Obsessively monitoring blog traffic
If I had a dollar for every time I checked the traffic on my blog, I would have a decent income from this thing. The software I’m using is Performancing Metrics, and I adore all the ways it can slice and dice my numbers.
Last week I had uneven traffic, and my overblown analysis of just five days led me to believe that if I post twice a day, I will double my traffic. So I have been testing my theory this week.
The good news is that my traffic doubled. The bad news is that this is very labor intensive. I look at BoingBoing (ka-ching! another link to their site, helping them to hold tight to the number-one spot in Technorati’s ranking of all 37 million blogs) and it looks to me like they post 30 times a day. No wonder they are ranked so high.
Maybe I could post that many times. But I’d go nuts. I’m already going nuts spending about four hours a day on the blog. Plus, I am not a big believer in being a workhorse. It’s not me. I’m a big believer in figuring out shortcuts.
But I haven’t found any. So here is my first of two posts for today.
Research published in Nature Neuroscience says when we are hungry we release a hormone that makes our brain a little bit sharper. So I decided that I would try writing blog entries while I am a little bit hungry – to see if things go faster. Maybe my shortcut will be hunger.
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Incidentally, you need to get your Trackback setting checked. I linked to one of your posts yesterday, and keep geting “403 Throttled” entries whenever I tried to Trackback to it. Finally worked this morning…
Posted by Adam | July 26, 2006
Thanks for letting me know about this, Adam. I wish my enthusiasm for my traffic analysis software were equaled by my enthusiasm for Moveable Type. Not that it’s bad software, just I find it very time consuming to learn to do anything with it.
I would love a recommendation for a person I could hire to do small, (probably annyoing) Moveable Type stuff each week for me.
Posted by Penelope Trunk | July 26, 2006
To be absolutely honest, if I didn’t have a business reason for being au fait with the inner guts of Movable Type, I’d have switched over to Typepad months ago, as it’s far more suitable for the less technical of us, and allows you to use your own domain with it. Might be worth considering.
Posted by Adam | July 26, 2006
Adam,
I realize this question is late in the game for me, but what, exactly, is Moveable Type good for? I fear that the person who recommended that I use Moveable Type is not as au fait as you.
Posted by Penelope Trunk | July 26, 2006
If hunger makes you sharper, maybe you should also consider it for motivation by making a rule that you can’t have breakfast until you’ve posted once and dinner until you’ve posted twice.
I should try that. I bet I’d be lighter!
Posted by David Christiansen | July 26, 2006
Perhaps Brazen Careerist could start Blog Traffickers Anonymous?
Seriously though, its only because its shiny and new that you’re hooked. Check back in three or four months when the thrill is gone.
And by the way, sometimes when feeding the ego, you make some interesting finds.
Posted by John Milan | August 1, 2006
I’m curious, does/can your tracking software distinguish between new visits to your site as opposed to repeat visits from the same computers? Would that be valuable for you to know? (And when are you going to write something about internet surfing at work? Or would that be a conflict of interest for you…) (smile)
Posted by Willy | August 1, 2006
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