I’ve posted a lot of entries during the two weeks that I’ve kept this blog. I’ve been writing about a lot of different subjects - as the five people who’ve visited the site might have figured out. It’s been a rather obvious attempt to try and learn something about what attracts people to a blog.

I’ve been trying to write catchy, cryptic and informative titles, and I’ve utilized anything from perfectly sober to shamelessly sensationalist approaches. The sad fact is that I’ve learned absolutely nothing, apart from the fact that it takes more than a fortnight to establish an audience. I knew that already, of course, but it’s a little sad that during these fourteen days I’ve had only six exclusive page views - especially considering the fact that I’ve tried really hard to write in a manner that would attract people to the site. Oh, well.

One plausible explanation is that the blog isn’t included in ordinary web searches on Google yet. When that happens, it’s bound to attract some traffic, I’m sure. But it’s still disconcerting to see that neither Google Blog Search or Technorati is helping out at all here. Considering the amount of people using those services, it seems obvious that I’m doing something wrong.

On the other hand, I have another blog where I write about music. I get a lot more traffic there (it’s also been up for quite a while) but I still notice that there’s almost no traffic coming in from Technorati or Google Blog Search - it’s usually Google web search or links from other blogs that direct traffic to my blog.

Now, I’m not expecting thousands of viewers here instantly, far from it. But maybe 10-20 views a day - or something. 5?

Language could be an issue, I’m not sure. English is not my native language, and it may be more obvious to a lot of you guys than it is to me. I think my writing’s fairly decent, but it may seem a little simplistic, accentuated and child-like to an English reader? And thus not very reader-friendly? I don’t know.

I’ve been trying to use tags extensively. I’ve basically tried two different approaches:

1. Specific, detailed tags that refer directly to the content. Like the ones I used in my PIM entry: PIM, PIMs, Personal Information Manager, using both singular and plural form.

2. Using popular tags: Hillary Clinton instead of Politics, Anna Nicole Smith instead of Entertainment, and so forth.

Choosing titles, I’ve tried to use attractive words, “eyecatchers.” I made a couple of music lists with a lot of familiar artist names to get some easy hits. I created a completely lame list of things to do when you’re bored…. not very successful, I’m afraid. My most successful entry so far is in fact the PIM entry (probably the only one with any real content, you may infer…you’re right on the mark…)

But it will be interesting to keep all these entries for a while and find out what’s most attractive to a reader. I hope that in time the traffic will give me some idea as to what works best to gain viewers. It’s certainly a learning experience.

You could argue, and with good reason, that the eclectic nature (and general lack of content) on the site will turn readers away. That may well be the case, but should I hit the bulls-eye with a single entry, I would still get a lot of hits on that entry. People would probably not return to the blog, as none of the other entries would be of much interest - but that’s a challenge I will have to address on a later stage.

Another aspect is the fact that I’m not networking from this blog. I’m not leaving any comments on other blogs to help me gain friends and links. I don’t plan on using that strategy, either, as I’m mainly interested in finding a way to make this blog work based purely on contents (or clever titles, if you will), at least at this point.

Well, that’s a status report from the blogmaster. Stay with me and find out what happens.

(BTW, I’m happy the mp3/download entry wasn’t a hit. I honestly don’t have the time or energy to compose a musical suite. It was just another shameless attempt to gain viewers. As was my last celeb entry. I don’t know crap about Anna Nicole Smith. I know, I know. I’m well aware of my deficiencies (some of them, anyway))