Longer visits or more hits? Tips for increasing visitor stopovers

Posted by Karel Mc Intosh
March 3, 2008

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Photo courtesy mollycakes

Which do you prefer? A large number of hits to your blog or less visits, but longer stays? Generally, my blog has a range of 25 to 40 visits per day, with an average daily measurement of 33 visitors, an average weekly log of 250 visitors, and an average visit length of two minutes, 38 seconds – with fluctuations from week to week. This isn’t a large number, especially compared to largely popular sites like ProBlogger, which enjoys a daily readership of 14,579 with an average visit length of one minute, 14 seconds. But it sure does feel good when you know that someone has taken some time out to read your blog.Getting someone’s attention spot on and engaging them for more than five seconds can sometimes be a challenge, because people want to be engaged on rational and emotional levels, and sometimes readers are fickle. Their subconscious questions and immediate responses follow the line of thought – is this information relevant? Do I even want to read this? I don’t like the colour; it’s hard on my eyes so I think I’ll close this window.  

Your blog is a database, especially if you’ve been blogging for a good while. For example, this blog is two years’ old, so there are numerous articles to go through. I attempt to put some links to my best articles so that people will go through more of the blog. There are various ways to encourage people to stay a little longer.

Here are some tips:

1. Have a fluid writing style. Use active verbs. Let the text flow easily so that you encourage readers to want to keep on reading, and that the chronological order of your points/ argument flow to create a picture for them.

2. Make your blog visually appealing. This doesn’t mean to go into décor overdrive. Use colours that are easy on the eyes, and that attract people to explore the site. Ensure the design, meaning the way items are laid out, enables people to easily navigate your site.

3. Create categories so it simplifies the search process.

4. Create sections such as archives, random posts, recent posts, and popular articles so that people can easily click through some of your articles. That way they’re motivated to click for more, especially if you have great content. 

Analysing statistics

When I log into my stats, I see an average visit length of 2 minutes, 38 seconds (today’s stats), and people’s clickthroughs. However, within this readership there’s a wide range. Thus far for the day, apart from those who read for a few mini-seconds, there’s a minimal stay of 32 seconds, then there’s the maximum stay of 36 minutes, 37 seconds. When I see this, I feel good, especially since I’ve bothered to pay for my stats service so that I can track all the pages a particular visitor read, and how long they stayed on each page.   

After all, I don’t want to be feeling good without merit. For example someone may spend 30 minutes on your site, but they may have gone to take a bath, and left the Internet on. If you’ve got bare stats measurement, you’ll just see 30 minutes, but can’t gauge whether they really read your blog for 30 minutes or if they went to walk the dog. But when you can see how many seconds a person stayed on one page, then where they clicked through and the pattern of their reading, it’s easier to assess whether this person was truly interested in your content.  

If you’re partial to knowing these sorts of details, then I’d recommend paying for a statistics counter. It isn’t more than $10 a month. I pay $6.95 with Sitemeter, and I also have a Google Analytics account so that I can cross reference information.  I must admit that since I’ve moved to a self-hosted, Wordpress platform, visits have been longer. But this really has to do with the random, recent and popular posts sections. Even if you’re on another blogging platform such as Blogger, you can create link lists with some of your best articles for people to explore. You can also make use of codes shared among Bloggers about there, about various widgets for recent posts etc. Blogger Buster is a great place to start, as well as a simple Google search.  

These methods will help with increasing visitor stays. But you’ve got to make sure that you have great content to keep your readers entertained.   So, what do you prefer? Large numbers or longer stays?

Sphere: Related Content

Blogging, Social media

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Comments

I just want a core readership. Would be nice to have both longer stays and large numbers:)

Comment by abeni on March 4, 2008 @ 3:05 pm

It’s a combination…

Good content does not necessarily increase ones numbers, but If you have good content when you do get those large numbers you tend to have return visits.

If you have frequent return visitors, the stays may not be long as they are already consumed the majority and are only looking for the latest.

What about those who subscribe via RSS or Email not being factored into either category.

The strategy could also depend on the life cycle and strategy of your blog, a newer blog that is monetizing may want more visitors as they have less content to spend time on whereas a blog such as this with extensive article numbers and non monetized may desire a devoted readership in whatever delivery format (click-throughs, RSS, email.

To add to the discussion, what about number of comments :)

Comment by Dre on March 4, 2008 @ 3:33 pm

Lol. Comments? Well, I know that sometimes people are quite shy when it comes to comments. Some like to look on.

Dre, I love your insight and agree wholeheartedly. It really depends on where you’re coming from. I know that the majority of my readers, like several other blogs, come from first-time searches on Google. The trick then is to convert these first timers into repeat visitors. Now that means regular updating, something that I don’t often do - unintentionally.

For me, I’m happy with people finding the info they want here, something that’s insightful about communications in the Caribbean. That’s the whole reason I started this blog. For me, monetization is not the focus. If it comes great!

To me the key is to keep writing something that’s stimulating. As you say, good content may not increase numbers on its own. It’s a mix of substance, timing, marketing, networking etc. But it certainly makes someone say, hey this is a place worth checking out.

On that note Dre, would you be interested in writing a guest post for Caribbean Public Relations?

Comment by Karel Mc Intosh on March 4, 2008 @ 4:13 pm

When looking at my stats the keywords and the content that first surfaces surprises me some.

I had an experience where I purposely tested specific keywords within my content to see the search engine’s reaction.

The worry though is when you recognize that a specific search engine generates a significant percentage of visitors (first time or recurring). Ever thought what would happen if you were no longer listed as a top result?

At the end of the day though, it depends on what the author’s angle is as most blogs have become a gateway to other avenues and opportunities.

Comment by Dre on March 4, 2008 @ 7:14 pm

I would rather 4 people click on my blog and read, interact, leave thought-provoking comments and return regularly (e.g. daily, because I update daily) than have 400 people click on it a day and barely spend any time. Quality not quantity. I like comments because it then makes the blog like a dialogue rather than monologue. But I agree with Dre - many people don’t like to leave comments, for one reason or another. It’s like going to an art exhibition - not everyone writes in the comment book, even if they have a strong opinion about what they have experienced there.

Comment by Elspeth on April 22, 2008 @ 2:43 pm

Hi Elspeth

Pleased to have you on my blog. I read yours from time to time. And yes… I completely agree with you! I guess sometimes, for those who don’t comment, that they don’t want to reveal their identities or they don’t want to be held against their word. But one thing I’ve learnt in the blogosphere is that you can’t be afraid of disagreements. When there’s dialogue you’ve got a way to hear both sides, and simply express yourself regardless of whether you’re a voice in the wilderness or you have 100 people on your side.

Comment by Karel Mc Intosh on April 22, 2008 @ 3:20 pm
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