Traffic vs Engagement vs Influence: Top 10 Posts [August 2009]

It’s been very interesting to do these top 10 posts because it let’s me look at 3 different factors:

  • Traffic – The posts are ranked based on traffic (unique hits) according to Google Analytics.
  • Engagement – How many comments a blog receives is usually considered a level of engagement.
  • Influence – The PostRank scores are meant to judge the level of influence your post has based on things like tweets, comments, bookmarks on Delicious, etc.

Some might argue that I should base my ranking on PostRank since it’s a more complete view. I don’t use PostRank as my ranking for this list because then I would only be basing it on posts made in a month which would not account for posts made in previous months. Also PostRank does not get everything, they frequently do not gather all the tweets that Tweetmeme gets, so it’s still not totally accurate, but it’s a really good indicator.

The main reason I base this list on traffic (even though that’s not the goal of this blog) is that tweets and comments don’t always equate to traffic. Sometimes one tweet or one link from the right source is far more valuable then a dozen tweets and links from other sources.

This month for instance shows me that 3 of Augusts Top 10 are from July. That’s because of the sites that linked to them.

Where my traffic is coming from?

Twitter is the number one driver of traffic to my site, although Facebook showed up in my Top 10 for the first time. But this traffic is very short term.

Search is the number two driver of traffic. Both Google and Bing appear in my Top 10 traffic sources.

Links are the number three driver of traffic. While some are legitimate follow on posts, several of my links come to me from other Zemanta users. This is the best feature of Zemanta but most people overlook that when doing product reviews.

Top 10 posts for August

  1. You Do Not Have to be Social Media Famous. 8/10/09 47 tweets, 7.8 PostRank, 9 comments
  2. You are Crazy not to Measure the ROI of Social Media! 8/27/09 37 tweets, 9.3 PostRank, 4 comments
  3. Lessons from Gnomedex: Too Geeky is a Good Thing 8/24/09 13 tweets, 7.8 PostRank, 3 comments
  4. My GTD Moleskine Hacks 7/07/09 2 tweets, 6.0 PostRank, 6 comments
  5. So Shut the Tweet Up! 8/07/09 27 tweets, 9.0 PostRank, 15 comments
  6. How to use Posterous for Internal Collaboration 7/30/09 9 tweets, 7.1 PostRank, 3 comments
  7. Mobile App Blogging Thanks to Posterous: Regator vs MeeHive vs Byline 8/19/09 7 tweets, 4.1 PostRank, 4 comments
  8. Agencies Get Out of Your Client’s Way 8/11/09 16 tweets, 6.1 PostRank, 8 comments
  9. It’s the Message Stupid! News and Politics. [A Case Study] 8/13/09 5 tweets, 3.6 PostRank, 2 comments
  10. How a DM via Twitter to a Blog with a Link to Facebook Got Me My Job 7/27/09 21 tweets, 10.0 PostRank, 4 comments
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Top 10 Blog Posts [May 2009] FriendFeed Steals the Show

Peter Kim has been doing a monthly top post recap for a while now. I like this approach and decided to steal this idea and remix it a little. He does it for convenience if anyone missed any of his posts. I like it for different reasons. It’s a simple way to show you what content resonated the most with readers.

For comparison I’ve also included the dates well as the PostRank score for each post. You can see this blogs full PostRank profile here (my profile is here). The raw numerical ranking is based off Google Analytics traffic numbers. The PostRank score is based off views and the number of times it was shared on Twitter and FriendFeed.

  1. FriendFeed is Reaching Critical Mass PR 10 – 5/20/09
  2. Enterprise 2.0 Needs a FriendFeed PR 10 – 5/19/09
  3. Why URL Shorteners Are Important PR 10 – 5/21/09
  4. What I learned from HP about co-opetition PR 7.4 – 4/30/09
  5. Ads in FriendFeed-This Could be Huge PR 10 – 5/19/09
  6. Leaving HP. Back to Agency Life PR 10 – 4/20/09
  7. How I moved up 300 spots in AdAge’s Power 150 in 4 months PR 5.5 – 5/05/09
  8. Social Media will soon face the realities of multiculturalism PR 5.8 – 5/04/09
  9. Despite the Promise of Social Networks Local Businesses Struggle with Marketing ROI PR 10 – 5/19/09
  10. Will RSS Ever Go Mainstream? 5.6 – 5/04/09

What resonated the most with you this month? FriendFeed was the big winner. (Kind of validates the claim I made in that most popular post doesn’t it?) After that the post I made when I left HP as well as my final HP posts had the most longevity.

It is interesting to note that nothing posted in the last 10 days shows
up on the list which makes sense given they wouldn’t have had as much
time as the others. It’s also interesting to note that some of the most visited blogs were not always the most shareable. Interesting.

Hope you found this useful. I’ll do my best to make this a monthly habit.

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