Tagged: statistics
The Best and Worst of February 2015
February flew by in the blink of an eye for me. I don’t know why because I wasn’t particularly busy or anything but it just did. I suppose that’s a good thing because I’m super-excited about my upcoming trip to New York at the end of May for BEA 2015. And because I’m also super-excited for season 5 of Game of Thrones on April 12. So yeah, February was pretty uneventful and yet it flew past. I can’t really complain about my month this time around.
This month I received 5,169 views in total with 3,407 of those being unique views. That’s down from January when I received 6,644 views but considering that February only has 28 days this year, that’s not so bad. I had some pretty bad days stats-wise this February but I also had some good days where I hit the 300 mark compared to my usual 150-200. Really, like the personal side of my life in February, I can’t complain about the statistics side of things.
So what were the best posts this month?
1. Why Girls Hate Game of Thrones—A Rebuttal
2. How to Read 100 Pages in an Hour
3. The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
4. Discussion: One Star Reviews
5. Why no Writer Wants to Tackle Chronic Pain
We actually have some different articles on the list this month! My discussion of one star reviews and negative reviews in general was hugely successful both stats-wise and comments-wise. It was very interesting to see peoples’ takes on the issue, both authors and reviewers. As for the chronic pain article, that really surprised me because it was never popular, even when it was new. Since I got more referrals from Facebook than I normally would I’m guessing that someone shared my post on Facebook in either an author’s group or some sort of chronic pain support group. Whoever it was, thank you and I hope it caused you to think.
Okay, then what were the worst posts in February?
1. Rotten Romans by Terry Deary
2. Bullying Under Attack by Various Authors
3. Have you Finished The Mad Reviewer Reading Challenge? Tell me Here!
4. Discussion: The Most Underrated Book (For You)
5. Feyguard: Spark by Anthea Sharp
As far as I remember, these are all new ones here on the worst list. As with most months, they’re either posts that are extremely dated (#3 being from 2013) or they’re books that are old or really aren’t that popular. For the first two the latter doesn’t bother me but I was surprised to see Anthea Sharp’s Feyguard: Spark on that list as well because it was an extremely good book. But oh well. I can pretty much guarantee that these 5 posts won’t be on next month’s worst list because the ‘worst’ posts always seem to rotate.
Well folks, that was my February. How was yours? Did it go by as quickly as mine? How’s the weather where you are? Are you as sick of winter as I am of hearing about that stupid #TheDress incident?
The Best and Worst of July 2014
Yep, this is another Best and Worst of… installment that’s a little late but it’s better late than never. Especially considering all of the tech problems I’ve had recently (and am still having). My keyboard recently died on my desktop so now I have to use a laptop that is way too small for my long fingers. Oh well, things could be worse.
Sadly on the statistics front, July just couldn’t compete with the previous four record-breaking months. Now that Game of Thrones is done for another several months and school is out (so I don’t get hits on my Hunger Games articles as much) I expected my views to go down and I wasn’t surprised when I only received 6,344 page views with 4,568 unique views. Still, that’s much better than last July, which clocked in at 3,958 total page views. My site is continuing to grow in popularity so I can hardly complain about how tough I have it.
Well, what were the best articles this month?
1. Why Girls Hate Game of Thrones—A Rebuttal
2. How to Read 100 Pages in an Hour
3. The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
4. Discussion: Who are Book Reviews For?
5. Discussion: Your School Reading Experiences
As with the previous four months, my Game of Thrones article gave me over half of the views I received and the other articles preceding it were far behind by comparison (3000+ hits compared to 100). My discussions did better than they usually do, mainly because I haven’t really posted discussions for a while since my tech problems started. Speaking of which, I still have to reply to all of those awesome comments!
So what were the worst articles in July?
1. The Squire, His Knight, and His Lady by Gerald Morris
2. Clockwork Prince by Cassandra Clare
4. The Fire Within by Chris d’Lacey
5. The Secret War by Matt Myklusch
All of these are reviews this month, which is unusual, but at the same time it’s not all that concerning. They’re all books that have been out for a while so of course they’re not going to get the same amount of hits as newer books that are being talked about all over the internet. I don’t see any repeat offenders so I usually don’t get too worried about which reviews appear on the worst list.
Well, that’s how my July went: lower stats and tons of tech problems but still not too bad. Work is busy, which is good, but at the same time I look back on the slow days of winter with longing because while I’m ringing up customers constantly I’m not getting any cleaning or estimating done. Still, I can’t complain. How was your July?
The Best and Worst of June 2014
I can’t believe it’s July 6th already, but then again when you have tech problems time seems to fly. So yes, it’s a little late for my Best and Worst of article but I guess it’s better late than never. Other than my ridiculous tech problems June was actually pretty good. Work is picking up as the tourists flow into town and the weather is finally, finally starting to smarten up. Luckily I’m not in the part of Saskatchewan that’s flooded or has experienced tornadoes.
Anyway, here are the best five articles of June 2014:
1. Why Girls Hate Game of Thrones—A Rebuttal
2. How to Read 100 Pages in an Hour
3. The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
4. Your Open Book Promotion Thread
5. I’ve Been Invaded by Gremlins!
For the fourth month in a row, I have broken my monthly stats record! Instead of the 13,316 views of May, in June I received 14,198 views. As with the previous months, I have the TV show Game of Thrones to thank for that as my rebuttal article received 8,581 views or about 60% of my total traffic for that month. I have the hugely popular season 4 finale to thank for that, I think.
So what were the worst articles in this record-breaking month?
1. Graphic Novel Review: Batgirl Volume II: Knightfall Descends by Gail Simone
2. Discussion: Romance in YA Novels
4. I am More Than Just a Chronic Pain Statistic
5. The Best and Worst of April 2014
Meh, none of these are surprising or worrying. The only real trend I’ve noticed among the five worst articles is that Scott Westerfeld’s books seem to pop up a lot. It’s not because he’s not a popular author but maybe because I actually liked the books. I seem to get a lot more traffic from reviews where I didn’t like the book.
So how was your June?
The Best and Worst of May 2014
May was both a month of sorrow and a month of joy for me. My boss, mentor and role model passed away after his third battle with cancer this month. I’m still grieving for him but things are slowly getting back to normal as I’m trying to move on. Other than that, May was a pretty good month. The weather was so nice that today I finally got the garden in and I broke yet another monthly stats record.
This month I welcomed 51 new followers but also smashed April’s monthly views record, which was 11,905 views. In May I received 13,316 views, which includes 9,771 unique views. I’d say 3 months of breaking my monthly view records is a pretty good trend. But enough of my rambling. What were the most popular articles in May?
1. Why Girls Hate Game of Thrones—A Rebuttal
2. The Hunger Games and Ancient Rome
3. How to Read 100 Pages in an Hour
4. End of Days by Eric Walters
5. The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
Meh, nothing new or unexpected here. The only really notable thing was that of my 13,316 views, 8,515 of them were on my Game of Thrones article (or about 64% of my total traffic). That’s up from the 58% of my total views last month! I guess as the season 4 finale draws nearer, more people are searching for Game of Thrones. It’s quite a lucrative thing to write about, statistics-wise.
So what were the worst articles this month?
1. Awful Egyptians by Terry Deary
2. City of Glass by Cassandra Clare
3. Sarah’s Key by Tatiana de Rosnay
4. The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
5. City of Fallen Angels by Cassandra Clare
As with the five best articles of the month, there’s really nothing new or remarkable here. The books are either older books or books that really weren’t that popular to begin with. No, it seems like Game of Thrones reigns supreme online lately. That’s a good thing for people like me who go off on a tangent and defend the both the TV series and the books.
So how was your May? See anything here that surprised you about my statistics? Are you a fellow Game of Thrones fan too?
Some Thoughts About Book Blogging & Statistics
I’ve had my own book blog for over two years and it’s actually taken me this long to come to the following conclusions:
1. Followers are way more important than daily views (generally).
On a more emotional level, it’s nice to know that currently more than 750 people enjoyed my blog enough to hit that follow button. But what I’ve found in my two years of blogging is that followers really are more important than daily views. Your average person stumbling across a blog isn’t going to leave a comment, but a follower might. Followers are the more engaged, active members of your blogging community and for me that’s why they’re more important than the number of daily hits I get.
Aside from that on a purely marketing standpoint, blog tour companies, authors and publishers seem to be far more concerned about follower statistics than daily hits. When signing up for blog tour companies I’ve only been asked once about daily hits (and I’ve signed up for 6 companies). And publishers/authors are generally not all that concerned about daily hits as long as you have a decent number of followers. I may only average 200 hits per day, but because of my 752 followers I get approved for a lot more review requests than I would if I had only 100 followers and 300+ hits per day.
2. Book reviews suck statistics-wise.
I’ve written nearly 500 book reviews but those are not what bring people to my blog. No, it’s my rants and articles that bring that most traffic. With season 4 of Game of Thrones coming up on April 6 my traffic has experienced an enormous spike because I’m suddenly getting nearly one hundred hits per day on my rant Why Girls Hate Game of Thrones—A Rebuttal. They’re not from people getting mad at the author for the initial ignorant article. They’re from people searching things like ‘map of westeros’ and ‘game of thrones women’. It’s sad to say, but for book bloggers, book reviews are not going to get you very far stats-wise.
3. Blog tours rarely boost traffic.
I haven’t actually taken place in many blog tours yet but I can say that the ones I have taken part in have done absolutely nothing to enhance my traffic. They’re a great promotional tool for authors to get their work out there and noticed in the blogosphere but for us bloggers they don’t really do much. Sure, the host-only giveaways are sometimes a great incentive as well as the fact that you’re getting more free books to read, but if you’re only in it to increase your stats you’d be better off writing a book review.
That’s not to say that blog tours don’t benefit bloggers as well. They’re good at helping you find awesome new authors. Thanks to blog tours I have some new favourite books in Andromeda’s Fall by Abigail Owen and The Collector of Dying Breaths by M. J. Rose. So if you’re not a big statistics fanatic, blog tours can be very beneficial by bringing books you otherwise never would have heard of to your attention.
***
If I had to give any advice from this article I’d say to my fellow book bloggers: don’t worry too much about statistics. Sure, keep an eye on them if you want to be approved for those popular ARCs, but don’t let them run your life. The internet is a fickle place and although one week you may have a huge increase in traffic the next week you’ll have a 50% decrease in traffic. Worry more about building your community and getting some dedicated followers and you’ll do just fine.