One of the first things new bloggers get addicted to is their stats.

In fact, many bloggers admit they are stataholics and may even need a 12-step program.

When we look at our stats and then start comparing  AWStats vs Webalizer vs Google Analytics vs Woopra vs SiteMeter or another favorite of ours, not only can watching the numbers drive a blogger crazy, if they’re watched TOO closely, it can be a total waste of time.

Take for example the graph which shows the pages views for The Blog Boutique in the last sixty days.

The numbers go up and down like a yo-yo.

Do I care?

No!

I’ve learned there are too many variables that can affect my blog traffic.

Today’s Lesson

When we’re new to blogging it’s easy to think our statistics are a reflection of the quality of our blog posts, when in fact, there are so many factors that can affect our statistics, we may never know for sure.

Listed below are FIFTY SEVEN reasons our numbers can vary from day to day.

1. What’s the age of  your blog?

With new blogs, stats can stay or drop to zero on a regular basis. Older blogs will see drops in their stats as well, however, due to loyal readership, the dips may not be as dramatic.

2. Have the search engines found you?

Until the search engines find a blog, traffic may be low. Once your blog gets found, you’ll begin to see more traffic coming from search engines, however this will vary from day to day.

3. Are you using your URL in your email signature?

If you start using your URL in your email signature, you may see on increase in your stats. This, of course, is dependent on who you send emails to.

4. Did a blog post get Stumbled (on StumbleUpon)?

If another bloggers “Stumbles” a post of yours, you may see a spike in your traffic. Unfortunately “stumblers” rarely become regular readers of blogs, so after the initial spike, your stats will probably return to normal.

5. Was your post tweeted (on Twitter)?

Twitter can be a great resource for sharing our work. If those who follow us on Twitter also like our post(s), they may “retweet” it to those who follow them which can affect our page views.

6. Or maybe you showcased your blog post on Facebook?

Facebook is another great place to showcase blog posts. It lets your friends know you have updated your blog, thus possibly gaining a visit or two.

7. Did you guest post on another blog?

While guest posting on another blog, we may see an increase in our readership since we’re being exposed to new readers.

8. Or, do you have a guest writer on your blog?

Based on the comments on the “Guest Posts – Yea or Nay? post, some of our readers may skip over posts if they’re not written by us, thus resulting in a drop in our visitor count.

9. Or, is your statistical program inadvertently counting your own visits to your blog?

Each statistical program has their own matrix for counting visitors and pages views. Check with your favorite program to ensure you understand their terminology. Sometimes a visit is really not a visit.

10. Did failing to add code from your statistical program code lead to a decrease in visitors when you changed themes?

See the first dip on the graph I shared? That’s what happened to me. I forgot to add the statistical coding into the new theme. The second drop to zero is because I did a screenshot of my stats right after midnight when the count was starting over.

11. Was your blog linked to in a fellow bloggers post?

If a fellow blogger links to us in their current post, we often see an increase in our stats. Check your referral traffic if you’re in doubt who linked to you.

12. What day of the week is it?

Many will say different days of the week can affect the traffic to our blog. Although I have seen this in my stats, I’m not finding a definite pattern.

13. What day of the week are you publishing?

Some say by publishing on certain days of the week, it results in a greater influx of traffic to a new post. This may be true if we’re posting on a daily basis, however, I’m not certain if applies to those of us who only post one or two times a week.

14. Is it a holiday?

One thing I have found is most bloggers either go on hiatus for the Christmas holiday, or spend considerably less time online. Less bloggers online mean lower numbers. On the flip side, if your blog is set up to capitalize on holiday traffic, the reverse could be true.

15. What season is it?

I read blog traffic dips during the summer. This makes sense since more people are spending time on outdoor activities instead of sitting at their computers. Those with families may have less time to spend online since their children are home for summer vacation.

16. What’s your niche?

Different niches can greatly affect our stats. If our niche is very specific, it becomes more important to use SEO (search engine optimization) to attract those with the same interests as us. Broader niches may get more hits from a wider audience.

17. Are you spending more or less time commenting on other blogs?

When we spend less time commenting on other blogs, we may see our traffic counts drop. Although we shouldn’t take on a tit for tat attitude, reciprocating comments is a great way to insure those in our community know we care about their blogs, too.

18. Was a post of yours submitted to Digg?

I don’t hear as much about Digg as I once did, however, if your blog post hits the front page of Digg, it can mean a huge influx of traffic, as well as more subscribers. Again, like having a post Stumbled, the spike of traffic may be temporary.

19. Are you having a contest?

Contests seem to draw in more visitors. However, once the contest ends, our stats may reflect a lack of interest in our blog.

20. Did you get press about your blog?

Can you imagine what would happen to our blog if Oprah talked about it on her show? It would go through the roof. Although this doesn’t happen to many, any type of press can affect our stats.

21. Have you started advertising your blog?

Advertising our blogs is starting to become a new trend. Paying for an ad on a high traffic blog could help to get our numbers up if others are clicking.

22. Have you submitted your blog to blog directories?

If you’ve recently submitted your blog to blog directories, you may see small increases of traffic.

23. Have you changed your publishing schedule?

Changing our publishing schedule can make a big difference in our stats. Publish more and you may see more traffic. It’s not a guarantee, but some swear by it. Keep in mind, you’ll also be spending more time on the blog. Publish less, and the reverse may hold true.

24. Are you using more guests posts on your blog than normal?

Although guest posts may not initially hurt our stats, if guest posts become the norm on our blog, many may unsubscribe. Hence, we’ll see a dip in the numbers.

25. Has the statistical program had internal issues which affect how the numbers are reported?

It’s not uncommon for a statistical program to encounter server issues which results in visits which are not counted. Sometimes they will notify you, but often, not. Here’s where using more than one statistical program comes in handy.

26. Are you asking others to subscribe to your blog?

If we want more readers, sometimes all we need to do is ask. Asking others to subscribe to our blogs will often also help our numbers.

27. If so, is your RSS feed easy to find?

If readers don’t see our invitation to subscribe to our blog, we need have our RSS button clearly visible.  Those who subscribe may come back on a regular basis, thus increasing our numbers.

28. Are you making it easy for others to tweet/retweet, Stumble or Digg your posts?

I’ve tried many plugins for this. The Sexy Bookmarks plugin worked for awhile, but now I’ve switched to “Share It” plus added the “TweetMe” button. I like these two plugins as it makes it easy for my readers to share my posts with others. If we don’t make it easy for our readers to share our posts, our stats can reflect that.

29. Is your statistical program reporting visits from bots and spiders?

Some statistical programs count visits from spiders and bots. Be careful which numbers you’re looking at. Obviously if visits from the search engine bots are counted, we’ll be looking at an inflated visitor count.

30. Did you recently start offering a newsletter

Newsletters are a great way to help increase our readership. If you’ve recently added a newsletter to which others have subscribed, your newsletter may be resulting in additional traffic.

31. Did you write an ebook which you are offering for free?

As we travel through blogosphere, we see many bloggers offering free ebooks. When they’re written about or reviewed, we may see small increases in our numbers as visitors come by to download the book.

32. Is you blog the landing page for your business?

Some bloggers are combining their business with their blog. Depending on which page we link to when we advertise could result in showing an increase in blog readers when in fact, those visitors are clients who will be contacting us for business reasons.

33. Did you participate in a group project?

Occasionally group projects are started and the “host” will list all of the bloggers who are involved. Having our name on the list may inspire others to click through.

34. Has a part of the world  experienced severe weather?

We often don’t think weather can affect our blog traffic, however, if there is severe weather in different parts of the world, our fellow bloggers may be dealing with the fall out from that instead of spending time online.

35. Or a catastrophic event?

Just like severe weather, a catastrophic event can affect how much time others are spending online. Some may be blogging or tweeting about it, but they may not be in a position to be visiting others.

36. Even economic conditions can affect blog visitors

The economy can make a huge difference in blog traffic. During the current economic downturn we may see less spending online, however, we may see more individuals turning to the internet as a way to supplement their income. Blogs are often the vehicle used for this purpose. More bloggers online can result in higher numbers for us.

37. Who is your target audience?

When we think about our target audience, we also need to think about how they interact online. Some target audiences may spend a lot less time visiting blogs than others. For example, if our target audience is fishermen, chances are instead of spending time online, they’ll be out fishing.

38. Is the information we’re sharing outdated?

We often hear what we write should be timeless. That’s true for many blogs, but for those who share current events, we need to be at the top of our game. If we’re continually sharing information that’s outdated, chances are visitors will find a better source for their data.

39. What attitude are we projecting on our blog?

So much can be said with words. If we’re angry, chances are our readers will know. If we think we’re better than others, they know that, too. The attitude we project online can make a huge difference in our readership.

40. Do we answer comments?

Although there’s no “rule” we have to answer comments, letting our readers know they are being heard can help to increase our visitor counts.

41. Is the font you use, easy to read?

We talked about this before. If the font on our blogs is so small or too fancy, those who have problems with their eyesight may not return.

42. Are ads or badges distracting our readers

Readers who spend a lot of time online are often annoyed by ads, banners and badges. They’re there to read the content. If our site begins to look like “the strip” in Vegas, chances are our readers will begin to avoid our blog.

43. Is your blog loading too slow

Using too many plugins, ads, banners, and/or badges can slow the loading time of our site down to a crawl. With the attention span of online searchers being short, if our site doesn’t load fast enough, new visitors may never even see it.

44. Are you using the CommentLuv or KeywordLuv plugins?

Plugins like these two are a big benefit to those who comment on our blogs. Utilizing them can mean more repeat visits and comments.

45. Do we give our readers more than one post to read?

It’s one thing to get a visitor to read our current post, but are we sharing more of our work, as well. Showing related, random or recent posts is a great way to show our visitors more of our work, plus increase our page views.

46. How easy is our blog to navigate?

Blogs don’t come with a GPS, thus we need to make it easy for our readers to find their way around. If they want to know more about us, our “about me” page should easy to locate.

47. Is the name of our blog memorable

For most established bloggers it’s too late to change the name of our blog, however, we can make it memorable. In case a reader doesn’t remember how they found our site, hopefully they’ll remember the name and search for it if they want to read more of what we share.

48. What is our reputation in blogosphere?

Our reputation off of our blog is just as important as what we share on our blog. When we walk our talk, chances are those who follow our blog will continue to do so, but if we project something else outside of our blog, we could easily lose readers.

49. Do you use obscene language or show nudity on your blog?

With blogs we do have freedom of speech, which includes foul language. Although we may blog “the way we talk”, some may be offended and not return.

50. Are our posts too negative?

Blogs raise issues of all types. Some are more delicate than others, however if when we write we’re all doom and gloom, we could easily drive readers away.

51. Or confrontational?

Controversy can increase readership to our blog, however, it’s a fine line. Those who are continually confrontational might turn off their reader base thus resulting in lost visits.

52. Or too redundant?

Anyone who has blogged for any length of time knows it’s easy to write about the same topic for the second time. Although we may be putting a different spin on it, rehashing the same topic too many times can make our readers yawn, and maybe unsubscribe.

53. Have you created pillar posts?

Pillar posts are those posts that continue to get new visitors. Usually they are also the posts which attract search engine traffic. Creating more pillar posts could help to increase our readership.

54. What are you showing “above the fold”?

Look at your blog as others see it. What do you see before you have to scroll down? That’s the area considered “above the fold”. If it doesn’t attract a readers attention, they may click off and never come back.

55. Are you male or female?

Some claim men are better at attracting readers, however, I think the jury is still out on this. Obviously.

56. Are you an introvert or an extrovert?

Getting found online takes a lot of self promotion. If we believe the description of introverts vs extroverts, it would appear extroverts may find it easier to promote their own work, thus increasing readership.

57. Have you been, or are you on, a blogging hiatus?

When we take time away from our blogs, unless we have someone blog sit, our blogs can remain dormant for an extended period of time. Without updates, our visitor counts can suffer. (This  may not be the case if our blog traffic is predominantly from search engines.)

I realize this post is considerably longer than my normal lessons, so I understand if you felt the need to skim the variables which can affect our traffic. Having said that, I’ll move to…

Today’s Assignment

What variables do you think affect your stats?

Where are you in the stat checking process?

Still addicted or moving forward?

Care to share?

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I love numbers.

In fact, my real job is all about numbers.

Whether I’m bidding a job, pulling measurements off of blue prints, balancing check registers, costing out jobs, billing customers, preparing payroll or compiling governmental reports, I’m surrounded by numbers.

I’m in my glory.

Today’s Lesson

When I started blogging, one of the first things I noticed was how numbers play such a big part in blogging.

With the ability to sign up for numerous statistical programs, we not only get to observe the growth of our blog, but we can also learn and improve our blogs based on the numbers.

Statistics can tell us:

1. How many visitors we have each day/week/year
2. How long someone stays on our site
3. How many pages a visitor clicks on
4. If our advertising campaigns are working and making us money
5. The time of day our posts generate the most traffic
6. How many subscribers our blog has
7. How many visitors we get from different countries
8. How many comments our blog posts generate
9. How popular our blog is with Google (page rank)
10. How many posts we’ve published
11. How we’re doing in comparison to previous days or months
12. The number of inbound links we have
13. How many comments our spam filter has caught
14. How we rate on Alexa
15. Plus much more

As much numbers can be beneficial in our real lives and in blogging, they can also play havoc on our emotions.

Whether it’s the fact we gained a pound in real life or lost subscribers to our blog, numbers can easily make a good day bad.

Although I try not to over analyze nor let my blogging numbers affect my mood, when I check my stats, I can’t help but think I could do better.

What about you?

Today’s Assignment

If you look at any of your blogging numbers and they’re not meeting your expectations, what’s your first reaction?

How do you keep your blogging statistics in the proper perspective?

Care to share?

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Numbers are everywhere

In the real world, we use numbers for our age, our weight, our size, our wages, our eye sight, the time, the speed at which we drive, how we’re graded in school, for the price of things, and the list goes on.

It’s often written, “numbers don’t lie”.

But, we know they can.

Today’s Lesson

It’s no surprise numbers are a tool of measurement in blogosphere.

A lot of bloggers measure their success by their numbers.

With blogs we have our visitor counts, page views, comment counts, feed reader subscribers, an Alexa rating, Google page rank, a bounce rate and if we monetize a blog, how much money we make.

With social networking sites there are the number of whom we follow, how many follow us and how many updates we’ve made.

In life, many people use numbers to compare themselves to others and/or to boast. It is often because of “the numbers”, some end up with an inferiority complex. In blogosphere it appears to be more of the same.

Since I’ve been blogging I have looked at the earnings, comment count, RSS reader count, Alexa ranking and/or Google page rank of others with thoughts ranging from “I’m impressed”, to “I’m envious” to “Those look like they’ve been manipulated”, to “I don’t care” and everything in between.

In some aspects I like that others show their statistics as it gives me an idea of what a blog is capable of. But on the other hand, I haven’t liked the negative emotions the numbers can ignite.

What about you?

Today’s Assignment

When you see the numbers for other blogs, what is your first reaction/feeling?

Have you seen instances where numbers are posted, but they’ve proven to be incorrect?

Raise your hand and share your thoughts.

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For great articles of how blog numbers can lie, see:

Blogs and the Art of Deception
False Profits – Why You Should NEVER Trust Online Income Earnings Claims