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BlogRush cheerily announced early this morning by way of email that the long awaited “Phase 2″ has arrived of their program designed to bring a rush of targeted traffic to your blog. I’ve expressed my skepticism about their program here before, but at the behest of the editors, I looked into the offering to see what new bits might be brought to the table by John Reese and company.

Clearly, they spent quite a bit of time on the graphics in the dashboard, which have received a significant upgrade and look to be exceptionally inviting, even by Web 2.0 design standards. Reese even took the time to narrate a fairly long video introducing the remaining BlogRush participants to the dashboard, and all it’s available statistical reporting. I could spend some time describing the graphics, design, and the various functions of the dashboard, but it’s all moot if the system doesn’t perform as advertised, so I’ll get to the meat and potatoes: does BlogRush bring traffic?

What you’re looking at here are the stats for the showcase blog of the demonstration video, Internet Marketing Sweetie. This blog’s dashboard was featured throughout the entire demonstration video, so presumably it represents if not the best of the network, what must be at least average. The column of numbers on the left with the red line around them indicates the number each particular blog post has been syndicated across the network. The numbers on the right indicate the number of click-throughs on those items from the widget where they’ve been displayed.

We’re seeing click through ratios ranging from .07% to .17%. As someone who’s done a bit of work with targeted text based CPC ads, I can tell you that if this was a paid campaign, you’d be going bankrupt in a hurry unless you fixed either your ad copy, your targeting, or both.

Certainly, some of the system relies on writing good copy in your headlines - a fair amount of it, actually. Even with my worst written ad copy when I worked with AdSense at least pulled in a 1% click through ratio, though (and I considered that deplorable and unable to generate profit). This system is supposed to pull in a rush of targeted viewers to your blog. Clearly they’re having a severe problem with the targeted and rush part.

On the upside, though, the dashboard does now include links to recent blog posts about news regarding the service. One third of the way to living up to the pitch, John. Keep up the good work.

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