Not that this post has anything to do with football or politics. I only mention it because the Blog Traffic OR Fifty Shades of Grey post was an experiment to see how much traffic I could drive to my site by using keywords. Especially words surrounding current events. If you don't remember or didn't see the original post, I suggest you go back and take a look at it to see what this is all about.
In that post, I mentioned the presidential candidates several times and even linked to their websites. I made lists of current events in the news that week and threw around the names of celebrities, brands, and popular television shows just to see what would happen. My post about 9/11 pulled in some big numbers a year after I wrote it. My post about the falling of the UARS satellite pulled huge traffic due to its relevancy to the moment. This would be the first time I had done this intentionally.
I wanted to let some time pass to see what happened with the numbers and I think I may be on to something.
Total hits: 575
I know this is not a huge number, but my average number of hits for any post is about 120.
All Time Rank: #7
The post you are reading now is my 227th post. My Blog Traffic OR Fifty Shades of Grey post was not that great, but it rose to near the top anyway.
Rank for the past 30 days: #1
This post was written over 3 months ago and is still getting more visits than any other post on my entire blog. I have 78 posts that have gone up since then and it still ranks #1 for the past month.
Rank for the past 7 days: #2
It was written over three months ago!
Rank for last 24 hours: #8
Despite its age and the number of posts to go up since then, it ranked in the top 10 today!
All Time Rank: #7
The post you are reading now is my 227th post. My Blog Traffic OR Fifty Shades of Grey post was not that great, but it rose to near the top anyway.
Rank for the past 30 days: #1
This post was written over 3 months ago and is still getting more visits than any other post on my entire blog. I have 78 posts that have gone up since then and it still ranks #1 for the past month.
Rank for the past 7 days: #2
It was written over three months ago!
Rank for last 24 hours: #8
Despite its age and the number of posts to go up since then, it ranked in the top 10 today!
While I did try to drop some jokes in on that post, it is far from being one of my better ones. The only thing it really had going for it was the name dropping I included in almost every paragraph. However, I do want to make sure that this is not just a fluke. I need to test the theory one more time.
This time I actually checked out the hot trends on Google's search engine to see what people are searching for. I want to go right to the source and get the real traffic this time instead of just throwing out a wide net and hoping to get lucky.
The most searched for term right now is (surprise, surprise) SUPERBOWL 2013! We probably could have guessed that one. Just for good measure, let's throw in a couple more terms to sweeten the searches a bit. Only a few hours ago, the Baltimore Ravens defeated the New England Patriots and the San Francisco 49ers beat the Atlanta Falcons. They will be playing in New Orleans on February 3, 2013 for Super Bowl XLVII. Is that enough terms for you?
Other highly searched NFL related terms: Ray Lewis, Earl Weaver, Chip Kelly, Colin Kaepernick, Marc Trestman (I have no idea who these people are.)
Jennifer Lawrence, star of Silver Linings Playbook, will be hosting Saturday Night Live this weekend. The musical guest will be the Lumineers. I don't know who they are either.
Lance Armstrong had a ball on Oprah this week, but got a little teste when he finally admitted to years of steroid use. This guy admitted to using performance enhancing drugs after he had sued people for accusing him of using performance enhancing drugs. I've got to hand it to you, Lance. That took some ball.
Manti Te'o of Notre Dame has been all over the news this week as he mourns the death of his internet girlfriend that he never met, Lennay Kekua. Apparently, no one else has ever met her either, since she was not real. Maybe the Patriots would have played better and would be headed to the Super Bowl if they had been playing for imaginary, dead girlfriends.
President Obama's Inauguration was this week, which opens up the opportunity to talk about gun control, Michelle Obama's fashion sense, the debt ceiling, NRA, and executive orders.
There is a growing theory floating around that the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax perpetrated by the government to push through stricter gun control measures.
TV and movie stars that have recently made headlines: Nikki Minaj, Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway, Jodie Foster, Anna Kendrick, Lena Dunham, Amy Poehler, Jessica Chastain, Justin Timberlake, Quentin Tarantino, Jamie Foxx, Claire Danes, and Tina Fey.
People who have died recently and are jumping up through the search engines: Conrad Bain, Stan Musial, and Pauline (Popo) Friedman Phillips (better known as Dear Abby). Natalie Wood even made a comeback as new evidence about her death has surfaced. ← (HA! unintentional pun)
Once again, I want to see if using these highly searched terms will bring more traffic. If it happens to this post as well, then I will know that it was not a coincidence. I will not be doing this experiment again and hate having to read about sports in order to know what is going on anyway. I actually had to look up the Falcons to see what city they play for. Although, the Manti Te'o story is intriguing. Back to regular posts in a few days.
I couldn't even find a way to work in a Nickelback joke.
Lumineers - Mega - Java - UFC - Wral - Frank Zamboni - Stacie Halas - Chief Keef - Amber Alert - Martin Luther King, Jr. - Stuart Scott - Golden Globes 2013 - Lincoln - Seahawks - 2014 Corvette - Miss America 2013 - Aaron Schwartz - Ganster Squad - Oscars - Beasts of the Southern Wild - NRA - scandal - People's Choice Awards - Sacramento Kings - Bethenny Frankel - Pokemon X and Y - Comcast - Pretty Little Liars - Elvis Presley - David Bowie - Rob Parker - Paulina Gretzky - Social Security - ABC Family - Justin Bieber smoking weed - A J McCarron - Katherine Webb - Huell Howser - The Bachelor - Google Docs - Alex Jones - Piers Morgan - IRS - CES 2013 - Chuck Hagel - NHL Lockout - Downtown Abbey
This time I actually checked out the hot trends on Google's search engine to see what people are searching for. I want to go right to the source and get the real traffic this time instead of just throwing out a wide net and hoping to get lucky.
Other highly searched NFL related terms: Ray Lewis, Earl Weaver, Chip Kelly, Colin Kaepernick, Marc Trestman (I have no idea who these people are.)
Jennifer Lawrence, star of Silver Linings Playbook, will be hosting Saturday Night Live this weekend. The musical guest will be the Lumineers. I don't know who they are either.
Lance Armstrong had a ball on Oprah this week, but got a little teste when he finally admitted to years of steroid use. This guy admitted to using performance enhancing drugs after he had sued people for accusing him of using performance enhancing drugs. I've got to hand it to you, Lance. That took some ball.
Manti Te'o of Notre Dame has been all over the news this week as he mourns the death of his internet girlfriend that he never met, Lennay Kekua. Apparently, no one else has ever met her either, since she was not real. Maybe the Patriots would have played better and would be headed to the Super Bowl if they had been playing for imaginary, dead girlfriends.President Obama's Inauguration was this week, which opens up the opportunity to talk about gun control, Michelle Obama's fashion sense, the debt ceiling, NRA, and executive orders.
There is a growing theory floating around that the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax perpetrated by the government to push through stricter gun control measures.
TV and movie stars that have recently made headlines: Nikki Minaj, Hugh Jackman, Anne Hathaway, Jodie Foster, Anna Kendrick, Lena Dunham, Amy Poehler, Jessica Chastain, Justin Timberlake, Quentin Tarantino, Jamie Foxx, Claire Danes, and Tina Fey.
People who have died recently and are jumping up through the search engines: Conrad Bain, Stan Musial, and Pauline (Popo) Friedman Phillips (better known as Dear Abby). Natalie Wood even made a comeback as new evidence about her death has surfaced. ← (HA! unintentional pun)
Once again, I want to see if using these highly searched terms will bring more traffic. If it happens to this post as well, then I will know that it was not a coincidence. I will not be doing this experiment again and hate having to read about sports in order to know what is going on anyway. I actually had to look up the Falcons to see what city they play for. Although, the Manti Te'o story is intriguing. Back to regular posts in a few days.
I couldn't even find a way to work in a Nickelback joke.
Lumineers - Mega - Java - UFC - Wral - Frank Zamboni - Stacie Halas - Chief Keef - Amber Alert - Martin Luther King, Jr. - Stuart Scott - Golden Globes 2013 - Lincoln - Seahawks - 2014 Corvette - Miss America 2013 - Aaron Schwartz - Ganster Squad - Oscars - Beasts of the Southern Wild - NRA - scandal - People's Choice Awards - Sacramento Kings - Bethenny Frankel - Pokemon X and Y - Comcast - Pretty Little Liars - Elvis Presley - David Bowie - Rob Parker - Paulina Gretzky - Social Security - ABC Family - Justin Bieber smoking weed - A J McCarron - Katherine Webb - Huell Howser - The Bachelor - Google Docs - Alex Jones - Piers Morgan - IRS - CES 2013 - Chuck Hagel - NHL Lockout - Downtown Abbey
Nickelback sucks!
I admire your dedication to your experiment. I don't think I'd have the patience to find that much news about popular media.
ReplyDeleteIt was actually quite easy. All the info was on one site. Google has a trending searches page. It shows the top ten searches for the day. I looked at all of them for the week.
DeleteYou should have mentioned The Hunger Games too. I'm glad you're trying this again though, to see if it was just a fluke. I hope you post the results in a few months when you know. I'm really curious about how it turns out, but I have a feeling that it will be another very popular post.
ReplyDeleteI will post what happened just so people can see, but will try not to make another post of this type in the process.
DeleteLast time, I threw up a bunch of stuff that I thought was relevant. This time, I actually poured through the trending searches from Google. I didn't include anything that wasn't being heavily searched.
If my theory is correct, I should get much more traffic from this one than the last one.
I unintentionally posted a drum cover of Arcade Fire's "Ready to Start" to Youtube a few days before they played at the Grammy award ceremony. It produced the two largest spikes in my views on any video and remains the highest hit.
ReplyDeleteTiming definitely matters.
The search engine optimization(SEO) is partially based on this type of thinking, I believe. You can even hide key words like these in the background of a page.
On the October 4 post, I put the words Fifty Shades of Grey between every paragraph using a font that was the same color as the background. The book was all that was talked about at the time. That pulled a good portion of the traffic.
DeleteOoh, interesting experiment. And because I have no life of which to speak of, I eagerly await the results. :)
ReplyDeleteThank you. I will give it a month or two and revisit.
Deleteeven if i didn't otherwise find you hilarious and intelligent, i would continue to follow your blog due to your awesome disdain of nickelback which prompts you to throw in NICKELBACK SUCKS even if you don't have a joke for it. it's okay, because it's a stand alone statement that needs no reference ;)
ReplyDeleteI appreciate how much you enjoy this blog and I will try not to disappoint. As for Nickelback, they speak for themselves.
DeleteJust to help bring in those football-fan stats:
ReplyDeleteThis Superbowl will be "Harbaugh vs. Harbaugh" and "Harbor vs. Harbor". The Ravens played well, and the Patriots played poorly. ...for which I am joyful because the Patriots are mean players. They are to this era what the Steelers used to be known for, and what the Raiders were known for: poor sportmanship.
Like 'em or not, the Ravens have good players, and have been in the playoffs every year since the then-new head coach Harbaugh started the rookie QB Joe Flacco...who graduated from University of Delaware!
I am a Bears fan, but of these teams, I will root for the Ravens.
Sometimes I wonder why you like me.
DeleteJust for the record . . . Earl Weaver has nothing to do with the NFL. He was a BASEBALL coach. It is related, somewhat, in that he was a Baltimore Orioles coach, and the Ravens are from Baltimore, so both were local news this weekend. But, since you have no idea who those people are, I just figured I'd mention that he's in the wrong category up there. You're welcome. Good luck with your experiment.
ReplyDeleteThank you. I was going down the list and not reading some of them very carefully. I would have never known.
DeleteBaseball is the sport where the court has bases, right?
Awesome, I got the attention of the big dogs. Do I get paid for this?
ReplyDeleteI've always wondered if it was worth going straight for the witchery that is SEO- You are making a pretty convincing argument here!
ReplyDeleteI believe taking the time and doing the research will increase traffic. However, I am NOT convinced that it will increase readership.
DeleteI, like most bloggers, want people to read my writing. Just passing through doesn't grow my fan base.
Well, the spammers obviously like it :).
ReplyDeleteIt actually was a well done post, considering how much you crammed into it! Can't wait to hear the results.
I have one post that the spammers seem to really like. I don't know why, but most of the spam comments I get are on that post. As far as real traffic, I've noticed that any post I did about fantasy football did really well during that season.
My spam filter has caught most of them, but I'll bet I have had at least fifty since this post went up.
DeleteIt was fun doing this post and the one like it before. I look forward to the results as well.
Haha this post is sure to attract tons of people.
ReplyDeleteWhat are your thoughts on Jennifer Lawrence? I won't tell Red, I promise.
Honestly, I had never heard of her until just the last few weeks. Because of this movie, her name has been getting thrown around. I saw her picture while writing this post and then realized that she played Katniss in the Hunger Games.
DeleteI enjoyed that movie, but don't remember her standing out.
I like her quite a bit. She was in "Silver Linings Playbook," which I would recommend.
Delete