If you are trying to grow your traffic, you have to first understand your visitors. When I first started blogging I thought that I could get a better understanding of who you are by just interacting with you through comments and emails.
Boy, was I wrong! Yes, I did learn some things about you through your comments and emails, but the majority of you don’t comment or email me.
After realizing this, I decided to survey you and dig through my analytics. Here is what I learned about you.
You love entrepreneurship
As you can probably tell from my about page, I started Quick Sprout as a personal branding blog.
If you want to become a “rock star” in your industry, you have come to the right place.
But over time it slowly changed into a blog about entrepreneurship. The interesting thing is, the change didn’t happen because of me, it happened because of you. You wanted me to blog on things that were more related to entrepreneurship. I didn’t realize this until I surveyed you a few times.
Because of these surveys, I started blogging about business related topics and traffic started going up. On top of that you promoted Quick Sprout on other entrepreneur focused sites like Hacker News, which has resulted in huge traffic spikes.
You engage when you come from Twitter
Although Google.com is my number 1 source of traffic, Google visitors aren’t engaging. They don’t subscribe to my RSS feed and more importantly, they aren’t commenting on the blog.
On the other hand referring sites like Twitter are driving a small amount of traffic, but those visitors are commenting on the blog. Once I learned about this I added Twitter (ReTweet) buttons at the bottom of each blog post, which has increased traffic and engagement.
You want me to blog more often
Another thing that I learned from the survey is that your biggest complaint about me, and I agree with it, is that I don’t blog often enough. Sometimes I will only blog once a month, while other times I will blog once a week. If I kept a more consistent schedule you would read Quick Sprout more often.
Over the course of the next 30 days I am going to try and blog on a regular basis, so that you come back more often. 
You love when I write about search engine optimization
The most popular keyword searches you perform on Quick Sprout are related to Internet marketing. Although Quick Sprout is a blog about entrepreneurship, this does make sense because my background is in Internet marketing.
I will start blogging a bit more about marketing related topics. After all, marketing is a key component to every great company. As an entrepreneur you need to know about the latest marketing tactics that work.
You like my old content
You visit the old content on the blog more often than the new content. Since you aren’t just reading the new stuff I publish, I need to do a better job of cross-linking my old blog posts with my new ones and vice versa. This will help you find more content, more easily… especially if you are new to the blog.
Maybe I should consider listing out the most popular posts in my sidebar.
You want to be rich, if you already aren’t.
The most popular way you tend to find Quick Sprout is by searching for the phrase “how to become rich” on Google. After finding this out I decided to write a few blog posts about my financial failures. It is hard to teach you how to get rich; since chances are that you will make your money in a different way then me. On the other hand it is much more realistic to tell you what you shouldn’t be doing if you want to be rich.
You tend to StumbleUpon my blog posts
You probably use StumbleUpon, and if you do, you tend to stumble the new blog posts I write during the weekdays. The interesting thing is, although you read older blog posts, you rarely stumble those.
So if I want to get the most traffic from StumbleUpon I need to publish my blog posts early in the morning because every time I write a blog post at night or on the weekend, you tend not to stumble much on Quick Sprout.
You are actually using Bing
Who would of thought that you are using Bing? I am actually getting a significant amount of traffic from Bing. This tells me that I shouldn’t ignore browsers like Internet Explorer because most of you Bing users are using Internet Explorer.
At the end of the day if your website isn’t compatible with all major web browsers, you are going to lose a lot of readers.
Conclusion
And to wrap it all up, here is the most important thing I learned about you.
Drum roll please
I know very little about you!
Although I can learn a lot about you by surveying you or digging deep into my analytics, there is still a lot that I don’t know about you. So if you could, please leave a comment with something about yourself; don’t be shy!
And if you don’t know much about me, feel free to check out my about page.
PS: Hopefully this blog post teaches you that you should try to learn as much as possible about your visitors. And once you get to know them, don’t stop learning because peoples’ interests, preferences, and tastes change over time.
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Interesting stats Neil, and great insight into why they matter too.
It’s interesting to see everything you’ve collected. Makes me wonder: do you, personally, think it was well worth the time and effort to setup and sort this data?
Absolutely! You should run your blog like a business. Knowing this data will allow you to put more focus on the areas that are bringing you traffic.
really cool! I am working on my new blog of mine, and I think it’s high time I do some kind of research on my readers/potential readers … thanks for this !
No problem Dinu! I hope it works out well for you.
Good stuff, yo! There is so much information you can glean off of analytics, yet many seem to overlook this data. Even seasoned internet marketers/SEOs!
Stumbled!
Thanks CK! Everyone should know this type of info for their blog in efforts to grow:)
Interesting look at analysing survey data but what survey software did you use for that, I’ve never seen results displayed so simply and elegantly before?
I like the cloud tag for custom answers, I’m assuming?
Kissmetrics.com
I had a feeling those analytic reports where something to do with Kissmetrics. They look really comprehensive by the way, nice job!
Thanks, it gives you a very clean observation with where traffic is coming from.
Awesome run down and should make every blog owner take a deeper look into their stats and what their reader want.
yes you are right.Its Neil’s ability to attract people through his attention by making his interaction with users.
It is very useful to install Google Analytics to your blog, to be able to track all the visitor traffic to your blog and learn more about the ways your visitors interact on you blog site. Here in Neil’s post you can see deeper look into some of the statistics you should keep an eye on regularly:
Exactly Zac, knowing what your readers want will only get them to come back…and hopefully bring friends
Are these kissmetrics?
yeah I think it is… it looks awesome
Yeah they do!
Kissmetrics? I didn’t know about that stats tracking software, I’ve been using Google Analytics, maybe I’ll give it a shot, since Neil is using it =D
Till then,
Jean
There are many features of Google Analytics that can benefit your search engine optimization campaign. The Google algorithm used for ranking sites for example includes many of the aspects that analytics will show you including bounce rate, length of time on the site & the referring sites you are getting traffic you get. These are all important things to keep track of to help you with increasing your ranking on Google. You want a low bounce rate or to limit the number of people who leave your site in 30 seconds or less, you want to keep visitors on you site as long as possible and also increase the number of referred traffic coming to your site.
Bounce rates and things like that having a role on your search engine rankings is a Myth, or at the very least pure speculation from webmasters and no one outside of the Google Search engine coders, really knows for sure.
Naturally though… you should aim for a lower bounce rate, and a a higher average time of your visitors on your websites, regardless of the search engines.
Till then,
Jean
A good way to make use of your bounce rate stats is to measure the efficacy of content changes. When you make a content change, record your bounce rate. Then make a comparison after a week and see if you are encouraging visitors to move further into your site.
@ used tires : There is a real possibility that bounce rate is a significant ranking factor right now. Even if it isn’t, it is my opinion that it will be made a factor in the near future. Even if it is not a factor, and even if it does not become one, there are plenty of reasons to look closely a bounce rate anyway.†– Eric Enge; Search Engine Land
Again though… it is all speculation… I have seen a conference video where someone asked Matt Cutt’s whether Google uses data from their Analytics to affect their search engine rankings, and Matt Cutt’s said no, and it would be in Google’s best interest to do that. So there is no way that Google would use their own Bounce Rate from Google Analytics to influence the ranking of a website.
In the end.. my point is… we can all speculate what the search engines base their rankings on, but in the end it’s about proving real value to the person visiting your website, and trying to achieve the best website possible. And yes naturally you should try to decrease your bounce race, and the time the user stays on the website, but it’s just my belief that it doesn’t have an effect on your ranking.
I just am one to believe that What makes you rank in the search engines, isn’t as complicated as some people make it out to be. There are some factors that people thin effect their rankings, that would be just way too much time consuming (run-time wise for a machine) for Google to attempt.
Till then,
Jean
I should also mention… that I used to be in the Software Engineering Field, but I’ve now switched over to Finance, so I do have alot of experience with coding, and Software in general of what it takes to achieve, certain operations on a computer. There are some operations that may seem easy for a computer to do, but it could take even a computer a long time before it completes the calculation.
Till then,
Jean
Google Analytics has many great tools, so one should definitely spend the time to watch the tutorials
I think it was a Spanish writer the one who said that the first kiss is not given with your lips, but it is actually given with your eyes. That is very nice and poetic, but for the ones who are a little more practical (IE, 98 % of us) this site is going to be both helpful and funny.Try it.
wow, nicely said
You will hear about it soon enough
sneak peek
Really good thought.
To add to your point on people looking at old articles. This is an issue for google and links from other sites, as they will always be for older articles. They have to be live for a few days-weeks-months for crawlers and other sites to find and list them.
So cover topics in monthly or yearly cycles. The old articles from that topic will rank better than the new but if they link easily to the new the visitor will find them and keep reading.
found on twitter
I don’t disagree with most of your comment.
For “breaking news” or other truely New stuff with little information already available, if you have a RSS feed and are using Feedburner then Google knows when you have new content and will index it. So for these truely New things / happenings you could be on the first page of Google fairly quickly.
I did a post around 11:30pm one night and the next morning I googled the “event” and was #2 on the results. The only site above me was the actual site mentioned in the event which had been established months before.
The point being that it probably doesn’t take days-weeks-months for crawlers to find you if you are sending out a RSS signal saying you have new content. Putting you on the results page is a different story though.
Right, so it’s very important to have a clear and easy path to that page. The more ways to enter, the more traffic you’ll see.
Neil, I’m Chris – A guy building 3 web companies from Bali, Indonesia (I’m from UK)
I have just taken up surfing, love to eat out and like naked women.
Personally, I like the mix of content you publish, so I wouldn’t like you to change a thing – Although more often would be great.
The guy who inspired you for your most popular post “how to become rich” must be brilliant
Yeah I would agree that you just need to post more often. You have a very interesting life and you have done many interesting things. I bet if you write about more personal experiences and adventures you had, regardless of what they are, people will read.
Great article man!
Thanks, I’ll start writing more about my experiences since so many people are interested to know.
Hey You
I want to know more about “YOU”.
Exactly. Should there be an article about his whereabouts and what Neil was upto for a month and a half when he did not post a single article?
I got busy
, but I’ll become more consistent.
I will definitely write more about my experiences, so stay tuned!
Neil:
Interesting post and great views on why every author/blogger should try to learn from visitors.
Once thing I have noticed that visitors on this site, including me, would like to read more stuff on reality. I would like to read blog posts derived from authors’ personal experiences. It’s always good and easier to learn from someone’s experience. More you ‘walk the talk’ and reference your thoughts & ideas using personal adventures, I bet, more users would read and comment on the post. That way, it’s very straightforward to get what you are trying to say rather than imagine what we suppose to get!
In reference to list most popular posts in sidebar, I suggest to post a link on Twitter thru http://www.su.pr Along with the most popular posts on the blog, this would list the most popular content alongside each link.
Cheers,
Pritesh
http://twitter.com/mehta1p
Thanks Pritesh, I will begin to reference more of my experiences, don’t you worry
.
Interesting post! And yes,I’m the one who waiting your most popular posts in your sidebar
I’ll definitely begin to do that, thanks!
Hey Neil,
I discovered your site through stumbleupon a couple of weeks ago and have since subscribed and been reading it as much as possible. Keep up the great work!
One thing that I think would be really cool on your site is incorporating Skribit, which allows your readers to make suggestions for blog posts and vote on others’ suggestions. This would be a great way for you to find out what we (your readers) want to hear about. No, I’m not affiliated with Skribit in any way, its just a cool technology that I’ve seen on a couple of other peoples’ blogs and seems to be pretty useful.
Best,
Jeff Tougas
Thanks for subscribing Jeff,and I’ll look into Skribit, it looks interesting.
Neil – good to read this article. I get your updates on twitter and for some reason, always click and read! These days I find twitter to be my article/news source.
Twitter is an excellent source to be updated with the latest and most up to date info. Glad you came across my blog.
Neil, surveying is a great tool but can you drop a few resource links for us to understand where we can quickly find the tools to learn and survey our users?
Hey…found you on twitter and I can’t remember how! But I find your tweets v.interesting, and wanted to know more…so here I am!
/>#
In fact I think you may have inspired me to write a blog of my own!
That’s excellent Bhavini, glad you found me! I hope you enjoy my others posts
Just keep writing, and write as much as you can. We (or at least I) find your posts very inspirational.
As I grind away on startup after startup attempting to find that one that sticks, if I have been reminded of anything from you is that persistence is key.
Persistence is the one thing that all successful people have in common. Find a topic you are passionate about and stick with it. Don’t just blog about something to make money, blog about something you are very interested in.
Very cool post Neil, it is always awesome to look at Analytics of a website, as it can tell alot about website, and what you can do to improve it. Anyways.. I actually found your website not via search engine… not via twitter or anything like that, But I was refereed by a friend in the real world by word of mouth! =D
Till then,
Jean
you are right i learn from Neil’s post web analytics keeps you informed about visitors to your site in real time. It also tracks where the visit originated from and visitors are navigating through the website. This valuable information can be used to sell more products and improve advertising campaigns.
Exactly. knowing where your business comes from allows you to more focus on what needs improvement, and what you need to do to go to the next level.
Word of mouth is one of the best compliments I can receive, so thanks
2nd time I’ve ended up on your site from other sites (TechCrunch this time)
I think we could do some things better with our sites if we asked people instead of guessing… For now it is doing ok.
Right, guessing will just keep you running in circles. Be straight forward and ask, it will save you time.
I am really impressed with your interaction with your readers! Haven’t seen much of it across other blogs – definitely taking note!
i m impressed too….By this simple interaction with your readers they begin to feel like you care about them. Because you care, and are interested in your readers, they will become loyal to reading your blog and will help you out by sharing your blog with people they know.
It’s rare, so if you do it, you will be one of the few. Readers like yourself love it
Hi Neil, Here’s some info about me. 40 year old male on the mid-east coast of U.S. I found you recently after listening to your interview on mixergy.com. I’ve been checking here daily for the past couple of weeks and have been a bit disappointed at the lack of more frequent posts. (I’m still checking back regularly, though.) I started and run a business that now (10 years later) has over 130 employees. I continue to learn about all things business from entrepreneurs like you who go out of the way to teach and inform others. Lately I’ve been mostly interested in SEO, ad testing, and general marketing principals and tactics – both to use in my current business, and in some other side ventures I’m starting. Thanks for your honesty and all the info you give out!
Glad my interview helped you find Neil. Usually it goes the other way. He helps people find me.
And I agree with you. I want to see more posts. I like Neil’s writing style.
In suppose he’s very busy which is why he doesn’t post. Moreover, I just relaized that this isn’t his personal blog either which might be a reason why he always blogs about topics related to IM/SEO, etc.
I’ve been working on several different projects, but I made a promise to my readers and I’ll write more consitantly
Thanks Andrew, I will begin to write more posts more often.
David, be sure to look at some of my previous articles as they cover exactly the advice you seek. I will be posting more often, my goal is once a week.
8 Things I learned about you
This blog post tempted me to post my first blog comment ever. I’ll just follow your request about telling you about what I do on the web and why I’m a big fan of this blog.
After reading this blog post, http://www.quicksprout.com/2009/05/17/the-real-secret-to-successful-network/
I became more involved in the forum our industry uses to talk with competition (the biggest competition in the industry too!). Since then, I’ve had three companies approach me to give me their clients for free in order just to work for our coming soon website. THANKS!
Owning several hosting sites and communities, as well as designing the websites, and administering them is what I do on a daily basis.
Thanks for the great stuff. And maybe my future replies will be shorter, but hey, why not start out with a bang.
No worries Jesse, no need to cut yourself short ever, I would prefer for you to express your entire opinion more often. Glad you like my blog and it’s amazing that the post helped you achieve amazing results!
Good presentation Neil.. one thing I would improve about your website is navigation. I find it really difficult to browse to older posts. May be a page with all article title with links will help.. or is this intentional?
Thanks for the feedback, I’ll work on creating a better archive page.
Also its heartening to see so many people searching for your name on Google.. awesome
Yeah it’s fun
I am glad that you have decided to write more frequently on your blog. I also think if you added a list of the most popular blogs or a better way to navigate to material that is specific to a certain niche.
And YES I USE BING! I really like it. I know it sounds stupid but I like the way it is laid out. The images section is a lot better than Google’s and it’s more aesthetically pleasing!
lol, I’m glad you are
. I’ll work on creating easier navigation.
Interesting Neil. I’ m really amazed you really know the trick how to grab your reader.Yes i love when you write some thing about Search Engine.No i m not using bing.
Since most of my readers are interested in SEO, that’s exactly what I’ll provide.
Owning several hosting sites and communities, as well as designing the websites, and administering them is what I do on a daily basis.
Good! So this was problem a lot of stuff you already know about it
I just thought of an Idea Neil.. for your home-page to get some more links going to your most popular articles. What if on your sidebar on your home-page you had a link out to the most popular articles? I see alot of websites doing that. Shoemoney… the website you mention on your homepage as “Killer Blogs” also has that section on his sidebar, under the name “Reader Favorites”
Till then,
Jean
I’m actually looking into creating something like that right now
Thanks!
I’ve found this post really interesting because it is filled with stats and reports. This shows the analysis level one has to make when owning a site such as QuickSprout. As far as Bing is concerned I never really use it. I prefer Google. But the business person like you has to consider every source of traffic because the more you have, the faster you would be pushed towards success….
Always understand your source for traffic to help your focus. If certain sources are providing you with good traffic, you should put more time and energy on developing it.
Yes you are completely right. Also understanding what the visitor who comes to your website needs can massively help towards ameliorating the services that you offer. Am I right?
Yep, that’s exactly right
Hello Neil,
love your post. I’m a young african leaving in germany and “trying to be rich”, well actually “planning to be rich”,by learning from people who know better. It’ll be nice to read more often from you.Love Entrepreneurship, and plan to be a great entrepreneur.
Glad to hear it Charly, I hope you earn a lot of success!
We all hear it. We all say it. Everyone wants to be rich but, short of picking the lucky numbers or winning the Publisher’s Clearinghouse Sweepstakes, most people go don’t know how to amass the wealth they dream about
Yep, your right, most people are not willing to do what it takes to “earn” their success.
Wow! I was really moved by this post. This one great example of blogger’s care to his visitors. Thanks, I have learn greatly from this post.
BTW, I found your blog from JohnChow.
Vic
John’s a great friend of mine, so I’m glad you found me through him.
Enjoyed the post quite a bit.
I am just amazed that you got that much play from Bing. I tried the thing a couple times when it first went live and haven’t been back. Didn’t like anything about it, especially the results. When I was trying it I did comparisons w/ Google & Yahoo and just didn’t see the results I needed. I won’t waste everyone’s time expanding on my Bing opinion though.
I do use IE7 though, I like it better than Firefox, Chrome (haven’t used Safari but it is on atleast one machine I use). Hate IE8. I uninstalled it. If it ever gets forced on me I will move to Firefox or Chrome at that point.
I am a research analyst so Search Engine results and a Browser that I customize to maintain screen real estate while keeping tools handy are the most important online tools I use.
I don’t subscribe to any RSS feeds. I prefer to bookmark and check back when I have time. I only bookmark sites I really like/use and will delete a bookmark to make room for another (so I don’t have to scroll down my bookmark list).
In my spare time I am luckily not “smoking crack” as Neil would put it (a reference to his Mixergy interview).
Although, earning any less might put me in that category.
So there you have it: Research analyst during the day, with my family in the evenings, and staying off the crack in the mornings.
lol, yah the crack wont help. I was amazed with bing traffic too. It’s almost impossible to compete directly against google since they control so much of the market share.
Really Great article yu have written. I have also chaged the “About me” and truly influenced my traffic & interaction with users
The about me page is VERY important, so be sure to be very detailed
Nicely presented stats…i am a school going student.. i started my tech blog, but it did not work, now i m confused how to reintroduce my blog.. suggest something…
Choose something your passionate about and write. Your passion is what will come across and if people like it, they’ll promote it
Wow, I’m wondering where you got all that cool information from. Crazy Egg?
No I think it is kissmetrics in private beta that he is developing
kissmetrics, coming soon
Hello Neil,
This is my first visit to your blog and I came to your blog from atniz.com.I liked your this post the most as it has the grassroots points for becoming successful online.Also I came to know about survey.io in which I’m going to add my survey.
Regarding comments in your site Neil I would like to tell that people generally comment in do follow blogs.Your blog is no follow and I think that may b the reason to get less comments as you are saying but I don’t think you r getting less comments.
Anyway I’m adding your blog in my Google reader too.
Thanks
People comment because they are genuinely interesting in adding to the conversation. Don’t worry about do/no follow and put focus on writing interesting and unique content.
Thanks for publishing some of your stats.
I am also finding that Bing traffic is strangely high for some of my websites. For some reason it appears that the algorithm they use is a lot more generous and so I am getting some very competitive keywords there that I could only dream about on Google.
I also took a look at Alexa this morning and Bing was on the home page showing the most amazing spike in traffic ever. In fact, advertising BING on Google and Yahoo is a great way of instantly getting to the top of search engines.
This is happening to mysite as well. Don’t know how! Let me know if anyone figures this out.
Its a fantastic idea to take advantage of it now, before more people start targeting bing. great job!
@ CanadaImmigration:
You’re right, Bing (or Microsoft’s Search Engine) has always been great for PPC traffic. For some reason it’s always more productive and has much higher conversion rates.
Still, conversions are conversions. Thinking back to my first experiments with using the Bing search engine, I did not find myself clicking through on ads, and if I had, I likely wouldn’t have made any purchases. If people were just messing around to see how Bing works, I have to wonder how many conversions this would have inspired. Perhaps there really is something significant in these numbers.
Well, I’ve seen enough already to put that skepticism to rest. Bing has already seen impressive traffic increases. Pair that with the impressive functionality of the engine, especially in certain verticals like travel and shopping, and I’m ready to reconsider some of my client PPC placements.
@ : Buy PSP Go
Well, I’ve seen enough already to put that skepticism to rest. Bing has already seen impressive traffic increases. Pair that with the impressive functionality of the engine, especially in certain verticals like travel and shopping, and I’m ready to reconsider some of my client PPC placements.
Yeah definitely right now, so take advantage of it
Amazing one Neil. I have recently started my blog and following leaders like you, since past few months i have GOT huge traffic on my blog from various means. Is there a way we can meet online as i wish to discuss something very Important if you have 5 minutes of time from your busy schedule.
send me an email neil @ neilpatel.com
Punctuality – The most important.
I try the best but I never understand all such technicalities. And I try the best to be punctual.
Someone said once – There are visitors for each subject but all we need is punctuality and continuity.
It’s better to be an hour early than a minute late.
Stumble Upon brought me here, but I’d have come for the funny “I’m Kind Of A Big Deal,” line alone.
lol, Its going to be the name of one of my upcoming books.
Neil before few days i have posted something really important as comment for which i never got your reply. Is there a way we can meet online or talk over the phone in order to get that going ??
I replied, send me an email
The statistics analysis will help in measuring the inputs first to get a desired output with the implementation of this process. Many procedures can be found that can be understood in terms of statistics analysis. You could select the practice which will suit you the best and the one which has a logical connection to your process.
But many things are also qualitative in nature which may necessitate a web survey or a focus group.
Right, it’s important to know what your readers want
TweetMeme’s RT button add more value to blog because anyone can Re Tweet the content or any blog post directly without going anywhere.User navigation interface can add more value to any blog.Re Tweet button is the part of best navigation.
I have seen on TechCrunch.TC is using simple compact button
near comment link.
Really best for RT directly while reading post.
It’s very simple and most of the big time bloggers are using it. It makes it so easy to promote your blog.
yes i really love when you write about search engines. but you don’t write often.
It’s one of my challenges that I will work on. Expect to see more posts every month
I know we’d all love for you to write more Neil, but to be quite honest, sometimes less is better, because in your case, every time you make a post you go above and beyond, and provide super valuable information whenever you make a post. So while I would love to read new blog posts more often, I would also say that I would much rather read infrequent blog posts, when the quality is as high as it is on your QuickSprout Blog
Till then,
Jean
If you can get your traffic to engage in the conversation then you are well on your way to a successful blog. I have had trouble in the past to get help people become involved. Glad to hear your having so much success with people commenting, it is definitely something to be proud of.
Right, and what better way to do it, than with a survey
Hi Neil, I just wanted to stop by to say thank yo for taking the time to respond to my post. It is a rare, but very appreciated thing when a blog owner responds to almost every post. Thanks again and keep up the great work!
I respond to all my posts, and you should too. It lets your readers know that you actually care
Thanks for the post. I have found a good way to find out what my readers want is to see what search term they used to get to my site. This allows me to provide my visitors with the content they are searching for as well as optimize my site for the search engines.
That’s an excellent method to use. Like you said, focus on the key words that are working, and then amplify them so to speak.
Neil one question, how many keywords should we have for our website and should we index different pages for different keywords? Plus what is the difference between Worpress Tags and Keywords?
They are the same. You want to focus on 2-3 keywords as too many will be counterproductive.
Neil, I like how the way you get to know your audience. In regards to this post you’ve written, I just wanted to let you know that I’ve stumbled across your blog from http://www.webcreme.com. I was looking for inspiration on website designs, and your website was on the homepage of webcreme.com along with many other awesome websites. I’m glad to have found your website for you do write great posts related to the topic of business and entrepreneurships. I’ve found my design inspirations and now I’ve found my entrepreneurship inspiration =)
Glad to know that, thanks! Hopefully you found the inspiration you need to move forward.
Neil, what a great way to analyze your demographics.
It’s interesting to note that the Google queries for “how to become rich” or “become rich” and their relevant, keyword permutations show your site for #1 or #2 spot.
It’s definitely a good thing
Amazing post.. Seems you have done huge research on your blog readers.. I agree with you that we should give our readers what they want..Even I googled for that keyword and your website is there..Amazing!!!
Understanding your market is certainly a good start my problem is any valuable information on my area (stock market) has generally been posted elsewhere so in generally it is just personal opinions which can be completely original and I’m not sure how many traders or interested parties want to hear opinions
Understanding your market should one of the first things done.
I couldn’t agree more. without understanding your market, it’s nearly impossible to provide the content that your readers are interested in. I have to say that I do regularly review my traffic stats, but I’ve never really applied the same logic to see exactly what my visitors wanted. Great twist.
Right, it’s great to understand your where your traffic is coming from, that way you know exactly what you need to focus on.
I know you don’t know a lot about your visitors, but I’m personally glad they decided to blog a lot about entrepreneurship.
For me Google analytics has been incredibly helpful in determining what content gets the most views and what pages of my own blog people spend the most time on.
Armed with this information I can better understand the needs of my visitors. Looking at my statistics has helped me choose topics that best cater to my audience.
And thanks for telling us about survey.io. I’ve been thinking about doing surveys on my site and this will make it easy.
It’s always important to understand who is visiting your site so you can create better quality content.
You def must know as much possible for your visitors this is a key for succsess.I don’t blog often enough myself and I think the reason is I am one man army as well
All you need to do is make a few alliances with your competition and learn from other people’s success.
I wish I had a skills to write articles?Can you learn it or you have to born with it?
It’s a skill like anything else on the planet. Keep practicing and failing and moving forward.
I liked that you are not only doing a survey but also working on:
1. Needs of your readers
2. Changes required
But, most strong trait I noticed & appreciated is that you are maintaining your transparency & commitment to readers as your #1 priority.
Well if my readers the one who promote me and give me even more exposure, naturally I find I need to give them what they want.
Is is possible to be to obsessed with analytics data? I study mine every single day for at least 15-30 minutes just to see what the trends are. Is every day to much?
It’s great to do that, especially if you can understand exactly where your traffic is coming from. When you have that answer, you can focus harder on the areas that are working and fix yourself from the areas that aren’t.
Good post i learned from my visitors alot because if my content does good on reddit i know what they like which is top 10 anything, Starcraft 2, long written articles.
They dont like, Spelling mistakes, Articles that are not liberal, Anything that is against welfare or anything that is pro welfare reform..(bunch of Left wing nut jobs lol)
Anyways just go on reddit and you will get the harshest criticts in the world.
Getting on Digg is actually a lot more difficult than getting on reddit. Bottom line is that these people are just looking for the best.
Yap, I have switched and target a localize market now rather than globalize to compete against. You will find much easier to compete in local market I guess…
Once you narrow your focus down, you’ll be able to see bigger results faster. This will compel you to move even more forward faster. Ultimately, it’s how you strive and go to the next level.
Hey Neil,
When it comes to traffic, I love and hate search marketing.
SEO: Takes forever, is relatively cheap (not free), but delivers quality targeted traffic.
PPC: Is instant, is very expensive, and also delivers good traffic.
Each one has its pros and cons, but I SUCK at doing this kind of nonsense. I outsource it so I can sleep in peace!
Sincerely,
Jay Jalodomisa
Right, but SEO can be easy… just do an hour or less a day. That way you can save some money…
I guess that is why it is important to comment on related blogs because those people if they like your blog they will start reading up on yours and you will get visitors that way.
That’s going to be one of the best ways for you to attract more readers. Great insight.
So surveying is a good technique to learn more about your website visitors. I will try that on my site and see the results and what my visitors are looking for.
It’s amazing to see what your audience thinks about what you have going on… it’s probably a lot different then what you’re doing. (generally speaking)
yes, I will agree your archives are a blessing, I have been reading them for days and so many gems of great info. It’s also interesting looking at your more recent posts now and seeing more articles about entrepreneurship. This is one of the things I think separates you from the average joe is you do research and APPLY IT. some people never take action.
99% of the people who love this blog probably don’t full take action… the 1% that actually does sees dramatic results. Which group will you decide to be in?
very interesting post, but I am not good at doing this kind of stuffs . I outsource it so I can sleep in peace!
If you have the skills to outsource it and it works, more power to you. I find that it’s a talent to communicate effectively enough for it to work.
Thats awesome! I went to the link for the survey and I’m going to look into using it. That is an important distinction! I think many bloggers get carried away with writing about just what they want to write about and forget that they are writing mainly for their community.
Sometimes they automatically steer into the wrong direction. Finding out what your readers like really just holds you accountable.
A question that I have for you is:
How do you go about creating a buzz for your content on the social networks? Or, do you not need to worry about this since you have so much traffic now?
If so, how would one go about generating this buzz if their blog is new?
If you want to create buzz, just create extremely unique content.
Good Luck.yha you will be; If you will b follower’s of Neil’s tips.
Hard work my friend, that’s what it takes!
There are just a few things I want to know about the people who come to visit my blog. There are many, many different items of statistical data that I could analyze about blog visitors, but for the most part it really boils down to just 3 questions:
Who my visitors are?
What are they looking at?
How did they get here?
It’s all about keeping it simple, I recommend everyone doing it.
All VERY important questions
After knowing such information, you can place more of your focus to take it to the next level so to speak.
Know what your people want, and deliver
It’s a great post, make sure you check it out!
it’s the one thing everyone wants to know
My goal will be to write at least once a week. So make sure you check back frequently.
You are absolutely correct Karol, I’ll write more often.
Glad to know I inspired you to do so!
Thanks, it was one of my best posts.
Yes they are, so make sure you apply it
Thanks Eddie! A lot of these tips may be familiar, but just keep consistent in using them.
a very small percentage actually.
Sometimes the sources you’d least expect are the ones that give you the most traffic. I was quite surprised with bing.
thanks bud
exactly!
No problem! Thanks and stay tuned for more to come.
Thanks Ronnie, I’m glad you found it useful.
Thanks Ricky, I hope you apply it to its full measure.
It can only help for you to know where you traffic is coming from. Take some time each day to analyze it in order to help your site grow.
Good, it’s one of the easiest ways to promote your site
Thanks, I’m glad you enjoyed it.