This represents a major milestone for our company. I am pleased to have completed this transaction, as it enables us to broaden our investor base and create a liquid market for our stock. As a publicly-traded company, we believe that we will be in a better position to take advantage of the growing opportunities emerging in our industry.

Read the complete announcement here.

Do you enjoy playing games? Do you enjoy collecting rewards? Well, if you answered “YES” to both of those (that’s a resounding “yes” by the way), then there’s a new game in town you might be interested. It’s a website called WeReward.com that lets you collect points for checking in or performing tasks at businesses you frequent. You can learn more about it from the following video clip:

It’s absolutely true; you can now do the things you love and get paid for doing it. It’s also a great way for businesses to reach out to their audience and encourage them to take on tasks that they specify and keep an eye on who is checking in and who isn’t. It provides them with a tool to offer incentives to members and to encourage behaviour that’s beneficial to their company.

Personally, I don’t have access to the scheme, as I’m not based in the U.S., but I have been playing with other location-based services and I think that this could be huge. It ties your real-life behaviour with a virtual game that lets you score points or gain incentives earned by what you do. It’s a great example of a win-win system. So, if you have an iPhone, Download the App and give it a whirl.

Here’s what my award looks like:

So, I wanted to send a great box THANK YOU to the entire team of Izea, particularly their illustrious leader, Ted. It’s been great working with you for all these years and I’m looking forward to see what new innovations you bring to the sponsored blogging and sponsored tweeting markets.

Just received an interesting email from Izea about Oppapalooza:

As you know we recently made some changes to the PayPerPost platform. While the feedback regarding our interface refinement has been great, we have also received some concerns relating to our pricing adjustments. I am sensitive to your pricing feedback and would like to try a new model for a limited time. My hope is that we will find a balance that works financially for advertisers, bloggers and IZEA. With that in mind, we have made the following changes:

- Minimum total cost per post reduced to $1.00
- Minimum word count reduced to 25 words with a link only option

That’s a pretty interesting development which is being pushed out till the end of the month allowing Izea to test the water with this “micro-payperpost” idea. My biggest concern is that this will affect the quality of the blogging network as it minimises the amount of effort people put into posting. On a positive note, it might also encourage new advertisers to try the medium out.

So, if you want to earn $1 for writing a sponsored post, click on the image above (disclosure: that’s my referral link) and sign up (referrals are still $15 each as far as I’m aware. If, on the other hand you want to try to buy some sponsored posts to see if it helps your online presence, here’s a signup sheet:

I’ll be interested to see the results of this experiment.

I came across a post on Izea’s blog talking about their latest release to their PayPerPost platform. Here’s what Ted (IZEA’s CEO) said:

When SocialSpark launched we adjusted its margins to create a model that would be profitable for the company. The model works and provides a clear path for the future. Meanwhile, PPP has been canceling out what we’ve gained in contribution from SocialSpark. Today we are adjusting the margins in PPP to match that of SocialSpark. Both systems will now have a 50/50 split between IZEA and the blogger, recognizing the value each of us brings to the table.

It’s also interesting to see that they also announced that they will be closing the doors on Zookoda, a service designed for bloggers to send out daily, weekly or monthly summary of your latest blog posts directly into their visitors inbox citing the fact that it wasn’t economically viable to keep it running. This has sparked a spate of comments from regular users who frankly will be left out in the cold. Izea (who were called PayPerPost back then) acquired Zookoda in April 07 citing they were “confident Zookoda’s capabilities will be of great help to our family of PayPerPost bloggers.” There is no doubt the service is a great help to bloggers but there may have been a shift in Izea’s outlook and priorities.

I suspect that these moves are a sign that Izea’s honeymoon period is over and time has come to focus on their key deliverables. I’ve always maintained that there was too much focus on bloggers and not enough on advertisers and this probably is a move to address that failing. It is a shame about Zookoda however, as Izea seem to be treating this as a cost centre rather than an asset that can produce positive contribution by strengthening their blogger base.

On those lines, it’s interesting to see Izea handle online campaigns for Ford, Kmart and Sears, particularly with Chris Brogan doing a sponsored post for Kmart and the subsequent flash fire that generated. The one thing I can say, is that whether you’re selling baby shower gifts or balloons over the internet, user-generated content is here to stay and it’s only getting more prevalent.

I wore my new Izea T-shirt today, the one that Ted send me all the way from the US. It fits pretty nicely even though the size *should* be a bit small for me. (Good thing I lost some weight)

I must say, T-shirts are always a great way to advertise your business as people are usually quite happy to walk around with your advert on their back or chest. This one is particularly nice as it’s a bright colour and the logo is in an unusual place. And I’m happy enough with it to blog about it. How many of you can say you have an Izea T-shirt, huh?

Ok, I’m rambling now .. maybe it’s time for bed …

Here you go:

Hope this helps!