Joe Carter has a post up on the lessons learned from a recovering Statistics-Addicted Influence Seeker.
Like any of us that blog for awhile he has learned some important lessons.
On the TTLB Ecosystem — I spent a year attempting to rise to the level of Mortal Human in the TTLB Ecosystem. Traversing the stages from Insignificant Microbes to Flippery Fish to Large Mammal, I checked the page daily and longed for the glorious age when I would reach the upper echelons. Though I rarely check TTLB anymore, I looked at it today and noticed that I was ranked #12 (oddly enough, behind two fellow evangelicals, Andrew Jackson and LaShawn Barber). While it may be a glitch in the system, I am currently ranked higher than Volokh, Eschaton, and even Hugh Hewitt. From this lofty perch I can now share with you what such an honor means:
Absolutely nothing.
No, actually, that’s not quite true. What it means is that lots and lots of people link to my blog. I’m flattered beyond words that so many people would consider me worthy of inclusion on their blogrolls. I’m not sure why they do so, but I appreciate it nonetheless.
But aside from instilling a sense of gratitude, being a Mortal Human has no effect on my life. It hasn’t increased my site traffic. It hasn’t increased my ad revenue. It hasn’t made my blog more popular, or more interesting, or more worthy. In fact, it’s much like getting to the end of a game of Monopoly. You realize the thrill was in the striving and the acquiring and once you have a big pile of (fake) money and nothing to do but collect rents, it’s not so much fun anymore.
I went through the stats stage for about 4 months and began to understand how much the numbers were people and started getting more interested in the people. Starting a blog is fun and exciting and I wouldn’t put any newbie down for what we go through. Most of us grow through that if we keep going.
Last night I had the dreary distinction of having to write the owner of The Blogdom of God again because BDBO is back on the BoG list.
This time Warnock asked for some stats to help a tech get this blog off that list.
I had to look up the password to the log. I just don’t go there. And when I did I got so depressed I got thinking about quitting blogging. It occurred to me the last time I went through that was when BDBO was flooded with pr0n.
The control panel is not a measure of worth, but I was in it rumaging around because of a list that promotes the concept traffic matters.
There are linear thinkers and circular thinkers and all kinds inbetween. I’m not a linear thinker. Trying to find sites and people in a list tells me nothing about the site or person. There was no satisfaction looking at numbers going up or down. I learned a few things.
a) I really do get a lot of spam
b) Main traffic to the blog is because people are looking for specific content
c) All my pleas to get of the BoG list appear to be in vain. That having been said, the TTLB/BoG traffic is/was so insignificant it took hours to find a couple of references to help Dr. Warnock get me off his list.
d) I’d see a blog URL and want to abandon the search and go have a read.
e) I haven’t cared whether I’m pond scum, a reptile, rodent or human for a long time.
f) It’s cyber space. Fortunes rise and fall so to speak. A portal, blog or site that ‘did well’ a year ago can fade away.
g) It’s mostly about money. Must be or spammers wouldn’t be top referrers.
h) Bloggers aren’t collectibles. But there will always be others that think we are.
i) Scrapped lists aren’t such a grand idea. There is something technically wrong, the BoG is seriously borked. The owner giveth, but he can’t taketh away. BDBO keeps popping back into the Alliance like play money in the collection plate.
I downed some extra strength ibruprofen and went to bed. I’ll leave the log to the blog administrator. The joy of blogging is people and the writing and the learning. That joy was stunningly crushed last night, but I came away with renewed focus. My readers and blogging compatriots aren’t statistics and I don’t ever again want to make them so.
Published 3 years, 1 month ago
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I have to admit, I was a little down (mixed up with anger) yesterday too. Instead of thinking to quit blogging, I thought that perhaps I should just remove the “christian” from my blog name and just be “messy”. Sometimes being a Christian blogger brings far too much politics. When you’re a ’solo’ blogger, people won’t try to rein you in and tell you want to do.
Ah, I’m being naughty ..
I shouldn’t complain about the ‘heat’ I got since I told myself to expect it, but it nevertheless dissapointed me greatly. Blogging was supposed to be fun; it wasn’t supposed to be political and argumentative. Even if we disagree, shouldn’t we do it nicely? Duh, I’m so naive. If people can’t do it in real life ..
And then there was the spam - my host installed some plugins that worked beautifully, but I sure see lots of spam too.
Stay strong, Bene!
I administer another blog far far away from the god-blogs. Keeps me sane.:^)
You certainly did get a lot of heat and I was sorry to see that. You showed grace and focus.
It’s the same old same old - we create something and hang on so tight we think it’s about us. Mix in the politics, let it get toxic and we’ve got church.
Thank you for blogging, for sharing yourself with us. Thank you for your honesty and your patience.
Thank you for your courage,and honouring all your guests. Thank you for being all that is good about us, the church.
Bene, those are some good, balanced comments. I also read Joe Carter’s post, and thought it was excellent.
However, as a relatively “little guy (gal?” in the blogosphere, I can’t help but smile at you high-traffic bloggers who say stats aren’t important. It’s like rich people who say money’s not important. Yeah, it’s not important IF YOU’VE GOT LOTS OF IT!
I mostly use my TTLB stats to keep an eye on my readership. It’s a way for me to see if I’m reaching, inspiring, or provoking people or simply boring, annoying, or taking them for granted. When my rank drops precipitously, I know I’ve been complacent and need to write more. I enjoy good conversations and good arguments/debates. If I don’t keep people interested, they don’t come back. If they’re not visiting, they’re not commenting. No comments means no conversation.
Cindy: What is a high stats blogger to you?
I get 10th the traffic Joe Carter would.
I get about 2/3 less the links and I’ve been blogging longer.
The average god-blogger gets 40-60 hits a day.
I’m not in Joes league or Funky Dungs. Probably not yours either.
Content counts but so does location.:^)
If I had to guess, Bene, you get far more readers than I do. Lots of bloggers seem to know who you are. I’m an unknown. Not even in my wildest dreams am I in Joe Carter’s league. BTW, 1/10th of Joe’s traffic would put you well ahead of me.
Just to be clear - I don’t blog for popularity. I occurred to me that my previous comment could be taken to say that.
Naw. Not taken that way at all.
The extreme tracker is there for your perusal.
I’ve just been around longer and tend to get into scraps now and then. I wouldn’t be around if it wasn’t for gifted and kind people.
Plus most of my readers aren’t god-bloggers so that opens things up.
Well Bene, I’m a reader of yours because I like what you say, and how you present your topics. BoG or not, I come here to read, not to see the latest God blogger do their thing.
The fact is, I think if we all finally admitted that our blogs aren’t really about God, but are actually about ourselves, we wouldn’t get so upset when someone challenges our “righteousness”. Maybe a better word for that would our “benificence”. The common misconception out there is that because I am a God blog, I am not in this for stas, nor am I in this to promote myself in any way, but only to promote God.
That, of course, is a lie. I don’t care about stats all that much, but I write to be read by other people. That’s drawing attention to myself, no matter how you slice it.
Good blogging, thanks for your work.