Retaining Readers By Adding Content

Wednesday, January 2nd 2008

2007 is over. I’ve added the 4th Quarter ‘Bragstat’ below, with markers of when I posted here. The purpose though isn’t to say “look at my #’s” but to remind everyone that posting new content brings past readers back to your blog.

knox traffic q4

Bottom line is that if your site goes stale, so will your numbers. Remember to offer a feed of some kind and a method for readers to subscribe to posts and email your colleagues when you post something they may enjoy.

You can see that there’s an trend upward in hits after each post. Disregard the last week on this pic for this site, those were iPhone x-mas gift receivers looking for my tools. I stalled in posting in November to let my Web2.OhMyGod article stick on top for a while - I got some good clickthrough but people were reluctant to comment, I think it freaked them out.

So, I’ve got a great tutorial for WordPress users coming in a couple days so be sure to check it out if you’re a blogger wanting to better your theme.

BloglinesDiggdel.icio.usFacebookMa.gnoliaRedditStumbleUponTechnorati

Possibly Related

9 users responded to this post

Dan O said on January 2nd, 2008

Thanks for the tips. I have run a local blog called the Mile High Buzz (for Denver Coffee shops) for quite a while and have seen what you are describing work amazingly well (although I must say I did most of it on accident at the time).

I am now working on a new site called Mile High Parents. Please check it out and if you have a moment, please let me know if you have any suggestions as this new blog is built.

Thanks!

Knox said on January 2nd, 2008

Thanks, Dan. I’ll be emailing you tomorrow, bear with me.

Convent Station Guy said on January 2nd, 2008

I cannot wait for your tutorial for WordPress users which you have coming soon. I have been working on my blog which I link to with this post but still have some way to go. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Jim

Knox said on January 3rd, 2008

Actually, I’ve been lurking there Jim and have some ideas for you. I wasn’t kidding when I said January, here we are

Dan, another thought - you ought to grab as many “mile high…” domains as you can right now, not bad Denver branding, and I’m sure others will be doing so as well.

Coloraboblogging said on January 3rd, 2008

Better hurry grab those sites before I do.

Great site you have here! I will be stopping by more often trying to learn more and improve my blog.

Thanks, Coloraboblogging - I’ll be dropping ion on you too.

Eric Bramlett said on January 4th, 2008

Nice #s, Knox. I need to work on pushing the RSS feeds, oh…and completely revamp my SEO blog! Congrats on your success. I’ve been polling a lot of people these days…what theme do you like to start with on WP - easy to modify, and functional w/ 2.3.2?

Knox said on January 4th, 2008

Hi Eric,
Thanks for the addaboy:)

Themes - I LOVE Copyblogger.

I tout it as one of the best “out of the box” SEO themes out there.

It’s rather simple, I tend to like that. It can be demo’d here
http://www.pearsonified.com/theme/copyblogger/

and downloaded here.
http://www.copyblogger.com/downloads/copyblogger.zip

Linkworth uses it for an idea about customization as shown here.
http://blog.linkworth.com/

It uses two css sheets, one for the meat and another for the look - makes it very quick to stylize.

I’ve used as a jump for some other client themes, even converted it to a 3 column for a WordPress powered CMS. I think he has a 3 column version out somewhere now.

Check it out, you may like it. My theme here (NOT COPYBLOGGER) was originally pretty complex and I slimmed it down with that themes’s inspiration. Incidentally, I’ve mucked it up since then.

Check out the nice “comments” asthetics on that with the theme - simple and perfect, invites comments.

As far as 2.3.2 - anything that worked on 2.3.1 is fine - the new update won’t have any affect on plug-ins or themes, it was about securing unpublished yet saved posts.