I don’t look at my stats too often (she lies, trying not to look as vain as she sometimes, unfortunately, feels), but last week I noticed I had gained a few more followers (I think I’m up to 360, not tons, but a lot for little ole’ me). I’ve also been checking out where my visitors are from and was surprised to find that I have had visits to my blog from 92 different countries in the last year. I find it so interesting that my readers are from so many different countries. I also find it interesting there are this many countries in the world and that there are a few on my list I have never heard of (Maldives and Suriname, I’m looking at you).
The majority of my visitors, of course, come from the United States. In 2019, 8,262 visits were from Americans. I thought the second highest visitor count would be from Canada (I don’t know why since I don’t really post anything that would be exclusively interesting to Canadians) but instead India is in second place with 835 visits. Not that anyone really cares (about the same as about this entire post) but rounding out the top five countries where my visitors came from were Canada, United Kingdom and Australia. Off-topic, but I only know one Australian and I think she’s too busy homeschooling her brood to even check out my blog so I don’t think those Australian hits are from her. I actually met her while blogging 13 years ago on a different blog (a mommy blog). There is some unimportant and unnecessary trivia for you.
I think some of my followers are simply looking for reciprocal follows on their blogs, which is the nature of the social media culture we find ourselves in these days. Many of my followers author blogs about psychology or mental health, which really isn’t a surprise considering my mental health is pretty unstable most days. I’m sure people who know me in real life aren’t surprised I’m being stalked by mental health experts (or self-proclaimed experts). They are probably expecting to find some business through me. Ha! But maybe some are following because they are actually interested in the ramblings of the girl from the boondocks (no, really, they want business.)
Some people probably follow me based on my posts about faith, some because of the fiction, maybe some for the photography (though those posts have been sporadic at best lately), and maybe some for the ramblings about creativity. Most bloggers say you need a niche for your blog (I heard the same from the photography world) but being random can pay off too.
Sure, I don’t have the following of other, high-profile bloggers, but I really don’t mind that. I like my small little corner of the blog world. If I did start to accumulate a high amount of followers, I’d probably delete this blog/site and start another one. I share for fun, not for attention. I mean, a little attention is okay and nice, but a lot of attention? No thank you!
I have never looked at a social media “influencer” (whatever that is), or someone famous and felt envy, wishing I could have people pay attention to me like they do them. I mean, can you imagine having all that attention on you in this highly political, always offended, always ready for a fight environment? Blogging or sharing wouldn’t be fun anymore. Instead, it would be like walking into a minefield and hoping you don’t set off a row of landmines that destroy your life and your love of writing.
In other non-important stat information from my blog for 2019 and 2020:
I had a total of 11,351 views in 2019 and 6,904 visitors (this doesn’t add up with how many views I received from different countries, but I think that total was 2019 and 2020);
161 blog posts (not many by most standards);
2,067 views from WordPress;
1,870 views from Facebook;
and a handful from other sites.
In 2020 I’ve had:
3, 544 views;
1,986 visitors;
and 49 blog posts (which actually seems like a lot for it only being the end of February).
So, if you are a blogger, do you keep track of your stats? I don’t normally, so if you don’t, that’s good with me. If you do, that’s cool too! Let me know in the comments (if you want to, of course).
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Congratulations. I love following people I can relate to and you are one of them. I have read where some bloggers get so many followers that they loose that connection of the ones they were close too, like it is just too hard to keep up. Guess I am more of a small town type of person then a big city type. I rather have personal connections then hundreds of likes and thousands of followers.
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Yeah, I don’t like the idea of losing track of the bloggers I follow. I like keeping up on you guys. And yes, I prefer connections over followers.
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I definitely went through an attention-seeking phase with it; now, it’s more of a “that’s cool!” thing. A lot of those hits from India are the spam sites -companies hire people to try to spam sites with links and whatnot.
I follow you because you’re intelligent, real, funny, and a good writer. Why else? 🙂
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The spam sites are why I refuse to advertise with Facebook. I paid them money when I had my photography business and all my likes came from India, which was not helpful when I needed local people to hire me. I finally gave up and now I won’t be posting there at all. What a waste of time.
I follow you for the same reasons, although I think I bumped something because I’m not getting updates from your other blog. Hmmmm..I need to see what is going on there.
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You’ve seen my rant now; I bet it’s WP’s fault.
Thanks for the compliment! 🙂
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I do look at my stats pretty frequently. I find that there’s a large number of “followers” that I don’t believe actually read my posts (many of them from other countries too), so I have always wondered why. I think many of them hope I will click on their links (often they don’t even have blogs). Sorry to disappoint them, but no way am I doing that. I only follow fellow bloggers that I have some kind of connection to or who interact in a meaningful way with me. Like you, I blog for fun in a random way and because I have to write. I don’t adhere to the ‘branding yourself’ thing and I’m not blogging to make money (that would be nice though wouldn’t it, but it sounds like too much work at this stage of my life).
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I think the same thing about it being too much work at this season in my life. I have two young children (or one young and one teenager), I’m homeschooling them, getting ready to move to another area, writing stories, plus the chronic health issues. I just don’t have the mental or physical energy to try to keep up with the game of building followers. I keep thinking “Well, if I’m going to write books, I’m going to need followers,” but I went through this whole thing when I tried to start a photography business and it was depressing. It was a daily lesson of how vapid people can be because so many times I was asked to “follow” them but they didn’t get a hoot about me or who I was, or what I was doing. It was such an exercise in futlity. The business failed but I was glad it did. It had sucked my love of photography away while I tried to play the popularity game. I’m not letting that happen again, or with writing, because those are the only two lifelines I have anymore.
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Yesterday I had 43 views/likes from someone in Romania. Obviously that blogger didn’t read all of those posts, so that’s strange to me.
I’m pickier these days with the blogs that I follow back. Congrats on your milestones! It’s still fun to see our blogs grow.
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That is strange! Yes, I am picky too. I only follow people who actually interact with me and I also need to like what they are sharing on their blog. If they like my blog, that’s fine but I’m not going to go like their blog just because of that. I started blogging again to actually connect with people, not get “likes” or “followers.” That’s bonus but wasn’t my primary goal for blogging again. I needed a creative outlet and after dealing with two years of loneliness it has become a lifeline for me to connect with other people.
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Hi, Lisa,
I follow you for the fiction and faith articles. What caught my attention on this post is about bloggers seeking reciprocal follows. I don’t know how you deal with it, but it was one of the reasons I took my domain from WordPress to a different host where I targeted only the search engines. I’ve thought of returning to WordPress because the CMS is easier to use, but the issue of having bloggers follow me without any interest in my articles or liking my posts without reading them scares me.
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You can get that in a lot of places, really but one reason I like WordPress is the reader and the ability to find new blogs easily. When I was just out in blogland on Squarespace, I really didn’t have any followers at all and didn’t know how to find other bloggers. If other bloggers want to follow me to get follows that is up to them, but I don’t follow other bloggers unless they actually comment on my blog and interact with me AND I have an interest in what they are sharing. I don’t do follow for follow on my blog or on Instagram. I follow if I like what I see and enjoy what’s on the blog or feed. So, if they boost my numbers, good for them – even though I don’t really care about the numbers. I’m not going to boost their numbers just to boost numbers 🙂 so… think of it this way – you really have no control over what they do but you have control over what you do and how you blog, so If WordPress works better for your blogging experience overall then go for it 🙂 (I was not paid by WordPress for those comments! 😂)
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Oh, and thank you for following, Janet! I appreciate your comments – the ones on the fiction help me improve!
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Wow, that’s really a great achievement! Congratulations! 🎊🎉🥳
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