Before Spending $25

Here is a comprehensive list of my weblog "popularity" statistics. I am doing an experiment to see how much these will change after spending $25. Help me Out, please. My theory is that there are a lot of weblogs out there that are "under-known" striving for "micro-fame". And with a bit of promotion, they can achieve this.

The other side (supply-side) of my theory is that "links" are cheap in the weblog world. That they can be bought. Although, the weblog advertising networks (corante.com, weblogsinc, gawker) are charging similar amounts as the big news sites and portals, there are hordes of webloggers out there that are much cheaper.

Promotion, which is akin to commercialization, is a bit against the ethic of many webloggers. But, I think that is a load of hogwash.

So, here are my stats. You can laugh at them if you want to.

6/8/2004
Google PageRank: 4/10
# of Search Results for "pc4media":
@ google: 1310
@yahoo: 791
@ask jeeves: 7 pages
@gigablast: 220
@feedster: 231
@blogdigger: 17

Alexa Traffic Rank: 1720
TypePad:Total number of hits: 11054
TypePad: Average #Hits per day: 200.98
#Bloglines Subscribers (all feeds): 5
Technorati Stats: 39 Links from 17 Sources
Feedburner Stats
Daily Statistics
Date Hits New Visitors KBytes
May-25 6 4 211
May-26 34 7 998
May-27 44 8 1210
May-28 37 3 974
May-29 47 4 1217
May-30 34 1 905
May-31 26 4 672
Jun-01 32 6 846
Jun-02 28 5 934
Jun-03 27 3 785
Jun-04 28 5 662
Jun-05 29 4 847
Jun-06 27 7 806
Jun-07 26 6 806
Jun-08 13 2 473

Links to pc4media weblog:
@WayPath (Mentions in Past 45 Days): 9
@Blogdigger: 0
@blogrunner: 0 in past 3 months
@google: 0
@bloglines: 14 (not including the links I made to myself.)
Mentions for pc4media weblog on Blogdex: 0? individual posts: advice for about.com, calling all web designers, tracking this experiment.

Bloglines deserves an honorable mention for the comprehensiveness of the index on individual posts, as mathemagenic concluded. And this feature of bloglines is obscured by the aggregator. Note to Bloglines: Need to Publicize This Functionality Better.

But, technorati takes the cake for recording mentions to my weblog, in general, as well as to individual posts (Contrary to Mathemagenic's conclusions about technorati, it does show you the post (not just the home page) that linked to a post.)

Blogdex, I'd say is a distant third.

I'll be reporting the stats again, once my experiment is over.

Comments

[Jeremy C. Wright]

Easiest way to get links? Link. Plain and simple. You've just made it onto my reading list, so next time you post something that I have something to add to, I'll link to you.

As a result, you'll get 50-100 new visitors. You'll likely get a dozen new readers. Some of those will link... And so on.

It's the practice of linking which gets traffic. It's the practice of great writing and good thoughts that keeps it.

[Gregory Narain]

Pete,

One slight miscalculation there. Alexa's numbers are reporting back on typepad.com as opposed to your specific sub-domain.

Not sure Alexa can be used except in certain conditions.

I am very curious how this experiment turns out, however.

Greg

[Peter Caputa]

good point on alexa, Greg. I didn't even consider that. I thought that was a bit high, but was too busy scavenging for data, to think about it much. duh!

And Jeremy. You are right-on about the links, great writing and original thoughts. The more of those you give, the more you get back!

I also think there are a bunch of webloggers out there that'll link for cash too. Just trying to see if they will come out of the woodwork and be able to yell a little louder than the journalists and techies turn "blogging purists".

By throwing the $25 out there, I am hoping I will pick a little fight.

[Jeremy C. Wright]

Controversy is also good for links ;-)

[Peter Caputa]

yes. it is.

[Greg Gershman]

To check links for Blogdigger, use the link search page; for example: http://www.blogdigger.com/linkSearch.jsp?link=http%3A%2F%2Fworcester.typepad.com%2Fpc4media%2F

You've also got a bunch of results on the regular search page for pc4media (http://www.blogdigger.com/search.jsp?q=pc4media).

Looking forward to seeing the results.

[Peter Caputa]

Thanks Greg. I added blogdigger results for the keyword search, "pc4media".

I also added the blogdigger blog to my bloglines subs.

[Lilia]

Technorati shows post links only in some cases (e.g. check your own cosmos). Have no idea why...

[Wayne Hurlbert]

The theory of "if you blog it, they will come" is fairly naive. It might work for a sentimental Hollywood movie, but in the real world you need promotion and marketing.

There are numerous ways to promote your blog, at low to no cost. One way, as pointed out by Jeremy Wright, is to link to other blogs. That is good old fashioned networking in action, especially when it's coupled with commenting on other blogs.

Once those readers arrive, you have to keep them with interesting and informative posts. Those regular readers form a solid base to help a blog's visitor traffic grow.

[Crafty Fox]

Hello readers. I am interested to see if this experiment leads to more traffic to one of the better technical analysis sites on stock market trading, www.craftystox.com ( Of course, you are the better judge of how good this site is!). Anyway, will leave it to the editors of this wonderful blog to see of they would include this post. Good luck to all of you.
C.Fox