IN RESPONSE (IN PART) TO “VIEWS” BY FANDANGO

We all want to know why some posts are popular and the rest? Not so much.

Everyone wants to know the secret. I think the secret is getting Google to notice you and put your posts on the top of their search lists. The year that happened to me, every post got tons of hits even when they were nothing special, but Google posted them at the top of their lists.

The highest SINGLE post I wrote got 14,531 views but it didn’t get them in one day. Not even close. This was one of those weird posts where it got a normal (on the lowish) number of hits at first but over a period of seven years, it has continued to get a couple of thousand hits each year. It has gotten almost a thousand THIS year and until I looked at the list, I didn’t even know it. Apparently there isn’t much written on the subject, so it pops up whenever anyone is looking for if there is a meaning to blood types.

The highest number of hits I got for one post in a single day (during one HOUR actually) was a silly post I wrote during the intermission of a TV premiere I was watching. It was weird because I kept seeing that line climb up and up and I read the piece and all I could say was “HUH?” It got 10,173 hits in less than an hour. It was a piece of writing so trivial, I would have forgotten it were it not for the really high numbers it got. And 9 years later, every time that particular show reappears on TV, I get another few hundred hits. I’ll be damned if I understand why.

I had year (2017) when for some reason, I was at the top of Google’s search lists. Every post went higher — at least twice as high — as it normally (whatever that means) would get. Then, one day, Google went away and it was back to the usual — around 50 to 100 for a good post. This has remained true even when I write a lot fewer posts — like this year.

Another long-running favorite has been my post on the Jonestown Massacre. I repost it every year because no one remembers it, but it’s something worth remembering. Probably especially right now. Overall, it has gotten 10,974 hits so far and will probably get few hundred before the year is done.

As for photographs? ONE black & white picture of a swan got more than 2,000 hits in a single day. It was my most popular photograph. It’s a good picture, but is it my best? I wouldn’t have thought so.

I’ve gotten a lot of total hits of more than 500 to 900 hits for many posts. Many of them were about the weather, especially hurricanes and blizzards. Weather is very popular subject and it cuts across political lines. As a side note, Garry gets more hits than I do on almost everything he writes, but he has his own fan club.

Rich Paschall has been getting very big numbers for his posts about “Bad Buddy.” He got more than 600 hit this past Sunday and got almost 1400 a few weeks ago. If you write about popular subjects, you get more hits.

I don’t do that. I’ve never wanted to write for the “hits.” I write what I want to write. It does well or not so well. If I think it should get more hits because it’s a better than usual piece of writing or photography (or both), I will run it again. Good posts often do better on a second round than on their first. It’s important to know when something you’ve written is particularly good.

I’m not sure what any of this proves except you can’t predict what will bring the hordes to your blog.

Do you care? Once I passed a million hits, I felt as if I’d done my bit. I cut back on how much volume I post. I also stopped writing a lot of political stuff. It got bigger responses than other posts, but it also made me crazy. These days, for political stuff I usually reblog other people’s material. I think my audience knows where I stand and writing the same material over and over again doesn’t mean I’m reaching anyone who doesn’t already agree with me.

Honestly, I wish I believed that writing on the “hot issues” of the day would make a difference but I don’t think it does. This is especially true for blogs like mine which have been around for a decade or more. We aren’t gaining a lot of new followers and our older followers are less likely to comment — but that doesn’t mean they don’t read. You can’t assume that the “hit count” is the real count. To get that “hit” someone has to open the post individually. If, for example, they are just scrolling? They can read a dozen posts, but you’ll only get a “hit” for the first one they opened and if all they did after that was scroll?

In the end, I have to ask you again: how much do the stats matter to you? Is popularity your goal? Or is putting up your best material your goal?

Categories: #Blogging, #Writing, Anecdote, Statistics

Tags: #Blogging, #Writing, Marilyn Armstrong