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| The meaning will come clear in the links at the end. (See how you generate hits?) |
Years ago a newspaper editor said she didn't encourage
columnists because all she ever had seen were
three columns and then a column
whining about how difficult it is to write a column.
That comment came to mind when I was considering starting
this blog. I guess with almost 900 posts now, over eight years without writing
about a blog, that wasn't a problem. I've said before I don't write here to
make money, nor do I write to generate an audience. The main reason I chose to
write a blog was I wasn't accomplishing much in traditional writing but almost
daily I dealt with the guilt of not writing and the urge to write but very
hesitant to dive into a major project or go that discouraging route of free-
lancing. A blog looked like the perfect solution to satisfy the demand without
committing to a major project. Think of it as a pianist doing scales for
practice. I did promise myself if I ever started writing about writing a blog I
would quit right there.
As a result of that, numbers of readers don't mean a lot to
me. I belong to a couple of bloggers' groups though I seldom participate. But I
see a lot of their conversations revolve around gaining readers, blog hits, a
lot of it to make money. I saw one person in a group say the main reason for
writing a blog was to make money. Of course if you are advertising something
you are paid according to the number of hits your blog or a particular page
receive. There are several applications available for recording blog hits. Though I
say it doesn't matter, I watch them and my mood can go up or down with the
number of hits so it apparently does mean something. My numbers do not begin to
challenge Lady Gaga, let alone a local news columnist, so apparently my
disregard for audience is working.
That said over the past couple of days I have seen record
numbers. Since noon the day before yesterday one post generated 2,664 individual hits along with 220 shares on facebook.
That is the most hits ever in a single day and the most for any post on the
blog in about eight years of posting. And, at this writing the number is still
rising. It eventually made this month the one with the most page hits ever.
To be correct, this was not a straight-up post. First of all
it was posted more than two years ago. The other day I attached it as a comment to a facebook post, because it directly
related to the subject of the main post and adds something on the same subject.
I've done things like that before, when a post fit a subject, but something
different happened this time. Facebook
has a feature where if you open some posts, it will promote three additional
related posts displayed right below the main one. My post was this second of
the three and I am sure that's what led to all the hits. Just to keep my feet
on the ground, the main post received more than 15,000 hits and more than a
thousand shares, so my numbers pale by comparison.
Still given my usual audience it's gratifying. Most of my
posts don't draw 220 views, let alone 220 shares, so it's all to the good. And it certainly confirms and condemns
me to my status as a minor
regional author. And, no, I am not going to quit just because once I wrote
about writing a blog.
THIS WAS THE MAIN POST I ATTACHED TO
THIS IS THE ORIGINAL BLOG POST
Michael Gungor
