Blogher '06 Session Discussion: Audience Building and $$$ Generation on Day One

5th (and 6th) in our series introducing you to each of our BlogHer Conference '06 sessions and their speakers, and finding out what you would like to get from each session. Today, I bring you from Day One:

Audience Building

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Elise Bauer talks traffic: how to build it, how to understand your site statistics, how to optimize your site to build search engine traffic, how to use syndication and subscriptions to build recurring traffic...the works!

and

$$$ Generation:

There are many ways to monetize your blog. It's hard to keep track. What's the difference between BlogAds & AdSense? Chitika & LinkShare? And does ad placement really matter? Hint: Jennifer Slegg will tell you "yes."

Why talk about these workshops together? Well, not everyone who wants to build their audience is interested in doing it to generate $$$, but just about everyone who is interested in generating $$$ should consider audience building a key success factor.

I hasten to clarify that building just any audience isn't what I'm talking about...

[img_assist|fid=395|thumb=1|alt=Elise Bauer] That's why Elise will be talking about the different ways to build your audience and the different kinds of traffic there are. She should know. Her premiere food blog, Simply Recipes, enjoys over a million page views per month. My cooking certainly wouldn't earn that, I can tell you! Point is: you might be aware of (OK, some of you might be obsessed with) your overall traffic stats, but Elise can point to specific information to be gleaned from your traffic stats. Are you getting mostly repeat visitors? Or lots of search engine traffic? And are you turning those folks into regulars? Are you using technology the way you could to spread your word? And make it easier for folks to both find you and come back to you? This isn't about gimmicks; this is about finding the people who would really enjoy reading you...and helping them find you!

[img_assist|fid=391|thumb=1|alt=Jennifer Slegg] So you've gone to Elise's session. You're jazzed up and filled with new ideas about how to build a vibrant, active, loyal audience. And since building that kind of audience means making sure you're providing dynamic, valuable content, you're thinking...why can't I compensate myself for the time I'm devoting to this content and this audience? Is that so wrong?

Well, you know here at BlogHer we don't think it's wrong at all. If you're into it, Jennifer can demystify it. One of her areas of expertise is Google AdSense, but she's going to help you wade through all of the various PPC advertising, ad network and affiliate options out there. Yes, there are lots of non-ad and non-affiliate ways to generate $$$ from blogging...raise your hand if you've gotten a gig via a blog connection...and if those ideas are what you're after you'll probably want to attend the From Here to Autonomy session on Day Two. But on Day One don't miss Jennifer telling you everything you ever wanted to know about on-blog revenues. Lastly, she's also going to explain why ad placement matters (and is worth mucking around with templates and code to customize.)

Which might inspire you to attend Mir and Tiffany's Design/CSS session next!

So, that's what we are envisioning for the session. But what do you think. What do you want to learn? What do you want to hear? What do you never want to hear again? What would make you attend this session?