Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Mizozo is Giving Away a Free Pair of Beats Solo HD Heaphones



Up for grabs in July's monthly Mizozo prize is a pair of Beats Solo HD Headphones. I have already purchased a pair of white Solo HD headphones, so choosing a color is not an option. However, they were purchased at Target, so I'm pretty sure you could exchange them for whatever color you like if white isn't to your liking.

How do you get this free pair of Beats headphones? Its actually quite simple. All articles published to Mizozo in July are eligible to win, and the article with the most unique page views wins the prize. How do I determine uniqueness or page views? Google, of course!

For those that haven't been paying attention, every month we release the numbers for the previous month as based on Google Analytics (last months numbers). The guy at the top of the list wins, very simple.

First thing's first, you need to register. Afterwards, just post as many articles as you like and promote them any way you can. Some great sources are Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, Stumbleupon and the like. It doesn't take much, we have had winners with only a few thousand clicks. For you crazy Facebook users with thousands of friends, you could win with a single article in less than 15 minutes. Of course, your article has to follow the basic rules, simply put don't be a spammer, but that's about it.

So, what are you waiting for? Signup today and get posting!

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Some News and Next Month's Prize

Last night I went to Target to purchase next month's prize, a set of Beats Solo Headphones. I decided the most neutral color would be white, so that is what I bought. With tax, the total came to just over $200, which is a bit higher than I had wanted to spend, but that's OK. Here is proof that I purchased the headphones.




So, why give away a free set of Beats Solo headphones? Well, it is actually quite simple. I regularly watch Google Analytics to see what's popular and what's not. Turns out that our two most popular prizes so far were the Beats Tour headphones and the Ploom Pax. Since I have tried several times to give away marijuana related prizes with little success (success is measured by the number of new publishers signing up with the intent to win the prize), I figured I would go back to the Beats Prize. Free Beats Headphones is sure to spur at least a little excitement, how much of that excitement turns into registered users is left to be seen.

One more thing, some development was done over the last week that I figured I would mention. One piece that I find relatively important is a fix to the Profile Picture in the user's subdomain (example: http://celebuzz.mizozo.com/), it is now larger. It was far too tiny before, and at least now it is somewhat visible.

Second, from an admin's point of view, I fixed a few minor issues, the most important of which was the Last Login timestamp. It broke several months ago (strangely), and so I haven't been able to monitor who is logging in and who isn't. Why is this a problem? Well, we are still getting a ton of requests for users, and unlike most sites I don't really care about the number of registered users, I only care about the number of active users. Hence, I would like to set a rule that if I create an account and it isn't used for 30 days (or so), the account is deleted. For this to work, however, I need to be able to track last login, and now it works. So, that's good!

Anyway, expect a more formal announcement of the July Beats by Dre Prize sometime next week.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

I Just Received the Last Prize Package


I just received the final package four our Camping Gear Prize, the Coleman foldable shovel with pick. The box arrived a bit banged up, but the contents were in great shape. I have a lot of Coleman products and for their price the quality is quite impressive.

Now that we have received all the gear, its a matter of who will write the most popular article. As of now, all I can say is that the highest rated article has barely over 1000 clicks by our internal count. Should be an easy win for anyone who has any social networking clout.

For reference, the original post with information on the prizes can be found here. The prize arrived in 3 shipments, with this being the third. The first and second each have pics too. Its interesting how Amazon ships sometimes. I almost always opt for their free delivery and it usually arrives within two days of purchase. This time, however, it came in a very haphazard way, and took substantially longer than it usually does.

Monday, June 10, 2013

Package #2 has now arrived



I just received the second package in our Camping Gear prize for June. The first package arrived early last week, so now we only have one item left, the folding shovel.

As you can see, this is the machete. Its actually pretty nice, well weighted and the string on the handle may in fact come in handy some day. The item feels like a good piece of steel, capable of cutting down virtually anyone ... er, anything.

I'm sure you would love to have this machete, along with the rest of this month's prize, so register soon and post a few articles. It's actually quite easy to win.

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

First Amazon Package has Arrived


It looks like our Camping Prize for June is being shipped in multiple packages from Amazon. The first package has arrived containing the following items:


We are still waiting on the Machete and the Folding Shovel. I will post pictures of those when they arrive.

So, if you are into camping and would like to win this great prize, be sure to register soon then post and promote.

I'll admit, the June prize is pretty weak, but this is due to our profits being low last month. This month's earnings were significantly higher and some great ideas have been floating around. Some have suggested returning the Beats Headphones prize, but a slightly better version this time. Others have mentioned some exercise gear, and I have been thinking of picking up a GoPro. We have a few more weeks to decide, so if you have any ideas please share.

Saturday, June 1, 2013

May's Numbers

In May, Mizozo saw a slight jump in viewership but a significant jump in revenue. Here are the quick results:

Visitors: 193,309
Page Views: 326,778
Pages Per Visit: 1.69

Earnings: $351 


Likewise, trying to keep the trend going, here's a link to our traffic breakdown as defined by Google Analytics.

Of course, our Top 5 articles list:

Top 5 Articles Published Ever:
#1 - Sila Sahin Nude Playboy Pictures (NSFW) [54,680]
#2 - The impressive remains of a Ferrari 430 Scuderia after a wreck on the Autobahn at 300 km/h [17,332]
#3 - Kelly Brook goes completely nude for Exhibition Magazine (NSFW) [12,676]
#4 - Miranda Kerr Accidental Topless Photos from Bikini Shoot in Miami (NSFW) [10,207]
#5 - What to do with your Rotten Tomatoes [7,384]

Top 5 Articles Published in May:
#1 - The impressive remains of a Ferrari 430 Scuderia after a wreck on the Autobahn at 300 km/h [17,332]
#2 - Miranda Kerr Accidental Topless Photos from Bikini Shoot in Miami (NSFW) [10,207]
#3 - Nina Agdal Goes Completely Naked for Esquire Magazine (NSFW) [6,536]
#4 - More Bikini Candids of Candice Swanepoel in St. Barts [4,670]
#5 - Wild Orchid Lingerie Mixes Well with Petra Nemcova (NSFW) [2,733]


While it is great to see our numbers increase, a single month doesn't set a trend so I'm not too excited yet. However, the earnings jump does make things interesting.

With an earnings of $351, and an operating expense of $140, we have a net profit of $210. Keeping 10% for safety's sake, we have an operating profit of $190, which will be used for next month's prize. If you guys have any suggestions, please leave a comment or contact me directly.