Improving site traffic
Two of the most ofetn asked questions in the blogging world are “how to I start a blog” and “how do I get people to read it”.
The latter is one question I would like to experiment with.
This site has been ticking over since the beginning of last December. As an eperiment, I would like to see if I can improve its performance from the point of view of visitors and ranking.
Determining a site’s popularity is not easy. Some people go by the number of visitors within a time period [say, a week or a month] while others go by page views. Another method is by ranking.
There are three generally accepted ranking figures – Technorati, Google and Alexa.
Measuring visitors to a site is not easy. On the Head Rambles site, I currently use Ice Rocket, Google Analytics, Woopra and raw log files. These all give wildly different figures for the same period, so effectively, I ignore them and use them for trending purposes only.
Ranking is a different matter.
I have just registered this site with Technorati, and it apparently has a ranking of 13. This is roughly what I would expect for a relatively new and unexciting site. Head Rambles used to have a ranking in excess of 200, but this has dropped off dramatically as the figures are recycled and existing links are discounted and only new links are measured. Head Rambles currently stands at 93.
Google Ranking is deemed to be important if you are interested in search engine ranking. Personally, I have not found this to be the case, as Head Rambles consistently shoots to the top of Google within minutes of a post being published. Head Rambles used to have a ranking of 5 with Google, which was excellent. However that dropped to 3, presumably when they discovered I was advertising with a non-Google affiliate? Ranking for this site is currently 4, which I think is pretty good.
Alexa ranking is a strange one. It is widely used as a benchmark for advertising sales, yet is notoriously difficult to predict as it seems to result from counting the number of visits from people who have the Alexa plug-in installed on their browser. If this is the case [and Alexa is not that popular as a plug-in] then it is an extremely bad method of quantifying a site’s value. However, this is the metric chosen by the industry, and who am I to argue?
The Alexa ranking for this site is currently 1,627,533 and it will be interesting to see if I can improve on this figure.
Over the next while, I am going to try various techniques to improve the traffic to this site. I will of course write about my efforts, and post the corresponding rise or fall in traffic.
It would indeed be nice if I could get this site’s Alexa ranking up close to that of Head Rambles which is currently at 195,510.
We shall see?
Determining stats is a tough one. The only method I trust is going through the log files. As a matter of routine I block icerocket, google analytics, woopra and others so chances are the only way you can see that I’ve been here is by this comment obviously and what ever is in your logs.
What I do use in addition to the logs is called Piwick. Very similar to google analytics. I’ve written about it here:
http://tech.sweetnam.eu/2009/02/alternative-web-analytics/
For the more “numerical” of stats, I use the Statpress plugin for WP (since that’s all my site is). Hits on things like the images I hotlink from my server, meh.
Although I do tend to go more on a comment-rate. As in, if people comment, then I consider that to be a proper hit.
Robert: That looks very nifty, but unfortunately my PHP isn’t up to the scratch. I could upgrade it, but as I’m dumping the server it doesn’t seem worth the effort. Maybe when I relocate to my new small server I’ll give it a bash [pun intended].
TheChrisD: Why wouldn’t a comment be a valid hit? I would consider any file load [excluding images, includes, CSS files and the like] is valid.
I mean, I count the number of effective hits based on how many comments, if any. I know it’s a bit of a lame approach, but that’s what works for me.
You are therefore underestimating yourself! I would estimate that about 5 to 10% of visits translate into actual comments, based on experience from HR.
Why do you want a lot of hits? Is it so that the site becomes a viable commercial proposition? I’m with Chris . .then I don’t advertise or make any income from mine, it’s purely a hobby. I can understand the need for hits if you’re actually receiving income from the blog.
“I can understand the need for hits if you’re actually receiving income from the blog”
That is called ‘hitting the nail on the head’!!
I just found you in my spam box agian, Baino…
Dammit. That’s my new ISP! Ah well then. Go for it. Whatever it takes I guess.(Might need some hot tips after May 15!)