Thursday
Blog Traffic From Reddit, Blogcatalog and Twitter
 Looking at stats for my newest blog 67 Not Out it's interesting to see where the blog's referrals originate.Times have changed since I first started blogging and now it seems that the likes of Reddit, blogcatalog, Twitter and similar sites can't be ignored. The argument against them is usually that the traffic isn't necessarily good traffic - but it's definitely better than not having it! With Reddit, for example, if you do it properly, you should get between 40 and 150 referrals in a day for blog posts submitted (you need a good, catchy title - it doesn't have to be the same as the one on your blog for the same post). If you are lucky you could get more traffic than this but the figures I have suggested are what I've been getting on average without too much effort. And that's the draw back with such sites - it can take effort and/or time. You need to network. I haven't been overdoing it - time wise - with 67 Not Out. I just go to Reddit, blogcatalog and Twitter once a day. I've never used these previously to generate traffic but, as you can see by the chart on the right, they are now important referral sources for the blog. Reddit is a strange site for two reasons. Firstly, sometimes my post submissions don't get listed properly and therefore draw a blank with referrals. It seems they have some sort of spam catcher that catches even genuine posts. So when I submit a post to Reddit I immediately go to the 'What's New' section to ensure the post has been accepted properly. It should show up within minutes. If it's not listed, something has gone wrong, probably it's been caught up in the spam catcher's net. If it has I leave things for a while and then delete the entry and later I try again. The other strange thing about Reddit is that posts can be voted up and down by other members. Well this isn't strange, but the fact that lots of people delight in downvoting perfectly good posts, is. But you have to accept this - they probably have some agenda in downvoting. With blogcatalog it's necessary to get noticed and the best way seems to be by joining in with their forum. Mind you, all forums can generate traffic. As for Twitter it's not my cup of tea really - too much spam and pointless tweets. But, as you can see, it creeps into my top 10 referrers for 67 Not Out. I'm also now trying Stumbleupon but I haven't fully mastered this as yet. I did get 80+ referrals for one post but most of the others only had one or two. Time willing I'll work on this.  Labels: blog referrers, blogcatalog, Reddit, Referrals, stumbleupon, Twitter |
