leave a comment and that's it. I would venture to guess most people just hit their back button to go back where they were. At that point voting is kind of a lost thought.

Look at blogs... where are all of the social bookmarking and viral tools on a post? And Ezine articles - where are the links and author resource box? At the bottom right? Why? Because that's where you wind up. At the bottom of the page.

Anyway, just something to take into consideration.
~RB

[Kathleen Rygiel Contribution Level: 1]

The Vote link is confusing - sometimes it is available and sometimes not. Perhaps it would be beneficial to have it available at every posting. We could show our favor to a particular post or a particular subject/category. Perhaps if the opportunity to vote were there with each click - we could really monitor where the urge to vote occurred.