Readership figures for political blogs are secret – especially the further you go into the furthest flung corners of the blogosphere. In fact, apart from the very top bloggers, everyone else is mostly silent about their readership figures.
That’s because the fall-off in readership from the top 2 blogs to even the 5th most popular blog is huge. It’s ‘distribution of wealth around the world’ types of curves, and that makes Guido & Iain the sort of Bill and Melissa Gates of blogging.
It seems barely credible to talk about a political blogging phenomenon so much as Iain Dale and Paul Staines just happen to run very successful websites that just happen to be blogs that just happen to be in a genre that’s normally very, very niche.
Let’s get some numbers out there to put things in perspective:
Guido got 300,000 absolute unique visitors this month (let’s call this ’100%’ of the political blog readership.) That’s with the help of television and the press and being a huge story himself.
Lib Dem Voice, the top Liberal Democrat blog, got 30,000 absolute unique visitors (10% of Guido’s readership) this month, and this is the biggest Lib Dem blog. That’s already a huge drop off. According to Wikio, Lib Dem Voice is the 6th most influential political blog.
This first month for charlottegore.com…. deep breath…. I got 4,250 absolute unique visitors (a teeny bit over 1.41% of Guido’s readership, or over 14.1% of the Lib Dem Voice’s readership). Those 4,250 visited 22,182 times between them. Hardcore!
I have no idea how this compares to other lib dem bloggers – I suspect that if you were to line us all up in terms of traffic I’d be in the top 10, I believe – but I’d be extremely worried about the state of the Lib Dem blogosphere as a whole if I was in the top 5.
What does all this mean though? What does it say about this ‘industry’ of political blogging. I think it means the vast majority of people reading political blogs are only reading one or two political blogs – Iain and/or Guido – the names mentioned on television and the newspapers. The further away from these two blogs people are: (one click? two clicks? three clicks? six clicks?) The number of readers drops off sharply with every click, requiring individuals to be a lot more determined to find and seek out interesting content.
This is why I don’t get, “ughhhg!! LUBDUMBS R stp00p1d LOLZZZLL!!!111″ type comments. Long may that continue.
So I think all in all I’m doing better than I probably should be (even if I’m probably not doing as well as people imagined), and that the people who visit this blog are as tenacious, stubborn and obsessed by politics as I am. Probably not as obsessed about the minutea of the blogosphere itself though… I really should ban myself from these ‘shop talk’ posts.
Roger Thornhill said...
1 May 09 at 5:04 pm
“This is why I don’t get, “ughhhg!! LUBDUMBS R stp00p1d LOLZZZLL!!!111? type comments.”
I must be slipping.
Charlotte Gore said...
1 May 09 at 5:14 pm
Lolllzzz!!!!1111
Mark Reckons said...
1 May 09 at 5:20 pm
That’s a great post Charlotte. I have not bothered publishing any stat porn because my figures are pretty low and it seems a bit pointless. However you make a very good point that as a result we don’t know how we are collectively doing.
I have only been seriously going since December 2008 so that’s 5 months and I have had a steady month on month increase in my traffic. In April I had 2,635 unique visitors from 3,271 visits and 4,246 page views so I am still quite a long way short of your good self and miles off LDV! Mind you, I got linked to from one of the main Ian Tomlinson stories on Guardian.co.uk and also Guido linked to me the other day in one of his main posts about the Downing Street petition, both of which boosted me a fair bit.
One thing I have found quite satisfying though is that I often find I am top or near the top for searches fitting the criteria of my posts within Google’s blog search and that is increasingly becoming a substantial source of traffic.
Anyway, I agree about getting a better quality of comments when we are niche and I am not sure how I would manage the volume of comments that Dale-o and Guido-o get!
Costigan Quist said...
1 May 09 at 5:36 pm
My unique visitors are within a gnat’s whisker of yours, Charlotte, which I guess makes sense given how we’re snuggled together on Wikio, with just Jennie squeezed between us.
Charlotte Gore said...
1 May 09 at 5:37 pm
Getting yourself linked by the Guardian and Guido is something I’ve never managed, so kudos to you
Laurence Boyce said...
1 May 09 at 6:35 pm
Yes, you should definitely avoid these shop talk posts! But you’ve done it now, so I may as well join in. First, the blog is just great Charlotte. It looks great, the content is great, I really hope you can win some recognition. By contrast, Lib Dem Voice strikes me as being run by a bunch of guys who, for some strange reason, really don’t want it to be a great success. Harsh, but I think fair. Maybe that is a metaphor for Lib Dems as a whole? I do hope not.
I would however dispute the notion that any of these blogs are particularly “influential.” I read Iain Dale every day, but it doesn’t influence me at all – that is in the sense of changing the way I see things, as opposed to photons merely hitting my retina. I read Dale because he is informative and entertaining – that is all. I never read Guido – he is totally overrated in my view. I think your blog may have influenced me a tiny bit – made me realise that I can be a bit bolder in socking it to the lefties!
Don’t obsess over the stats Charlotte. You’re saying something vital and original and that is all that matters.
Stu said...
1 May 09 at 6:41 pm
If you’re looking for visitors, obsession is a good thing. People read your blog because their interested in the way you speak about the thing you’re obsessed about. Guido is obsessed with political sleaze. Iain Dale is obsessed with political gossip. You’re obsessed with Liberal ideologies. DK is obsessed with libertarianism.
You carve out your niche, try and become the best person to serve it, and then everyone who’s interested in that niche will come along and read.
I’m going to write a blog post about some of the wider points you made, though.
Charlotte Gore said...
1 May 09 at 7:11 pm
Laurence,
Oo that’s made my day that has
Bunny Smedley said...
1 May 09 at 7:19 pm
At the risk of sounding rather unworldly, how do people work out these ‘absolute unique visitor’ stats? By which I mean, how does one find this out?
As you may have gathered, building a mass readership isn’t exactly central to my plans – I’m much more interested in finding the two or three people who’ll read all the way through a 6,000 word post than two or three thousand people who’ll visit the site, scan the headlines and leave a few seconds later. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but, well, horses for courses, as Stu more or less said.
Charlotte Gore said...
1 May 09 at 7:39 pm
Typically people use Google Analytics. I honestly don’t know how you get that added to a wordpress.com blog though, or even if you can (a quick search says ‘no’)
Perhaps someone else who uses WordPress.com can advise? This blog self-hosted which means I get to fiddle with all the various bits and pieces, whereas I think you’re more limited in what they allow you to do.
Bunny Smedley said...
1 May 09 at 8:39 pm
Thanks, Charlotte. I hope you’re better at poker than I am at understanding code!
Guido Fawkes said...
1 May 09 at 9:08 pm
I started with 60 uniques a month. It stayed in three figures for a year. Then one hot story and a bit of marketing…
S. Weasel said...
1 May 09 at 9:19 pm
I don’t know. In the circle of political blogs I read, most people leave their stat counters out where people can click on them and check stats. Matter of honor, I guess. Also, there’s more of a gradual tailing off between the top and the bottom.
These are mostly American blogs, though, so perhaps that’s different.
Stu said...
1 May 09 at 9:21 pm
For what it’s worth, I wrote up my thoughts on why we’re not competing, and why the best bet is to find a niche and be the best at it.
I think you’re looking at what you call the ‘political blogging industry’ entirely the wrong way – it’s not one market where we’re all competing for a finite number of visitors, it’s an infinite number of markets where we each find the readership that are interested in what we have to say.
Also, as Guido says, it’s as much about being in the right place at the right time, and knowing what to do with that luck.
Stephen Tall said...
1 May 09 at 9:52 pm
Laurence – “Lib Dem Voice strikes me as being run by a bunch of guys who, for some strange reason, really don’t want it to be a great success. Harsh, but I think fair. Maybe that is a metaphor for Lib Dems as a whole? I do hope not.”
Bless you, Laurence.
There’s loads of room for improvement in LDV, all of us would be the first to admit, but for a volunteer-run site with no full-time staff and no big-money investor I think we do alright. The fact that our readership has doubled in the last year suggests we’re doing something right.
cheers, stephen
Mark Pack said...
1 May 09 at 9:54 pm
For one reason or another, I’ve seen the stats for a fair number of Lib Dem blogs. It’s up to the individual bloggers to decide whether or not to publish them, but I’m not giving away any secret information if I highlight that there is only an extremely, extremely weak relationship between the amount of traffic different blogs get and how many comments they attract. Curious, but it does mean I think that some low traffic blogs are doing better than the traffic numbers suggest because they are successfully getting at least some people talking and discussing.
Plato said...
1 May 09 at 10:17 pm
I never quite understand why some blogs are shy about their stats whatever they are.
I consider mine to be a place to vent my spleen or stick up what I found funny, appalling or provocative.
In light of your post, I looked at my blog roll again and no wonder I get some very odd Google searches from wedding cakes to naked skin-heads.
Your blog is the only LD one I visit – the rest are insufferably smug or boring IMHO!
jack night said...
1 May 09 at 10:30 pm
on a good day 1500 visits. Average 30k per month. Post orwell 60k day 1, 20k day 2 now stable @ 2k. Am on phone keyboard…sorry 4 txt spk.
oldrightie said...
1 May 09 at 10:37 pm
I get sod all but it still gives me a place to vent my anger and despair at left wing stupidity and dogma. It’s mine!!!!!!!
Michael Fowke said...
1 May 09 at 10:40 pm
I get about 15,000 hits a month (maybe 10,000 of those are unique, I don’t know), and I am absolutely nowhere on Wikio. Wikio is dominated by political blogs that all link to each other. Life is so unfair!
Stu said...
1 May 09 at 10:57 pm
Mark Pack: “doing better than the traffic numbers suggest because they are successfully getting at least some people talking and discussing”
YES! EXACTLY!
You choose your own metric by which to judge your success – some people use page view stats to judge their own success, but others might use the number of comments they get, or the number of times they are linked to by other blogs, or even just how they feel about their own writing.
The point is, only you can decide what metric I most important to you, which renders the idea of comparing raw page views near enough pointless.
Twosser said...
1 May 09 at 10:59 pm
I get about 50 per day…and I do not have a blog.
Technomist said...
1 May 09 at 11:05 pm
If I get a hundred visitors a day, I am very happy.
Constantly Furious said...
1 May 09 at 11:07 pm
I’ve only been running a few days, but I’m finding the “ooh I’ve got a voice” feeling to be far outweighing the numbers. I don’t look at the numbers. 2102 in 2 weeks/. The numbers don’t bother me. Refresh, dammit.
Martin said...
1 May 09 at 11:24 pm
I rarely hit 100 a day, for two reasons.
1. I rarely say anything recently, due to examness.
2. It’s not worth reading anyway.
killer said...
2 May 09 at 12:06 am
i kicked a guy to death the other day for £6. what a waste of time . noone has any money anymore.
Jennie said...
2 May 09 at 12:31 am
* snuggles between Costigan and Charlotte *
Right then, who’s got the brandy?
(YorksherGob could get 1500-2000 on a good day, more usually 900-1000, but that’s visits, not Absolute unique thingies. Look forward to using analytics on the DW blog. Couldn’t use it on LJ).
MatGB said...
2 May 09 at 12:35 am
When I blogged on Blogger, and then on my own WordPress, I checked stats religiously, and for awhile they were very good (for the time, late ’05/early ’06). But by todays standards they’d be considered piss poor.
Guido’s right. One good story, you get the traffic, if you’re good enough, you can then keep the traffic, or at least some of it.
When I stopped trying to be a serious blogger and went back to just LJ, well, no stat counting. But I’ve got people involved in politics, I normally get decent comment discussions, I’ve had letters written to MPs as a result of what I’ve posted.
By my metric, that’s important. Hell, I’ve even got paid work out of it.
Stats aren’t as important as the top flight want to think, unless you’re chasing ad revenue.
I do recall beating Guido in the search rankings for one specific scandal, and the traffic for that was phenomenal.
Mark, it takes about 3 months for Google to start paying attention to a new blog. At that point, a reasonable number of incoming links’ll give you a good search presence. That’ll give you traffic.
The important thing is how many of those readers can you convert in to coming back. That’s partially what Charlotte’s sidebar is trying to do.
Meh, not sober. I really ought to write this up. I’ve been promising Dr Pack I’d do it for months. Someone make me?
Charlotte Gore said...
2 May 09 at 1:01 am
Did I say something controversial? Christ you go away for a few hours…
Hmm yes, hits is not the be all and end all. I guess just having a lib dem site with the word ‘libertarian’ in the title and actually meaning it is pretty much the point these days. I reckon I get my money’s worth, put it that way.
S. Weasel said...
2 May 09 at 1:07 am
No, Charlotte — Guido gave you a link, and he’s the hitfather right now. w00t!
Unless you were an early adopter, nobody gets page views just for showing up. There are upwards of ninety million blogs at last count. If you want-a da hits, you have to work out what you bring to the party that is unique.
Interesting job description? Insider? Are you funny? Good researcher? Cartoonist? A keyboard and an opinion aren’t going to cut it.
It’s a convenient myth that Drudge is an ordinary bloke who had a great story fall in his lap. Same for Guido. Truth is, both of them scrabbled around for a long time, establishing themselves as good reads (and honest receivers).
Meh, not sober also.
Charlotte Gore said...
2 May 09 at 1:40 am
Ah… so he did. Ha. He’s trouble that man.
Yeah what you’re saying about having a unique pitch is bang on, bringing something distinct. I think what Stu’s said about having your niche – mine seems to be one of political positioning and good, interesting discussion, which is a super-micro niche, but it’s cool and I get a lot of non-aligned, libertarian, tory and lib dem readers, and this stops me going mad.
Hmm shop talk officially bad but it does give people a chance to vent stuff doesn’t it?
Henry North London said...
2 May 09 at 5:59 am
Its taken me 2 years to achieve readership of about a 1000 hits plus a month…
Hard graft and decent SEO articles
my most popular item to date and the one responsible for a myriad of hits
Type History Baileys Irish Cream into Google
Rorschach's lemming said...
2 May 09 at 7:28 am
Now, Charlotte. If you were to simply post regular photos of yourself in your skimpies, your traffic would increase. Not rocket science, is it.
Letters From A Tory said...
2 May 09 at 9:07 am
Charlotte, I have a self-hosted WordPress site and have Statcounter as my stats package. I think Google Analytics might have a few more functions, but Statcounter just needs you to add one line of code to your self-hosted WordPress blog and it tracks everyone and everything for you.
Wordpress.com is a pain because you have to use their own stats package (which only gives hits, not visitors) and you can’t add Google Analytics or anything other package as far as I’m aware.
dick dolby said...
2 May 09 at 9:41 am
But surely the point of the ‘blogosphere’ is that unlike the ‘main stream media’ you can find something very very specific to you. Say, youghurt knitting in Romania. Or something, er, ‘specialist’ pastimes.. If all blogs had to aspire to Guido level traffic they would either have to be as bland as Radio 2, or go into the gutter to get the ‘Red Top Traffic’, like the Sunday Sport News of the People Screwing..
Stu said...
2 May 09 at 10:18 am
LFaT, I use StatCounter and Analytics. Statcounter is great for casual voyeurism (and noticing when people link to you), Analytics is brilliant at looking at long-term trends, and their Unique Visitors count seems more reliable.
The WordPress.com stats are rubbish – just raw pageviews with no way to block your own visits by a cookie or IP like you can with Analytics and statcounter, so you have to make sure you’re logged in all the time or you’ll show up on your own stats. Those stats are very much a ‘feel good’ function rather than a tool for people who are interested in their visitors, where they come from and what they’re interested in.
Plato said...
2 May 09 at 10:37 am
I use web-stat.com – it’s great but not free, pays ye money…
And on the subject of niche blogs – I link to this one – about appalling cake decoration.
It gets thousands of hits and shed loads of comments every day.
Hanging Chad said...
2 May 09 at 11:21 am
Dear Charlotte – it’s the old, old problem. The “fustest gets the mostest”, so Guido has a head start. Political blogging isn’t “WHAT I had for breakfast” – more like “WHO I had for breakfast”. All jugular veins and red meat, the thrill of the chase. I don’t want to see Bambi get eaten, I want the blogging predator to bring down lions, donkeys and jackals, chew their bones and show me their entrails – in the certain knowledge that they deserve it.
LibCync said...
2 May 09 at 11:43 am
Take a few 0s of that figure to get mine! Must try harder..
About 50% of my traffic is through google searches. Still get several people a day searching for variations on “wire in the blood cancelled?”.
Belinda said...
2 May 09 at 12:26 pm
We get around 5000 on the blogs on out site
Laurence Boyce said...
2 May 09 at 1:54 pm
Thanks Stephen. You’re right of course, LDV isn’t so bad. I shall look forward to my next intensely frustrating disappearing comments experience. Although to be honest, I think I’ve more or less said everything I’ve got to say. Religion bad, socialism bad, civil liberties – we’ve got them, stop complaining . . . what else? Did I say religion was bad?
Anyway, thanks for publishing all my stuff. We had some interesting conversations, and I managed to make myself really unpopular. But I don’t think I ever influenced anyone, at least not in the direction I would have liked.
But the next time you redesign LDV, why not ask Charlotte? She obviously knows a thing or two about this interweb thing, and I believe she charges very reasonable rates.
Charlotte Gore said...
2 May 09 at 6:22 pm
Nah Laurence you do good work, especially on the faith issue. Would be awful if you gave up.
Laurence Boyce said...
2 May 09 at 8:31 pm
I’m all blogged out Charlotte. Tired of being repeatedly abused and misrepresented. Though to be fair I’ve done a fair amount of abusing myself so can’t complain.
David Davis said...
3 May 09 at 10:34 am
For The Libertarian Alliance, if anyone is interested, our Feb, March and April total page views were 42,132, 46,446 and 34,361: all these from approximately half those numbers of actual unique visitors. April was a bit thin on new material, and I had other things to do.
We started in October 2006, with three (3) views in total. I don’t know where this puts us in rankings.
Don't Call Me Dave said...
3 May 09 at 1:42 pm
Unless you are running a political blog for a living, chasing hits can be a detraction from your main purpose of getting a message across.
My blog Not The Barnet Times receives a fraction of the hits of Guido’s site, but the number of people who are likely to be interested in Barnet’s political scene compared to the national scene is obviously going to be smaller. It doesn’t mean that the blog is less effective pro rata.
There is nothing wrong with niche blogging! As long as you receive enough hits to make your efforts worthwhile, then continue.
Alex said...
6 May 09 at 6:56 pm
May I add my “ughhhg!! LUBDUMBS R stp00p1d LOLZZZLL!!!111??
I feel I have to do my bit.