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WHERE’S MY TRAFFIC?????????
By JLP | July 6, 2009
Time for a heart-to-heart with my fellow AFM readers.
I have refrained from saying anything on my blog but I can’t for the life of me figure out where my traffic has gone.
Look at this trend:
Everything was okay until around January of this year when my blog got hacked. I’m wondering if my traffic has anything to do with that? I don’t know. I have asked several friends who know a great deal more about this stuff than I do and none of them really had any answers.
All I know is that I’m back to levels from two years ago. That shouldn’t be happening.
Perhaps I’ve lost my edge. That may be true but my missing numbers seem to be from lost google search results. My adsense income is down tremendously too. The confusing part is that I am still getting google traffic. I would think if google was the problem, then my google search traffic would be almost nil.
It’s troubling because I look around me and see other bloggers going like gangbusters. And yet, here I sit, stagnating.
All this has me scratching my head and frustrated pretty much most of the time. I’m not sure I want to keep blogging if things aren’t growing.
Maybe it’s time I move on… If things don’t turn around or I don’t get this figured out, I may just concentrate my efforts elsewhere.
Topics: Blogging | 50 Comments »
July 7th, 2009 at 4:30 am
I found your site a few months ago, visited several times, and then subscribed via RSS (also subscribed to APM, too). So I hardly visit the site itself anymore, though I read almost all your articles. Not sure if that has anything to do with it.
July 7th, 2009 at 4:41 am
Maybe Obama and the Democrats have everybody on welfare. No need to work or save.
July 7th, 2009 at 4:54 am
Makes no sense.
I'd suggest the obvious — you need a geek to get to the bottom of it.
For what it's worth, I found the site a couple months ago and visit four or five times a week.
Most finance blogs are crap; yours isn't — even when I'm not in agreement with the politics.
– Mark
July 7th, 2009 at 6:25 am
I'm also an RSS reader, so I don't know how that affects your scores. I have noticed two things which I feel might have an effect; these are both my commentary and obviously just thoughts. 1) While I'm not sure this is numerical, I have this feeling like I've been getting less from you – I don't know if it's in actual posting counts, or just that it seems to be less…personal financey? Not quite sure. Obviously the title is "all financial matters" not "my home finances" but I think that's the door I came through
2) you (for a while at least) took a much more political spin and I certainly know comments at the time reflected a lot of people saying they were peeling on out. That said, I don't know why that would leave a continually declining state.
That said, if you do shut it down, go out with a bang
Don't leave us withering on the vine wondering if there's going to be another post as they dwindle slowly away…
July 7th, 2009 at 7:42 am
I have been a long time reader and have recently switched to using Google RSS Reader. I'm assuming it masks itself as a single user even though it really represents thousands. Keep up the great writing.
July 7th, 2009 at 11:09 am
Maybe everybody is reading your rss feed now? Would that matter?
July 7th, 2009 at 11:39 am
I 2nd the RSS idea — I'm hardly ever at your actual site.
Have you signed your site up for a Google Webmaster account? It will track your search ranking within Google, and tell you what problems it sees with your site that might be affecting ranking.
Also, did your URLs change when your site was hacked? Have your URLs changed when you redesigned the site? It might contribute to loss of traffic.
July 7th, 2009 at 12:11 pm
I've read your blog all of 2 times I think and was pulled in by the headline. Since I'm a blogger I too look at traffic stats and all that. I have some thoughts.
RSS is great and I read most of my blogs that way but there is no way your RSS is responsible for this. The traffic swing is too substantial for that.
I don't know how political you got but I can say that I hate when blogs do that. I touch on political issues from time to time but for the most part avoid it. In the US, getting political alienates half your readership.
I suggest you take a good look at what you've been writing about and switch gears for a while if necessary. I haven't read your blog so I can't speak to whether you should or shoudn't. If your google search traffic hasn't let up, then generally speaking the traffic to your blog from regular readers has.
One suggestion, don't vent your frustrations with traffic on your blog, this is no more interesting than hearing someone on TV talk about their ratings.
July 7th, 2009 at 12:23 pm
You need to add an extra account to your GA account and let someone take a look to see if they can determine where the issue is.
I'd be happy to take a look for you although there are probably other bloggers you know better.
July 7th, 2009 at 1:00 pm
I am also an RSS reader who rarely visits the main site.
I do have some ideas that might help.
1) Try reinstalling your tracking code. Perhaps it got damaged after your site was hacked.
2) Work on more (white hat) SEO. Sometimes SE traffic can drop like that. I could be a matter of time… or a need for more SEO work.
3) Look into some alternative traffic sources. Try to use social media sites such as Tip'd, Digg, etc.
Hope this helps,
Nate
July 7th, 2009 at 1:01 pm
I'm an RSS reader- they have blocked many sites at work so it's just easier that way. I read several PF sites, as well as Consumerist, Lifehacker, etc. I find that all of the sites post the same kind of articles, all the time. There's nothing new or exciting- it seems that as soon as one site posts something everyone else just reposts it. That makes me read less, FWIW.
July 7th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
I don't have an answer, just some thoughts…
You think you should do a carnival or more round-ups like the one you just ran? Give us in the community more reason to link to you. But your PR is 5, so that may not be the issue.
Maybe try and write more how-to posts yourself. I know you've somewhat graduated from writing basic personal finance posts (as I'm sure your archive is stuffed with them), but maybe try writing more nuts and bolts type posts. Answer people's questions and solve their problems.
My traffic has been very flat this year. I just tell myself to keep going. Keep pressing forward.
btw, I'd love to have that traffic. I do fairly well on just a 3rd of your June number.
Keep it going, JLP.
July 7th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I would say that in the past few months your posting rate has been
down considerably from the previous months. Maybe you just hit a lull, becuase I have been enjoying you again recently. Good luck. I'd love to keep reading your blog.
July 7th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
I can't remember when I started reading your posts, but it was certainly sometime in mid-2008 or before. As with so many of the others I immediately added your posts to my Google Reader because I didn't want to miss an entry. Somehow I find it easier to read a pretty lengthy list of feeds in the reader as opposed to remembering to compile a list and scroll down through them from time to time. I hope you don't stop producing articles because yours are among my favorite reads.
July 7th, 2009 at 2:15 pm
Check out Matt Cutt's article on hacked sites and the Google Webmaster Console. http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/how-google-handles-...
Also, you might consider including your RSS subscription numbers in along with your visits. Google's RSS crawler returns the number of subscribers to you when it fetches your feed. You can analyze this data with Feedburner and monetize the feed itself with AdSense.
July 7th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
That looks like too large a drop to only be related to posting frequency or content.
I would guess the hacking incident hurt your reputation with some search engines, or at least with Google. I believe you can be temporarily banned or at least missing from search results even while maintaining your Page Rank. And, of course, with a PR5 you should be doing pretty well with your traffic.
Are you sure there aren't any malicious files left on your server or other remnants of the evil-doers? If all is well know, the great G will figure that out in time and restore you to your former state…assuming of course that is the problem. You'll really have to do some serious research to get to the bottom of this. Good luck!
July 7th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
RSS. That way I never miss a post, and I also never come to your blog unless I need to comment.
July 7th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
I'm an RSS reader as well. Re: the income, perhaps you should change up some of your placements and do some A/B testing to see if you can increase income there.
July 7th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Where are you getting your traffic numbers? Are you getting them directly from the HTTP server logs, or are you using some kind of 'tracker' script? My guess would be that people are either blocking javaScript and/or blocking ads with browser plugins. Also, you are only 6 days into July, so graphing that bar doesn't make much sense.
July 7th, 2009 at 10:57 am
I’ve been a reader for a couple of years now, and as others have said, your posting frequency has seemed to decrease, as well as the quality of the posts. There isn’t as much thought provoking posts as before, except for the more political leaning posts.
And I agree that you have the right to post whatever you want, and if you are going to post some things with a political theme, looking at the other side and showing some criticism of all views may balance it out a bit and make for a better discussion.
July 7th, 2009 at 4:47 pm
Well, as a progressive, I found a lot of your political analysis uncompelling and besides the point. I came to hear your spin on financial and investing issues. I have other people I read for macroeconomic/political analysis–that's what their expertise is in. I have never been interested in pushing back here, but it seems to me that a lot of your political analysis involves sweeping generalizations and acerbic judgment. I have found that to be a real turnoff. Perhaps others have as well. Hopefully you'll get back to your core of investment issues and people will start pouring in again.
July 7th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
Well… I did read by coming to the site for a while, then I went and set up RSS and read way fewer comments and post less now than I did before. I still read all the articles.
I also feel that the # of post that I fully read has been down lately for one reason or another. It seemed like the vacation time had long periods with very few posts.
Also I know that if I get updates on comments that I will come back to the site more often to check or at least see those updates. Which you just recently have added but have not been back for very much, maybe that will help some.
July 7th, 2009 at 5:39 pm
I'd say your blog has gotten a little half-hearted. Most of your posts are kind of worthless and just exist to put one up for the day. I can understand that because I tried my hand at blogging and ran out of ideas pretty quick. Too many book posts and random stuff that no one cares about lately.
Your Republican rants have also gotten pretty frequent although you seem to have cooled it lately. Anyone can turn on Fox News for that stuff. That is actually why I pay a visit to your site every now and then though. Just to see what your latest claim is and make a counterargument if you have gone off in the ditch again.
But I don't think too many people want to read that kind of stuff on a financial blog. For every right-leaner, there is a left leaner and the people in the middle don't really care to hear ideology. Many will agree with you but more will just get tired of it and leave. Most just aren't that interested in political theology.
I'd say you need to work harder at making interesting financial posts. Perhaps answer a couple of reader inquiries a week. People always like to put their two cents in on that type of thing.
I'd save the political posts for your allpolitical blog (which very few are interested in I'm sure you have noticed).
July 7th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
Couple of comments. I just found your blog today and this post so have no idea about your political views, your posting frequency, or anything else.
I did see from going to Quantcast that your traffic dropped significantly recently. I have also read on several other web traffic websites that Google is currently changing SERPs so give it a chance before getting upset.
I will say that as your first post for me to read – this one is a turn off. If your entire focus is growing traffic and making money for yourself without giving value to the people reading it, then that could be the root of your problem. You are no longer passionate about what you write or how often you write.
People can sense when you no longer care and it appears that may be where you are today.
As far as the political views, just remember that it will limit the size of your audience but may also increase their loyalty. A smaller more loyal tribe can be better long term if that is the direction you want to go.
July 7th, 2009 at 6:04 pm
Retired: Thank God you are around to "set me straight."
AllPoliticalMatters.com isn't getting much traffic because I haven't been posting there–so I wouldn't use that as an argument against my political posts.
As far as RSS Feeds go…I HATE 'EM! I always have and always will. I used to only use partial feeds but I got tired of hearing people complain. Now that I offer full feeds, people seldom stop by the actual site. What's the point in blogging if people aren't visiting the site?
Still, even with the lost traffic due to RSS feeds, it doesn't explain the decrease in search-related traffic and the resulting decrease in Adsense revenues. Regular readers don't click on ads, so I wouldn't expect a decrease in Adsense revenue but that is exactly what I'm experiencing. I think there's a bigger issue at hand but I just haven't figured it out yet.
I filed for reinclusion to the Google index and it was approved on June 15th but traffic has not improved.
I'm at a loss…
July 7th, 2009 at 6:16 pm
Scott,
Are you saying I shouldn't be concerned with traffic and growth? Just do what I do and don't worry about the stats?
Surely I have to have some sort of gauge as to this blog's effectiveness. The only way I know how to do that is by looking at traffic numbers and revenues.
July 7th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
It is a bigger issue. Most of your posts just aren't that interesting and you have become pretty political. My point is that your allpolitical blog doesn't really have a following whereas your financial site does. Even if you did post on allpolitical, very few would read it. That is my point. Stick with the finances instead of making your financial blog a political blog.
"Join the Jonathan Clements Fan Club"
two posts for David Fabers book
Excellent Customer Service at Sam's Club
Complete Stranger In a Bookstore
Who is going to make regular visits for this stuff? I used to check your site more often and I've noticed your comments were down so I found your traffic post interesting because I thought I was seeing the same thing. It's pretty bland stuff most of the time. Just giving you my point of view.
July 7th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
In simple terms, there is a near infinite supply of political blogs, some good some not. There is a much more limited supply of financial blogs, especially good ones. That’s where you competitive advantage is. No sense competing against more supply in an area where you have more common insight.
July 7th, 2009 at 2:18 pm
Just a quick count (might be off by one or two posts per month as scrolling was a bit jumpy with all the ads and all), but going back the last few months your total post count per month goes as follows:
10/08: 48
11/08: 50
12/08: 48
01/09: 38
02/09: 29
03/09: 22
04/09: 30
05/09: 27
06/09: 35
Notice a downward trend?
July 7th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
ditto on political comments. After reading several posts I’ve considered dumping this site but have yet to. I have plenty of other political sites i can visit if i want to read that. your site is in my money folder not in my politics folder.
July 7th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
I found this website back in the summer or fall of 2008 and loved it. Spent a lot of time poking around the archives and reading the new posts every day. Your financial advice posts are very helpful and informative.
I think you’ve kind of gotten away from that in the last several months. Just by scanning the last several posts, I see a few book reviews, some political commentary (which I don’t mind being thrown in the mix from time to time), and a few other random topics. But very few actual financial advice on budgeting, investing, money management.
I still enjoy your blog but I probably only frequent your blog about once a week or so now. I’m probably not the only one. You’ve just kind of gotten away from you bread and butter. Also, I wonder if the market crash last fall gave everyone heightened interest in personal finance, but as the economy continues to drag there is some fatigue (for lack of better word) setting in??? Just my $.02.
July 7th, 2009 at 3:48 pm
I check your blog every day (via RSS)and have no
complaints…..
July 7th, 2009 at 6:34 pm
JLP,
I’m going to use the term “index” in a different way here. But just curious if you’ve checked on whether all your pages are indexed? I’d first see where I stand in terms of search traffic. Also, analyze where the traffic is coming from…. Maybe pick an old post and see how it’s ranked.
If all your pages are fine, then maybe it’s time to do more networking. just some thoughts.
It’s possible that your site lost some authority/trust due to the hacking episode. But if that’s been resolved, you could get it back over time.
July 7th, 2009 at 6:56 pm
JLP,
I’ve had this happen to a few of my blogs over the years as well and scratched my head for answers, and also considered quitting the deal.
However, your problem, as was mine, is related purely to broken links. Forget your so-called friends advice above re: RSS and not returning to visit your site – this is totally related to search engines, namely Google.
I would suggest downloading a free version of XENU (type it into Google) and start checking through your site. I’ve already done a check on your site and found heaps of 404 errors – Google hates these and penalises accordingly.
Once you’ve cleaned all these up, either by deleting them or coding with rel=nofollow tag – my preference is the former – you can expect to see your stats begin to slowly increase again within the next week or two.
I haven’t taken a look but you may also want to consider how your blog is handling duplicate content. Check out info on canonical data.
All the best and I hope you don’t give it up. Your content is great and you disclose some great tidbits.
July 7th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Like all the other commenters said, maybe it’s partially due to RSS? But that’s still quite a bit. Gotta get a nerd/geek to check out your website and see if your traffic got routed somewhere else when your blog got hacked. I’ve been visiting your blog on and off for about 2-3 years so I don’t think you’ve lost your edge, probably something wrong with the website itself.
July 7th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
Truthfully, your postings became far too political and almost hostile at times. This a supposed to be a personal finance blog, and instead I found rantings about society or politics.
When you posted your feelings about those on foodstamps buying junkfood, I nearly vomited – then I posted an angry response to what I viewed as your arrogance/ignorance. I quit visiting, and cancelled the RSS feed long ago.
Now I see I’ve not been alone in these feelings.
You are an extremely intelligent, gifted person in the financial arena, and I enjoy your writing skills. You speak with clarity and a strong voice, yet sometimes you do lack compassion and can be judgmental. I don’t see that on my other favorite financial blogs.
If your heart is no longer in this, then let it go. It’s okay to evolve and move on.
If your heart is in it, then renew your commitment and get busy dedicating yourself to interesting posts and subjects. Finance is not static.
July 8th, 2009 at 3:16 am
It’s all relative. At your June lull, your blog still had more visits than what my blog has ever achieved at its peak in April (tax season). Yours still has twice the traffic than mine now. Although I also wish more people visit my blog, I don’t mind being a hidden gem. Like many others said, regular readers read via RSS feed. If you care more about visits to the site, you are discounting the loyal, regular readers in favor of search users.
Because of the financial crisis and the recession, there is more competition in finance related articles. Mainstream media run them. There are also more blogs. After all, there are only a limited number of keywords. As good as Google is, it must have a hard time figuring out which content is of better quality. Maybe Google bumped your older articles which used to show up in top positions to the second page. Your articles are still good. Google just got confused because there are so many similar ones.
July 8th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
I have to echo those commenters who say that your political posts leave me wanting. However, I disagree with those who suggest you discontinue them because they are out of place. Politics and finance are not discrete issues. My dissappointment with your political comments is that they are not thought out. I’m not goint to sift through your older posts to prove this point, but you often simply jab at a politician or their proposal simply because of who the politician is. While that’s quite normal in our day to day life, it’s terrible writing. Fox news (and many other sources) does a great disservice to both journalism and the citizens by relying on the loyalty of those who enjoy simply badmouthing their opponents instead of engaging them with real dialogue. And I’m not saying this as someone who must forcibly engage every stray lunatick I meet. But the point of view they (and you) dismiss is one shared by approximately half the nation. While this says nothing abut it being legitimate, it certainly speak to the necessity of dialogue.
On a different note, I am very interested in your personal experiences on how you make ends meet, whether it be with this site or otherwise. I would not dwell on this too much, but I would welcome a follow up post in a few months.
I hope, nonetheless, that you will not put too much faith in these comments, because they may not speak for those who no longer come here. I suggest examining those articles that were read the most, or at least those that called for the most comments, and see what you were doing there that attracted the readers.
For what it’s worth, I get an RSS feed of your headlines, but I come to your site to read any article that tickles my interest. Again, for what it’s worth, I don’t think I’ve ever clicked on an adsense ad in my life.
July 8th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
RSS
July 8th, 2009 at 6:33 pm
thing is…investing is so depressing these days…we are all getting our lives back, i think. when the market turns, everybody will be back
July 8th, 2009 at 8:23 pm
I can say that I haven’t been visiting your site in a while. I used to visit a lot when you had more insight articles into the why behind stocks, etc. Now, I search out other websites. As someone who feels like their finances are pretty well in order, I don’t want to hear much about “spend less than you earn and earn more than your spend.” That being said, I don’t visit many PF blogs anymore for that reason. Maybe if you had articles that dealt with other financial info you could tap into another type of reader.
July 9th, 2009 at 1:24 pm
I agree with those who note that your postings have become more political. I also think that your responses to those who disagree with you seem very hostile. I used to visit the site nearly everyday, but had started feeling uncomfortable with the way you mixed political opinion into your financial advice. I finally stopped visiting regularly back in November when you hinted that a one-day drop in the stock market was due to the election of Obama.
Like Nazim above, I wouldn’t mind if you showed the connection between political developments and their economic consequences, but if you do that, it needs to be a thoughtful analysis. I’d also like to see you be more open to those who disagree with you.
I’ve just recently started looking in again from time to time. I wanted to see if you had gotten back on message. I’ll check back from time-to-time now to see if you make a course correction. I hope you will. I used to enjoy the site.
July 9th, 2009 at 1:29 pm
Thanks for all the honesty, everyone.
Claire,
It’s not my intent to respond with hostility. But, I guess I come across that way (just like commenters come across that way too).
I still think these issues should be talked about. They are important and we gain nothing when we sweep them under the rug.
July 10th, 2009 at 1:00 am
JLP – I didn’t mean to leave you with the impression that the numbers don’t matter. I meant that they cannot be the driving force behind your site. If this is your only income, I can see it being a much larger issue.
Visitor traffic can fluctuate for many reasons. By bringing it up though you got a great deal of honest feedback on your site from the eyes of your customers. You also admit that you had some issues earlier with a site hack. It takes time to rebuild those things.
As a new visitor I have enjoyed what I have read. I find political posts entertaining or education depending on how they are expressed.
I hope your traffic returns as does your passion for this site.
Sincerely
Scott Lovingood
July 10th, 2009 at 10:30 am
JLP – Might I suggest adding a twitter feed? I don’t use my RSS reader much anymore since I found twitter. Now I mainly go directly to sites that I find interesting when they post a twitter update with the headline and/or teaser.
Just a thought!
July 10th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
I used to enjoy coming here regularly, but I’m considering unsubscribing. Yours was one of the few blogs that went deeper into financial topics, further beyond the “spend less than you earn” and “put money in your 401k”.
Recently, the post quality has diminished, and I agree with others on the negative feelings generated by the political bent. Everyone’s got a political side, but as a middle of the road person, I’d prefer a more even handed, ‘here’s one side, but here’s the flip side’ type of treatment. Neither side is right (or wrong) all of the time.
I think your closing statement “If things don’t turn around or I don’t get this figured out, I may just concentrate my efforts elsewhere,” pretty much does it for me. If you don’t care anymore, don’t ask why your traffic is down. You have your answer… and I think I have mine.
July 10th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Gee Sally…thanks for your support.
I do appreciate everyone’s honesty–even if it’s not what I want to hear.
July 11th, 2009 at 1:43 am
JLP,
You have your answer in this mock focus group. I stopped coming to this blog when it took a political angle. I have over 100 RSS feeds and if the article is good, I’ll click through so I disagree with RSS being the issue in fact, it may get you more traffic from loyal readers.
And it wasn’t so much the politics but how poorly you were arguing a side. It became Fox News like. It is clear you understand finance and you put together great Excel data. Not so much with politics. You lost your audience because of this. Like many other comments, people would come to this site for the financial advice. When it took a political slant, people must have thought this is becoming like a Drudge Report or a DailyKos.
And from your comment, I sense that you are losing passion with this. Good writing comes from deep within so maybe you should examine what you want to do next.
July 13th, 2009 at 11:23 am
JLP,
I think you should write what you’re passionate about, because that’s when it’s interesting. Many people wrote about having other political sites they visit for “that kind” of information. Well, there are many other financial blogs too. There are so many blogs that people can find whatever they want. That’s why I think it’s most important for you to decide what your blog is about and not let your readers dictate it. After all, you’re the one that has to write it!
P.S. I guess I’m different from most of your commentors. I enjoyed your finance/political posts and especially the comments about them. I was excited when you created your A Political Matters site, but you rarely post there. But then, I agree with your politics.
July 17th, 2009 at 6:48 am
If this market driven interest rate is manipulated by increasing the money supply (money being used to measure wealth), investors and consumers are fooled into thinking that, a) Investors can make the investments and b) Consumers can keep on consuming. This creates a dislocation of consumption versus investment or savings, ending up in resources being gobbled up faster than if the investments were not made or the consumption delayed. This is the boom-bust cycle