Last month was a pretty massive month here at ProBlogger with a record level of traffic (Google Analytics shows it at about 650,000 page views and our server side stats place it at 1.3 million – so it’s somewhere in between), 3959 comments (a new record) and 107 posts (the highest rate of posting at PB for at least 12 months). There was a lot of action on the blog a couple of reasons. It was partly a result of the blog’s redesign (which led to an increase in both actual visitors and pages viewed per visitor) as well as the 31 Day project.
107 posts is a lot to digest – so I’ve decided to summarize the top 15 in terms of visitor numbers.
Here’s a quick summary of the hottest 10 posts from ProBlogger in August 2007:
- When it Feels like Nobody is Reading Your Blog – a post that seemed to tap into the experiences of many
- How to Draw StumbleUpon Users Into Your Blog – a guest post on enhancing your StumbleUpon experience
- ProBlogger Redesign – Bedding Down for the Night – no doubt the biggest event at ProBlogger this month was it’s redesign
- Dig Into Your Blog’s Statistics – part of this month’s 31 Day Project
- We’re Entering New Design Transition Phase – another new design related post which got a lot of comments
- Beginners Guide to RSS – a short post with some good links to teaching others about RSS – including a cool video
- Create a Heatmap of Where Readers Click on Your Blog – using a cool tool called CrazyEgg to track where your blog’s readers click
- Declutter your Sidebar – most blogs need to do this every now and again
- 10 Ways to Hurt Your Blog’s Brand by Commenting on Other Blogs – some reflections on some of the dangers of commenting on blogs
- Analyze Your Blog’s Competition – how looking at other blogs in your niche can help you improve yours
- Email a New Reader of Your Blog – a most basic tip that can help build your blog’s readership
- Do You Use American English, British English or do you Swing like the Canadians? – a reader debate
- First Impressions Matter on a Blog – most popular video post of the month
- Why does my Feedburner Subscriber Count Fluctuate? – one of my most Frequently asked questions
- Stickify Your Blog – another video post on making your blog sticky
Of course this month was also popular for the 31 Days to Building a Better Blog Project which has 31 of my own blog tips and over 600 of yours!
I really liked the project and the posts you have written Darren. There was no doubt that it helped everyone take part in what a blogging community should be through ProBlogger.
Sly from Slyvisions.com
That’s a really huge difference between Analytics and server stats… what exactly would cause that?
I can’t imagine that half the readers have disabled javascript…
Blogging often creates a momentum. One minute it can be difficult to write a post. But once you get going ideas keep coming.
I have the same problem with the server side stats not being the same as google analytics.
Wow. And they say summers are slow…
I’m not surprised though. Your 31 days series was fantastic. :)
I enjoyed the 31 Days series. It was fun reading through the huge lists of reader-submitted tips. Any chance of you doing something like that again?
Wow Darren, congratulations on a successful August! I agree with what others said in the comments; the 31 Days series was awesome! I learned some really useful things during those posts and will probably refer back to them often.
Likewise, August was a record month for my blog as well. I didn’t receive even close to the fraction of visitors you did, but for me, it was a lot. I owe a lot of it to your help.
Thanks and keep up the good work!
thanks Brad (and everyone) – I’m glad to hear things are growing on your blog too – keep up the great work.
Redwall – we’ll do another one at some point in the coming months.
In terms of serverside stats – from my experience, they are always bigger than anything like google analytics or sitemeter. I can’t remember the technical details of why (but I suspect it’s because they don’t count pages that don’t fully load etc) but it’s pretty normal.
Your Alexa Traffic Overview show a huge increase after the new theme too. I like this new design and it make browsing a lot easier.
I am learning a lot from ProBlogger. 31 days is indeed a knockout!! Great & handy in every sense. Thanks.
i’ld go consolidate the tips from the “31..” and then thank you later!:p
Hi. I will be a regular reader of your blog. keep posting new techniques. Can you tell us how much traffic you get daily from search engines . 650,000 wow! .
Congratulations Darren
I definitely LOVED the project as well. Great job! Also, the redesign is very updated as well… I have seen quite a few A-lister bloggers convert to this type of layout within the last few months.
Congrats on the records traffic and comments! *=)
I agree with the others–your 31 day project was great and the site design looks fabulous! Congrats on a wonderful month.
thanks to everyone for your feedback. I do appreciate your support and participation at ProBlogger. The great thing is that in the last month comments were up by a higher proportion than actual traffic so as a community you’re really helping to keep improving this site.
I wonder if comments are up everywhere among the top blogs, since John Chow recently spoke of “commenting your way to the top” of the search-engine rankings.
Also, I would be interested in reading a analysis of linking patterns: the links to your individual posts here on problogger.