Virginia Is For Families

I decided to check out Google Analytics this morning. I haven’t been there in awhile because I couldn’t figure out how to insert the code correctly. My code doesn’t look like it is supposed to look. It doesn’t have <body/> where it is supposed to be. The only place I can find it is in the footer. I’m sure there is a rational explanation why this is so. Andreas Viklund is a great maker of templates. But unless someone can tell me the reason it will always remain a mystery.

Anyway, I went there and found out that apparently I placed the code in a spot where it could vegetate and it has been turning out stats. I especially like the one that shows where all my readers arrive from in their journeys. It shows number of visits, pages per visit, average time per on site, percentage of new visits and the bounce rate. I didn’t know what a bounce rate was but found the explanation.

It’s a very short visit.

I have to give it up for my true readers here. The top two are Bernie and Truddle. They combined for about 150 visits. I’m not saying that they personally visited that much over this one month time period. It’s all about visits from their blogs including them. If I am reading it right. They are right up there with Yahoo and Google. Their combined totals were around 200 visits. I think there might be a problem with Yahoo. But how do I tell? It doesn’t accept Pings. Maybe it’s upset about something. Another mystery.

It’s very interesting to read this stuff and I encourage everyone to do it. I’m an idiot for not doing it until now. I noticed that eight visits came from a forum called Web Hosting Talk. So I joined it.

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/index.php

It looks like a great place. Maybe it will help. Here’s a blogger who kindly gathered up many, many blogging directories in one place for those who would like to join up.

http://tips-for-new-bloggers.blogspot.com/2007/04/submit-blog-to-blog-directories-ii.html

And I updated Cocomments. Catherine Morgan, who is a writer and someone I respect a great deal, had responded in late October to a comment I made on her blog. And I never saw it! Because, once again, I am an idjut.

This brings up an important point if you love finding new readers who like to comment the way many of us do. What is the difference between having someone make a great comment on your blog and going to someone else’s blog, making a comment and having them make a great comment in return? Not much I would say.

In fact, maybe your chances are greater in terms of having more good conversations. All you have to do is find a few blogs where the blogger will converse readily with you.

I’m really talking to myself here. Because this is something I need to hear. I have some great readers who make excellent comments. And I appreciate them very much. Would I like to find another Truddle? Not really. She is one of a kind. But there are others who are uniquely different and I would like to get to know them.

I used to be a social worker. People would come in to my office and we would be having heart to heart conversations in ten minutes. Perhaps that is what I am missing.

I was thinking it would be a good idea to focus on exactly what it is that’s happening here and put it on the front of the weblog. Create a static page. Surely I can figure out how to do that.

Maybe it will say something about yours truly being a retired social worker. Maybe that would be a good direction to move forward.

If you would like to check out Bernie and Truddle look in the sidebar for recent comments. That’s where your great readers live. Or look in the Blogroll for BFK or Whisper. Either way.

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More Writing About Blogging

http://davidnotes.com/2008/01/24/technorati-and-triple-digits/

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