I’m curious what got the ‘buzz’ started. Why people got excited about this site and did the ‘pass it on’ thing (Have you seen this yet???). Was there buzz because they reached the Movers & Shakers in under 10 days… or was that a result of the buzz?

How big of an impact do you think the Press Releases for this site had on their initial exposure & popularity? Or do you think the ‘names’ mentioning this site to their readers had more of an impact on the community than anything else?

I had the same initial reaction as most of you when I first took a look at the site (after several mentions that I *should*): “hmm, okay”. Nothing really jumped out at me or got my attention. It’s a decent looking site, I just didnt see what was causing the excitement.

That’s what I’d love to figure out…

Lynn

So what I should have said should have been more like this….

It looks kind of like Threadwatch, but aimed at the “guru” community instead of the SEO/SEM community.

[BREAK]

It gives off a sleazy like vibe to me because of the fact that they accept press releases (which are usually company or personal schpeel) and most of the articles are reprinted on their site – making it look like some weird cross between an article directory and a news site. Of the ones not reprinted on the site, some: http://www.imnewswatch.com/archives/2006/06/imnewswatch_new_1.html require me to subscribe to get to the real story.

That doesn’t seem like “news watching” to me. Tell me the news, why it’s news (add some opinion to it, otherwise, you’re a glorified feed aggregator) and link for me to get the full story on the news… *that* is what I consider a good news watch site.

And I guess I’m the only one who finds the photo gallery of Internet marketers to be a weird feature LOL.

http://www.imnewswatch.com/archives/2006/06/hughbanks_launc.html – a sales letter? How is that news? Ok, even if you go for the “people like to know about new products route” – where is the *unique* information? A review, an interview, a question as to whether it will be used for “evil” (which we all know I’m not worried about LOL)… something that makes it something more than a reprint of a sales letter off some guys site… who is this guy, why should I care?

So sleazier and aimed at guru’s – two seperate comments… we all know I’m not a “guru” follower, but I’m never a random guru slammer either. My problem isn’t the general theory behind this site, I just find the execution a bit… sleazy, or maybe not what I consider well done.

Today, though, I decided to stick around and click on a few of the articles and was pleasantly surprised at the single entry pages (easier to read and digest). I even found some useful information that I hadn’t known about just yet.

I’ll reserve judgment for the time being, but I’d agree with most that it’s a guru watching site. It could possibly be construed as sleazy because there are definitely some black hat products floating through there (though not blatantly advertised as such).

Then again, who are they to censor the news? If they’re impartial, I can see nothing wrong…if they’re taking some bribes under the table to feature certain products/press releases/articles over others, then they may run into some problems.

Like I said, reserving judgment, but the buzz piques my interest as well. Please be sure to share your findings Lynn.

~ Teli

If it’s a new site then marketing heavily like this is the only way that’s going to get a high number of visitors because Google, will take some time to rank them in the SERP’s.

Once you get the traffic it’s keeping their attention that’s important.

I saw value in the site, even though most of the news updates don’t interest me at all. But same goes when I head over to Google News or any other news site.

I am interested to know why Rae thinks it’s sleazy (other than it’s guru-related)? I haven’t seen an affiliate link come out of the site and they appear to review things before they post them. It’s not fully automated from what I can see.

I think the site is useful for people who still don’t use feed readers (most don’t). They bookmark some really good pieces of information amongst the clutter.

It’s definitely a guru-watching site, but there’s a market for that. It’s useful for people who like to keep up with the gurus, the gurus who want keep tabs on what products other people are developing.

Personally, I think it’s a brilliant idea and something people could possibly apply to other markets as well.