Blog homeOver the weekend I did a bit of analysis on this blog. Anyway, I thought you may like to see what I have found out.
- 500 subscribers (of which 80 are via email)
- 431 blog posts (e.g. average of about 1 a day since the blog was launched)
- 586 comments written by 272 unique people (uniqueness by email address) (excludes my comments and trackbacks)
Comments by post
i.e. how many comments would I expect to see on a single blog post
TOTAL 431 posts
0 comments 250
1-5 137
6-10 28
11-15 9
16+ 7
So 250 out of the 431 blog posts have no comments at all. Gawd - what I am writing must be dull or not provocative enough.
Total number of comments by person
i.e. for each person who has commented at least once, how many times have they commented?
TOTAL 272 unique people have written at least one comment
1-2 comments 229
3-4 19
5-6 11
7-8 4
9-10 2
11+ 7
So 7 people have commented 11 or more times.
Gartner’s four levels of community engagement
In July this year Gartner announced the following community segmentation research findings:
Working on my numbers, 7 out of the 500 subscribers are “Contributors”. Interestingly, 6 out of those 7 actually maintain their own blogs - hence this backs up this assertion (Because they are also “Creators” with their own spaces).
So is this blog unhealthy - or is it within the norms that you would expect (based on the Gartner research)?
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hi alex,
with regard to the Gartner research, readers might be interested, by way of comparison, in this seminal study into participation inequality / community segmentation from 2006: http://www.useit.com/alertbox/participation_inequality.html
Hi Brucini
“Blogs have even worse participation inequality than is evident in the 90-9-1 rule that characterizes most online communities. With blogs, the rule is more like 95-5-0.1.”
That makes me feel better! Thanks for the link. Cheers. Alex
Hi Alex,
Great post - I found the data you included extremely interesting. In addition to the Gartner metrics, I think you should also add into the mix how your traffic volume has played out during this time (total v. uniques, repeat v. new) and referral source (direct v. SEO) to get a clearer gauge of the blog’s health.
Pete
Hi Alex
I’m one of the 80 via email and I really like your posts, so keep them coming.
Cheers
John
Hi Alex: I also read “Musings” via Email and really appreciate it. I have never found another blog or website that is so specifically tailored to answering the types of questions I have on the online travel business. I may be a “lurker,” but I am an apppreciative lurker!
Hi Pete
Re doing a full traffic analysis - yes do get quite a lot of non-subscribed traffic (for example if I write a post about a topic - many “non travel” people may read it - but not want to subscribe to a travel ecommerce specific blog. Comments, subscribers, article reads….. it is all helpful data.
However my interest (for the analysis I was doing) was on the conversational aspects. I don’t want this to be a one way “broadcast” but a two way conversation. I am not convinced I have this sorted out yet…. but it could be that many travel people are not yet “tuned” to having a public conversation about issues that may impact their business (as some people find that difficult - or are unable to due to their employer not approving of that kind of “unofficial” official comment)
I am also weighing up whether I should spend more time writing on SFBO (Small Fish Big Ocean) - which would help my business (as I can communicate with customers who pay money!) - or whether I should continue doing this “industry” type blog - which is great for people knowing about “me” but I would prefer if people knew more about my products!
Happy for people to lurk! (hello everyone!)
Alex
I also fall into the ‘lurker’ category and have ‘Musings’ on my iGoogle home page. I have occasionally looked at SFBO but I’m afraid I’m unlikely to be a potential customer in the forseeable future! Please keep the posts coming: as a relative newcomer to blogs it’s great to find one so close to my own interests.
Hi Greg
Thanks for your comment. SFBO is more for niche operators - and not as active as I want it to be (hence it could be if I focussed on it!). I like this blog……. and don’t worry - I am not going to stop posting here!
Cheers. Alex
Interesting post Alex.
Thinking about it I think I need more ‘opportunists’ and was going to introduce consumer polls and ways consumers can ask questions, but have not really got around to it yet. Looks like I need to get my act together.
I would take a guess and say about 4-5% of my visitors are contributors and the majority are lurkers looking for advice on an array of travel topics. So many blogs lack comments, and that problem is primarily because they do not involve their readers and ask them questions.