Each day during the week ending September 27, Technorati had a new post published with insight into the current state of the blogosphere.

Technorati defines the Active Blogosphere as: The ecosystem of interconnected communities of bloggers and readers at the convergence of journalism and conversation.

For the 2008 State of the Blogosphere Report, we wanted to go beyond the numbers to deliver insights into bloggers and the state of blogging today. Who are the bloggers, why and how do they do what they do, and what is the impact on their lives and work?

To find out, we conducted a survey from a random sample from more than 1.2 million bloggers who have registered with Technorati. In addition, we have supplemented the survey results with our traditional analysis of Technorati’s index data.

For convenience purposes, here are the links:

• Day 1 - Who Are the Bloggers?
• Day 2 - The What and Why of Blogging
• Day 3 - The How of Blogging
• Day 4 - Blogging for Profit
• Day 5 - Brands Enter the Blogosphere

I will discuss a number of the main points mentioned in the study, including analysis and information that was provided.  References to images are included, so you should use the associated content.

Content included is copyright Technorati, Inc.

Blogs Continue to Grow

The number of blogs being reported by sources such as comScore, eMarketer, and Universal McCann all report figures of bloggers, people reading blogs, and total blogs ranging from 22.6 to 346 million blogs/bloggers/etc. - a large indication that the mainstream media is continuing to adopt blogs.

The Term ‘Blog’

As the debate continues to grow as the term continues to be swayed by blogs that appear more as “magazines,” although they are still connected, include a comments area, although more than 95% of the top 100 US newspapers have reporter blogs.

Stats

These figures relate to the image shown in the study.

• 133 million blog records indexed by Technorati since 2002.
• 7.4 million blogs posted within the past 120 days.
• 1.5 million blogs posted in the last 7 days.
• 900,000 blog posts in past 24 hours.
• 76,0000 blogs with Technorati Authority of at least 50.
• Top 100 blogs by Technorati Authority (image).

Day 1 - Who Are the Bloggers?

More than half of all bloggers have a household income of over $75,000, and are generally affluent and educated.  Three out of four are college graduates, while 42% have attended graduate school.

Half of all bloggers are on their second year of blogging; 59% have been blogging for more than two years, indicating that a majority of bloggers have been blogging for more than a year.

Global Bloggers

- Two-thirds of bloggers are male.

- 50% are between the ages of 18-34.

- Four in ten have an annual household income of $75K+; One in four have an annual household income of $100K+.

- 44% are parents.

In the United States, a majority of bloggers do not live near the largest metropolitan areas.  The largest concentration is near the San Francisco Bay Area, followed by New York City, and Los Angeles.

- 43% of blogger respondents live in the United States.

- 72% of bloggers write in English.

Technorati Authority

In June, 45% of the bloggers that posted have an Authority of at least one, meaning they have produced content that has been linked to by another website/blog.

How Bloggers are Identified

- Personal bloggers blog about topics of personal interest not associated with their work; makes up 79% of total.

- Professional bloggers blog about their industry and profession, but not in an official capacity for their company; 46% of total.

- Corporate bloggers blog for a company in an official capacity; 12% of total.

Four out of five bloggers tend to be blogging for personal reasons, while about half of bloggers are professional bloggers, generating some sort of income for their own business, and another 12% blog for an official company.

Blogging in General

The “new” aspect of blogging is now over, as 49% of bloggers report that they are on their first blog, while 51% of respondents said they are not on their first blog, with many on their 6th+ blog.

Day 2 - The What and Why of Blogging

A majority of bloggers write about multiple topics, of both personal and professional topics, which are both equally popular.  Half of bloggers consider their writing style to be sincere, conversational, humorous, and expert.

Prominent Topics: Personal/Lifestyle, Technology, Other, News, and Politics

Reasons for Blogging

The main reasons that people begin a blog is to “speak my mind on areas of interest,” “share my experience and expertise with others,” and “to meet and connect with like minded people.”  Read the rest of the article to find additional reasons.

Measuring the Success of Blogs

75% of bloggers measure success in personal satisfaction; 58% in number of posts or comments on their blog; while 53% on the number of unique visitors.  Revenue stood at only 16%, followed by “number and quality of new business leads” at 10%.

Concealing Your Real Identity on Your Blog

44% of respondents said that it isn’t important at all; 24% not that important; 20% somewhat important; followed by 12% of very important.  The main reasons for wanting to conceal their identities were to ensure that their family and friends were not exposed or harassed at 44%, followed by “other” at 36%.

Additional reasons include: It allows me to break news and post rumors I hear about without fear of receiving bad info, personal safety and privacy, and respect for my company.

Impact of Blogging on Personal Life

A majority of bloggers responded that they have made friends who they have communicated with online, but never met in person, and have become more involved with my hobbies/interests as a result of blogging.  Professional and corporate bloggers also responded by saying that blogging has benefited them.

Blogging Has Opened up Unique Opportunities

People in the survey responded, saying that they have been invited to interest group events, blogger roundtables, and have been endorsed as a sponsor/reviewer.

One third of bloggers have received free products through their blogging career (whether sent to them, at blogging conferences, etc.).

Day 3 - The How of Blogging

Time Spent Blogging

The average blogger spends between 3-10 hours per week blogging, making up roughly 42% of the entire population.  24% spend at least 10 hours, followed by 34% spending less than 3 hours per week.

Help While Blogging

78% of people who took the survey reported that they are the sole person who writes on their blog, followed by unpaid help at 13%, and paid staff at just 9%.

Posting by Technorati Authority

In order to get into the “Top 100″ list, the average blog produced 310 posts, over the course of 23 days (factoring out to about 13 posts/day, with the next 500 at 20 days/125 posts, and the next 5000 at 13 days/25 posts. Clearly, the top 100 blogs need to continue producing that high level of posts to remain at the top.

Tag Usage

- 71% of top 100 blogs use tags.

- 59% of next 500 blogs use tags.

- 45% of next 5000 blogs use tags.

- 36% of all active bloggers use tags.

- Most tags fell under the News, Music, Video, Internet, or Blog categories.

Blogging Tools

85% of blogs use a commenting system, 84% have archives by date or category, 82% have built-in syndication, and 70% have a search box.  An average blog uses seven out of the thirteen tools listed, with the average blog using at least four widgets.

Main Methods of Visitor Attraction

- Listing their blog on Technorati, commenting on other blogs, listing their blog on Google, and tagging their blog posts.

- The “average” blogger uses at least five of the methods included to attract visitors.

Connection to Readers

Between six and ten percent of all bloggers have worked to meet their readers, while 53-70% of all bloggers have not worked to create any events with their readers.

Statistics and Analytics Tools

Google Analytics is the primary method of capturing the level of visitors that blogs receive, used by 66% of bloggers.  SiteMeter and StatCounter follow behind this, in use by 1/5 bloggers; 42% use more than one service; and in total, more than 100 tools are used.

- 49% of blogs receive less than 1K visitors/monthly, 33% 1-10K, 12% 10-50K, and 6% 50K and higher.

- 54% of blogs receive less than 5K page views/monthly, 25% 5-20K, 13% 20-100K, and 8% 100K and higher.

Blog Investment

In the past year, the mean US$ invested was $1,020, with the average blog investing just $50, and the maximum was $200,000 (although many “sites/projects” would cost more than this).

Day 4 - Blogging for Profit

Advertising on Blogs - Types and Percentages

- 46% run no advertising on their blog

- 38% have search ads

- 28% have display ads

- 20% have added affiliate marketing links

- 6% participate in paid posting

- 5% are spokesbloggers

- 4% run rich media ads

- 28% use three or more methods

Advertising Management

The largest group of people use self-serve tools to offer contextual ads or use pay per click ads on their blogs (69%), followed by affiliate advertising links, getting paid for purchases generated by visitors (35%), and negotiation with advertisers directly (19%).

24% of bloggers do not want their blog cluttered with ads, 24% do not want to make money from their blog, and 21% do not have enough visitors to make it worthwhile.  Additional categories make up the remaining percentages.

Average Income

The average blog, according to Technorati, makes more than $6,000, followed by the top 1%, who generate more than $200,000 yearly.  $75,000 was the average income for those who generated more than 100,000 unique visitors per month ($6,250/month).  The median was just over $22,000.

Bloggers who do advertising on their blog/offsite spend an average of $1,800 annually.  The median revenue of U.S. bloggers, at $200, typically spend about $50 on their blog.

Average CPM for advertising in the U.S. is $1.20; mean is $4.20, and the maximum is $30 (CPM US$ is cost per thousand impressions).

Day 5 - Brands Enter the Blogosphere

More than 80% of people have posted product or brand reviews on their blog, with only 18% who have never done so.

Credibility in the Blogosphere and Media

71% report that blogs are taken more seriously as sources of information; 51% say more people will get their news and entertainment from blogs than traditional media in the next five years; and 49% say blogs are just as valid media sources as traditional media.

U.S. bloggers spend “nearly twice as much time online as U.S. adults 18-49, and one-third as much time watching television.”

Participation in “Web 2.0″ Activities

- 84% comment on articles or blog posts that they have read.

- 69% have subscribed to an RSS feed.

- 68% watch videos online.

- The average person participates in at least 5 of these activities.

Brand Messaging

61% of bloggers feel that other blogs entice them to learn more about products and services, followed by web content at 46%, and TV, print, or outdoor advertising at 33%.

Conclusion

Please be aware that this is simply a summary of what was stated in the report - please visit the main article for additional information on the history and future of blogging/blogs.

Many of the figures didn’t come as much of a surprise to me, although it was worthwhile knowing some of these figures to better target certain groups.  I believe that some of the figures were skewed by participants, who didn’t state their correct income, as $6,000/yearly appears slightly high for the average income.

In addition, this article can help bloggers who look at trends, as the previous reports can be found in the archives, for comparison.

This is a short roundup of links and resources dealing with WordPress and related announcements.  Provide your thoughts and additional links in the comments area.

WordPress

• WordPress Developer’s Toolbox [Smashing Magazine] - Steven Snell published a complete resource list for WordPress enthusiasts and users alike.  You can find resources, tutorials, themes/design information, icons and more.  A must-read article if you need to venture into working with WordPress or are looking at designing/creating more advanced sites.
• Admin Interface Survey [WordPress Development Blog] - Now closed, this survey offered users the ability to voice their opinions on the 2.7 version of the WordPress backend panel - links are now located in the sidebar within drop-downs rather than the header [and endless clicking, unless you use plugins to modify this area].
• Protecting Your Blog with SSL [WordPress.com blog] - A video and instructions on how to take advantage of the CookieMonster toolkit when using public networks.
• Go Ad-Free on WordPress.com - For just $0.08/day or 30 ($30) credits yearly, you can remove the ads as an upgrade to your free WordPress blog.  While the Automattic team likely makes about this much (average) from every blog, some users prefer not to have ads ever displayed on their blog.  In the future, you will also be able to use your own ads.
• WordPress 2.7 Features List, Finalized [Hack WordPress] - With about a month left until the next major WordPress version release, there are several enhancements and feature additions that I am certainly looking forward to.  However, I am also hoping that the code base used is reduced to maintain or cut down on the load time.  Features listed below, with plugins that would be eliminated (that I am currently using).
  • New admin User Interface, with menus and improved navigation.  (Baltic Amber Admin Themes, Admin Management Xtended (not as likely), and Lighter Menus)
  • New edit post page, allowing dragging and dropping of meta boxes; easily expanded and collapsed or completely hidden.
  • Option to hide columns on content index pages.
  • Comments API for moderation on mobile devices such as the iPhone.
  • Reply to comments from the admin.  (I don’t use any plugins for this, but there are some available)
  • Keyboard hot keys for managing comments.
  • Threaded comments along with new API.
  • Sticky posts.  (Plugin available)
  • Automatic plugin installation and integrated plugin browser.  (WP Easy Uploader - likely won’t switch, as you an upload nearly any file with this, including themes, images, etc.)
  • Automatic upgrade integrated.  (WordPress Automatic Upgrade, SimpleScripts/Fantastico)
  • HTTPOnly auth. cookies.
  • New HTTP request API.
  • New SSH2 filesystem abstraction for updates and installs over SFTP.

Movable Type

• Virtual Movable Type released, available as open source code, a free download, or priced for professional/corporate users.  It allows you to use the system without going through the process of installing Movable Type on a web server - created by JumpBox, and is available as a full-featured virtual appliance.
• Movable Type Developer Guide [MovableType.org Documentation] - This guide includes nearly every code required to add “custom functionality, user interfaces, and other components” to your site.
• Sandbox for Movable Type {September 10} - As a plugin, you can use the Sandbox themes on your Movable Type website, which allows you to build templates built around theme frameworks and well-designed starter themes.  As you may know, WordPress has taken advantage of the Sandbox themes for quite some time.

Blogger

A new “social” tool was added to Blogger, making it easier for all members to connect with other readers and stay updated with the blogs they follow.

I was somewhat anticipating the new features - I knew that it would likely streamline the entire interface and bring it up-to-date with other analytics services (its main competitor Google Analytics and StatCounter.  The main elements that I was looking for included an interface refresh, as the current version is just slightly out of date with current web technologies, functionality in terms of finding stats, as well as any other improvements that it could offer.  In its (now) current state, many of those features are at the level they should be, as it offers quickly viewable statistics of your site, without delving into Google Analytics.

“Old” SiteMeter Main Page

“New” SiteMeter Main Page

While I commend the effort on the part of the SiteMeter team, I feel (as they stated in their apology on their blog) that more testing on the part of users should have done, with a gradual rollout - we’ve seen countless times before that rollouts to all users/members can be disastrous, leaving many wondering why the switch was made without their consent and so suddenly.  However, I also believe that members were left in the dark, not expecting the drastic changes that were to be had with the new system in place.

After months of testing, the new interface, feature set, and everything else was prepared for rollout, only to find that many members disagreed with what the “new” site offered.

This post will feature some of the new features coming to the new version, once it is “officially” released, as well as its comparison to a few competitors (although it is rather short, as I only briefly tested the new version - otherwise, my initial reaction/expectations).

Competitive Pricing

As SiteMeter must cater to major blogs (many of the Gawker blogs use the tracking code on their websites), it also had to become more competitive by introducing a one-size-fits-all model, with pricing at $6.95/month or about $59 yearly.  Previously, pricing ranged from $6.95 (up to 25,000 page views) to $199.95 (up to 15 million page views), obviously making the new pricing model more attractive to both large and small-scale bloggers.

Other competing services, including StatCounter and Google Analytics have (had) higher limits separating the threshold before you must upgrade to a premium account.

Prior Pricing - Found Here

From my brief look at the new interface, RSS feed and similar statistics would be unavailable for free members.

Speed - SiteMeter.com and Widget/JavaScript Code

At points, the previous code that you placed on the website was slow and there was no way to make the actual image invisible unless you upgraded your account to a premium version.  With the switch to the new version, members would have been required to implement the new widget code (if applicable), which was designed to speed up your site while providing more accurate statistics.

Accuracy - A Must for Services that are All About “Analytics”

From the short overview of the new features, it appears that they are now able to target and exclude more Bot and RSS traffic from the actual traffic details of your site’s traffic levels, meaning traffic levels would be more accurate.  Visitors would likely be higher, while page views would be lower as a result of this change.  Cookies would be able to track down and exclude your IP address more than before (the old system), up to 100% of the time, rather than just 50% of the time.

Interface - As a Consumer-Based Service, People Expect a Clean and Intuitive Interface

Compared to the “new” interface, the old system was easier to quickly get a snapshot of the daily traffic  - one of the top three main reasons why I was using this service in addition to other services (Google Analytics, for example).  Upon logging in, you were presented a separate view of Visits and Pave Views - with total, average per day, average visit length, last hour, today, and this week all placed in a chart.  To the left, there is more advanced statistics, primarily focusing on providing a single view for each.

Now, when you take a look at the image below of the new version, it is built nearly entirely of Flash/AJAX rather than basic HTML and other technologies that are faster loading.  Much like Google Analytics, I would assume that a user would be able to customize the main page to suit their needs, but it doesn’t appear so looking back at the version.  

New Interface for Stats

While more information is provided, additional views (pie charts, line graphs, and charts) are options for viewing the Top Countries, Search Bot Activity, Entry Page, and Visits and Page Views (in this Summary Report) make it easier to visualize information compared to raw data.  

Users that have become acquainted with the old system would easily find this harder to navigate, not displaying the stats that they were familiar with on the main page, and splitting data into additional areas - Audience Overview, Traffic Trends, Geolocation, Browser Data, Visit Report, Path Report, Demographics, Scoreboard, and RSS/Bot Report - in other words, it would take much more time to find what you only truly need a quick snapshot of.

Other users have commented that some areas, including browser/visitor information doesn’t complement the other areas of the site with poor formatting of this area, in particular.

Transition to New Service

The transition wasn’t expected to be 100% smooth, but the load times during the first couple hours of the new design/features were painfully slow, with times where the site was completely unavailable.  You could say that you don’t need to look at your stats every few hours (especially on the weekend), but some users may have become frustrated trying to access the new service during this time period.  Load time was exceptionally slow, at over 30 seconds for less than 75KB of data.

Conclusion

Much like their apology letter on their blog (excerpted below), I believe that over the next several weeks they will be able to integrate the new features over a period of time (through use of a better Beta program to transition members to the new service - nearly one million of them.  Whether that takes some, I believe that this product transition will be worth it in the end, allowing members to reap the benefits of a (hopefully) improved interface.

What were your thoughts of the new interface/features/pricing if you took a look at them, and what are your overall thoughts of SiteMeter as an analytics/stats service?

Excerpt from blog:

Our intention is and has always been to offer you, our customer’s better tools and more accurate data. Obviously we fell short of this.  The first thing we need to do, moving forward, is to roll out new product releases in parallel to our current platform.  This will give everyone a chance to try out, evaluate, and comment on our new concepts.

We would also like to take this opportunity to ask those of you who had issues or concerns with the new site to participate in future beta testing.  We had originally asked for Beta Tester in two of our newsletters sent earlier this year so we’re eager to build our beta group even larger.  If you’re interested in participating please send us an email using our support ticketing system with BETA TESTER in the subject line of your email.

The moves that Google has been making recently have angered some people, which may appear to be possibly infringing on their personal rights, including personal information, although Google has published multiple blog posts clarifying the information that users have had questions about.  Beyond the fact that Google is constantly trying to drive traffic to their properties, the undeniable truth is that these services will ultimately impact the way we all interact with the billions of pages of newspapers, and information.

What Does Google News Archives Mean to Bloggers and Others Online?

Bloggers will ultimately be able to benefit from Google News Archives, as it is easy to link to and excerpt articles from the news stories found in newspapers that have been archived to date.  To find an article that has a newspaper associated with it, the search result will have “Google News Archive” next to the newspaper title and the date it was published, however older sources from TIME have been excluded, as these articles can be found on their website as text.

Previously, bloggers and journalists alike would be required to dig up an article from a local source or have the newspaper agency send the article, often costing heavy fees for either party and lost time, trying to get “the facts.”  

Let’s say you are writing about a historical event.  Instead of searching throughout the web, you’ll simply need to locate the archived article, then create a link to the specific article using the tool located on every newspaper page.  There is no need to create multiple links, images, and excerpts to news articles as once before.

News stories that were once forgotten, in towns that didn’t start growing until the late twentieth century will now have some relevance to other people, should Google fulfill their promise in trying to archive nearly every newspaper in the world.

Put in short terms — it’ll save time for bloggers, while maintaining consistency by using sources that have generally become credible through the years, adding more relevance to your own blog through your personal research and thoughts.

Twitter: Less than Two Years and Now Used in Mass Media

Not only CNN, but several other popular mass media sites and television (traditional) media have been on the forefront of adopting the micro-blogging client as a method of quickly communicating with their viewers and readers.  While most web-aware people understand the importance of communicating through this method on the Internet, the growth of the service would likely be much higher if people understood its overall purpose.

Twitter now receives well over 21.8 million (United States) monthly visits, has enjoyed year-over-year growth of between 400 and 800 percent, as well as month-over-month growth of between 15 and 25 percent.  While these figures are quite astounding, it represents the trend that “old media” is currently transitioning to online, interactive forms of media that allow viewers to “chat” with the on-air correspondents, and provide direct feedback, rather than older methods, such as phoning in, and writing into the producers/journalists through mail or email.

The slow evolution from the once tell-true methods of growing your target audience are slowly coming to an end.  With the introduction of Twitter as a prominent part of the news program, and potentially as its own independent show for showcasing the ideas of viewers from their dedicated page, Twitter is rapidly gaining the trust of people who wouldn’t normally revere web applications designed for people who are connecting with each other on the Internet.

Put it all in perspective.  Why would a company with one of the largest audiences and cable news networks strongly work towards getting people to divert away from one of their online properties and travel to Twitter, a non-related, but equally compelling service?  Obviously each coincide with one another, providing the valuable asset that the company is looking for in strengthening and/or rejuvenating its audience to a slightly younger/Internet-savvy crowd.

Conclusion

Through these two examples above, one can see how the evolution of traditional media to online formats is rapidly taking shape, mostly by large, multi-billion dollar corporations that have money to experiment in areas that could lead to further innovation on their fore fronts in other areas.  

After online diaries (an off-shoot of the modern blog) started around 1994, it took much longer for blogs to become mainstream - nearly ten years, at which point they were used in the media/election.  Obviously, the mass media is beginning to “get” what journalism is instead of sticking to practices that worked twenty years ago.

The future of blogging may not be as clear as it once was — twenty to thirty years ago there was no such thing as “online journals,” although there were still newspapers, which are now being digitized for everyone to read for free.  Look twenty to thirty years into the future and the video, media (photographs, etc.), and content (blogs, etc.) will be archived in a similar fashion, only through use of a new revolutionary format, making them even more accessible.  It won’t necessarily happen, but if the past is any indication of the future, there will be drastic changes in the way that today’s online/offline activities take place.

[Source: Google Blog]

The dependence on these services, primarily by larger advertisers can sometimes lead them to suspect that some sties get either more or less traffic, depending solely on what these sites report.  After all, most sites don’t have a dedicated Advertise page with specific details from the tracking codes that have been installed on their site or the server-side tracking programs.

Recently, there have been more people asking about the relevancy of Alexa and other sites, which allow anyone to access a general trends chart of your site traffic, page views, and other “snapshot” details.  There are many specific details you need to know about how each site obtains its information, reflective of what is displayed in the charts.

Note: Daily Blog Tips recently published a report comparing Alexa traffic vs. Google Trends and Compete stats, which is worth checking out.  Daniel’s was a case-by-case study of how Alexa stats are misrepresentative of the true figures, while this report is primarily based on traffic levels of my site versus others.

Alexa - “The Web Information Company”

An Amazon subsidiary, Alexa bases its traffic on people’s habits who use the Alexa toolbar.  Information is then placed in the traffic rankings system.  Trend graphs display a three-day moving average of the site’s daily traffic rank, charted over time.  Several popular anti-spyware programs currently classify the add-on as a tracking program, warning users to uninstall it.  

Disclaimer: Traffic is based on toolbars, “which may not be a representative sample of the global Internet population.”  Sites with lower traffic are not weighed the same as higher sites, rankings over 100,000 and above should be regarded as not reliable.  

Main Problem: Algorithm recently changed, not tracking social bookmarking/networking traffic as accurately.  Generally estimates reach, rank, and page views on percent of the entire database of sites Alexa tracks.  If more people use the toolbar and visit particular sites, the traffic levels of that site may, in essence, be higher for that site.

Quantcast - “The World’s Only Open Internet Ratings Service”

Traffic levels at Quantcast are supposedly based on extensive research and development by the team of engineers and mathematicians to help provide publishers with a free and easy way to report on the traffic audience, for metrics and stats that advertisers demand, including demographics, traffic, and lifestyle assessments.

Disclaimer: Determines traffic from ten million internet properties (as of June 2008), seventy-five billion directly measured events, and 204 million US people online.

Main Problem: Requires code to be added to site, otherwise inaccurate stats will be reported or none at all, depending on the size of the blog.

Compete - “A New Breed of Web Analytics Company”

Compete judges traffic from two million plus United States Internet users that have given them permission to analyze the web pages that they visit and ask them questions via surveys.

Disclaimer: Provides a more accurate look at larger sites, as determined by their “About” statement, mainly factoring in larger sites. Favors United States traffic.

Main Problem: Traffic is determined based off of people’s opinion, stating that marketers can use this information across the entire company, not just for online media planning or site design decisions.  Extremely rough estimates, sites may not register low traffic levels.

Google Trends - “Compare the World’s Interests in Your Favorite Topics”

Google Trends (sites) analyzes web traffic based on searches and Google Analytics information, should you decide to share it with other Google Services.  It also bases it on the number of times your topic/site appeared in Google News stories.  

Disclaimer: Still in beta/labs, so it’s still in early stages of development, potentially containing inaccuracies for a number of reasons.  Only available in English and Chinese.

Main Problem: Like the other services, results are normalized, so large spikes do not register as accurately as daily/normal traffic levels.  Sites require a minimum of one thousand daily page views to register, sometimes higher, therefore it can’t provide an accurate analysis of the web’s sites.  Plus, it only registers traffic in Google, leaving out approximately thirty to forty percent of the results.

Site Meter - “Counter and Statistics Tracker”

Site Meter is a free and paid service that I will be using in this report to analyze the traffic trends.  It requires a tracking code to be installed on your site.  Individual company.

Google Analytics

Google Analytics is one of the most used services for tracking site information, from everything from user paths to browser information.  Requires a tracking code to be installed on your site.  Owned and operated by the largest search engine.

Report

In order to produce accurate results, I compared all of the above tools and services and produced similar charts, all for this site and comparisons of other sites in similar topics and ranking (higher also included).  The main goal: to find the most analytics and tracking service, whether available to the general public or requiring a tracking code to be installed.

First, we’ll take a look at each service individually, then take sample charts from each service comparing multiple sites.

Google Analytics - The following charts are taken from my Google Analytics reports page, with the first showing Site Usage, or a detailed report of visits, pages/visit, average time on site, % new visits, and bounce rates for the June 1-June 30, 2008 and July 1-July 31, 2008 period, stacked.  This chart is to give a good idea of United States versus international traffic levels and growth for the two month period.  The average time on site and other details are not necessarily factors to keep the report simple.

This second image is page views and visits, stacked for the entire period that this site has been active, mid-October to the current date.  Used to represent traffic trend of site over the time period.

Site Meter - Again, these charts are simply paced for trend information, giving “specific” details of monthly traffic levels, and the overall trend through the bar graph.  Traffic for the October to August period.

Quantcast - Analytics information from select periods (tracking code removed).  It is a rough representation of daily traffic levels, but needs to be included for this comparison, as it is considered one of the top three to four publicly available trends sites. Different views included.

Compete - Traffic information since the site launched.  According to Compete, my rank has gone down (negative) more than 250,00 ranks, indicating a 55.3% decrease in traffic.  Compete also states that their traffic levels have now surpassed that of Alexa’s.

Alexa - Traffic information from the February to August 4 (latest) period.  The “reach” is based on world traffic levels.  According to the chart, I have climbed 50% in reach and 69,991 in rank over the past three months, although the general trend is fairly stagnant, not increasing over time.  Graph is completely smoothed.  

All Services (Their Traffic) - Added as a representative amount of the popularity of each service - Site Meter, Quantcast, Alexa, Compete, and ComScore (another service).  Google Trends and Google Analytics (15,000 US visitors per month) can not be estimated correctly.  Interestingly enough, Compete marks ComScore with a “Warning” label, indicating that it has been flagged as a spammer/scammer, spoof site, or malware distributor.

All Services (Blog Tipz Traffic) - To best represent trends (Alexa and Quantcast implemented based on available data).  In this chart, I compare all the services listed above, for easier comparison.  Alexa and Quantcast’s information are also not on the same scale or basis, traffic percentage, for Alexa’s.

Snapshot: Compete’s traffic levels are most inaccurate the the past two months, while Google Analytics and SiteMeter’s are the most accurate, followed by Quantcast’s (likely), then Alexa’s, based on the growth pattern.

Other Comparisons

In these examples, I have compared my site to other, fairly popular sites, to see how each site stacks up.  One of the site is fairly randomly selected, simply added for illustration purposes.

Links: Compete | Quantcast | Google Trends | Alexa

Google Trends - Two sites not available for ranking.  Indicates trends, but not much more.  It can’t display traffic for websites with less than 1,000 daily page views/visitors, so sites with high ranking have more data available.

Alexa - Nearly all the sites show similar traffic levels, other than John Chow and Pro Blogger’s website, which have shown large downturns, and now upturns in traffic.  Inaccurate results when comparing all results.

Compete - Not enough information for two sites.  Fairly accurate results when comparing multiple sites, not accurate on some (my) site.

Quantcast - Two versions, “Literal” and Relative comparisons, respectively.  You can see when sites add or remove the code through the charts.  Provides good metrics of growth on a daily basis and comparison, especially in the “Literal” comparison.  However, it is similar to Alexa and Compete’s caveats as it requires the tracking code to be added and appears to favor United States traffic more than global traffic.

Conclusion

While my traffic levels are quite low compared to some of the sites compared, it shouldn’t make a huge difference, as my site is ranked “within the top 100,000″ in Alexa and several other services.

In the report of comparing trends and monthly visitors, Site Meter and Google Analytics scored the highest in being able to produce similar reports.  For the past two months, Alex and even more so, Compete, failed to provide accurate traffic/trends in line with the code that was placed on my site.  

It is quite staggering when you take a look at the difference in the number of visitors.  There are dozens of sites that will provide free tools to track your site popularity, and most of them, many run by multi-billion dollar companies (Amazon) can’t even provide decent site trend information.

My advice: Do your own analytics and tracking by installing a tracking code, with the best choice being Google Analytics, followed by nearly any other service.  Advertisers need to stay away from Alexa and in some cases, Compete and request information from the selected site/network of sites.  Google Analytics allows you to share varying levels of reports directly from your Dashboard to potential advertisers.  In this way, you can potentially gain advertisers as they don’t have to research and be mislead by the services that other large, site analytics corporations can’t touch.

Traffic Ranks:

Alexa - 168,365 (World)
Compete - 465,254 (US)
Quantcast - 1,712,503 (Not an accurate representation)

What can you do with Alexa?  Look at how your small site is more popular than large, authority blogs.  Compete?  It indicates that your visitor levels are rapidly declining and need to refine your promotion methods.  They aren’t even useful for “trend” information.  Major work on their code and algorithms needs to be done.

With the new design, very few new features come, but the design has overhauled some of the areas inside your profile with the recent visitors module (to the top of the page, rather than below the fold).  The main page now has a more defined message about what the service is about:

• Discover - You’ve got a blog, see who’s checking you out.  You might have more in common than you think!
• Broadcast - Share your online activity!  All your latest photos, blog posts, videos, tweets, and more on a single page, updated automatically.
• Connect - Now that you found the cool people on MyBlogLog, connect with them all over the web!

A three-step outline is provided to the right about how to get started, along with a showcase (slider) of twenty blogs with the most followers.

These changes follow in suit with smaller, but equally brand-creating moves, including the MyBlogLog Connector, a tool to help keep you connected and updates from Zillow and Trulia profiles, catering towards the real estate blogging community.

BlogCatalog Screenshot
Early June 2008

MyBlogLog Screenshot
Late July 2008

As these two social networking/blogging tools continue to evolve to the quickly changing blogosphere, it is apparent, in both cases, that they are trying to meet the demands of bloggers to create (singlehandedly competing against one another) a single, unified profile of all your social communities that you belong to.  

While the design of each service may not tell the whole story of what is behind the shiny interface in ways of tools for connecting with others, it may certainly be a step in the right direction - resulting in a single location to track the status of people in your small “network” of followers.  Along with the site redesigns and new features, it shows that there is still a hard working team behind these networking sites for new members to utilize.

The Smashing team will likely use the results from thirty design problems that are encountered in every day design, and wants to pose solutions to them.  Today, the first article of possibly many in the series on blog design was published, with the following results found on those blogs.

It is noted that the results should not be used to design your blog, but simply represents the number of blogs that are using those examples in their design.

Some of the findings are listed below.

• large blogs require a multi-column layout solution (usually 3 columns suffice) (58%);
• layouts are usually centered (94%),
• layouts usually have a fixed weight (px-based) (92%),
• the width of the fixed layout varies between 951 and 1000px (56%),
• 58% of the overall site layout is used to display the main content,
• CSS-layouts are used (90%),

Her blog was run at AllAboutOlive.com.au (unavailable) and at World’s Oldest Blogger, in which her 74th post stated that she was ill and had moved into a nursing home.

Photo Copyright Adam Ward

She shared stories of her life - raising three children on her own, living through two world wars and the Depression, and working as a station cook.

Her blog, or “blob” as she referred to it, was set up in February with the help of a friend who wrote the entries.  

Riley died on Saturday, and would have been 109 in October.  She will be greatly missed, and has served as an inspiration to all bloggers and people looking to start a blog that blogging can start at any age.

“She had people communicating with her from as far away as Russia and America on a continual basis, not just once in a while.”

“What kept her going was the memories she had, and being able to recall those memories so strongly.”

[Source: Reuters and News.com.au]

Maybe I didn’t get the humor from the writer, Tom McNichol, when he criticized bloggers (which includes himself), stating: “That’s what makes Lifehacker one of the few truly — gasp — useful blogs on the net.”  We should all go to Lifehacker and all our problems would be solved.  Maybe Lifehacker should be the only blog that exists, as all other blogs simply don’t provide any useful “stuff”.  He severely misses the point that every blogger needs to be able to find information, often specified to one blog niche.  For example, relating to blogging, if you need to find out how to customize a WordPress theme, a single blog likely won’t be able to deliver all the information.

Next, he goes on to say, “While the typical blog is written by one person wearing sweatpants reclaimed from the hamper, Metafilter lets any user — regardless of what they’re wearing — contribute links and brief commentary highlighting interesting stuff he or she finds on the web.”  I doubt he dresses up in formal attire every time he blogs or writes books in his home.

While this may appear like a personal attack on McNichol, I feel that he should give more respect to his readers that have actually created a successful blog, unlike he, who blogs for those established by already dominating media powers.

In terms of the accuracy of the list, this post from Blogcosm breaks apart the list by Technorati Rank, Alexa rank, and category.

Update - Blogcosm has posted some of the many ways the list bashes bloggers by going through the list of 25 blogs.

Top 25 Blogs According to Time

1. The Huffington Post
2. Lifehacker
3. Metafilter
4. Tree Hugger
5. PostSecret
6. Blog di Beppe Grillo
7. Engadget
8. Freakonomics
9. Gigazine
10. Ace of Spades HQ
11. Radosh.net
12. Gawker
13. The Daily Dish by Andrew Sullivan
14. Velveteen Rabbi
15. Boing Boing
16. Tech Crunch
17. Web 2.Oh…really?
18. The Sartorialist
19. Daily Kos
20. The Consumerist
21. Indexed
22. Wired’s Threat Level Blog
23. Regret the Error
24. Bad Jocks
25. The Reverse Cowgirl

Most Overrated Blogs

1. Slashdot
2. JIm Cramer Blog on RealMoney.com
3. Ars Technica
4. Nicholas Kristof On the Ground
5. I Can Has Cheezburger

You can vote for your favorite blogs on a scale from 1 to 10.  With more than 4,600 votes, Ace of Spades HQ comes in at first place for user votes, with Indexed, Lifehacker, TechCrunch, and Engadget following suit.

What do you think about this list of top blogs?  Do you think it truly reflects the most favorited blogs or is it simply a way for Time to add another abysmal feature for bloggers?

Yesterday marked an event which once again undermined the respectability, credibility, and honesty of many popular (and seemingly professional) bloggers.

An Internet meme that captures your reader’s attention, making them spend a few minutes clicking through the countless pop-up dialog windows of the lyrics, is really funny.  It not only led unsuspecting, new, or returning visitors to think about never returning to the site, but it also left the never leaving impression in their minds about the post that caused he or she to begin disliking their blog altogether.

In my personal opinion, it is never a good opinion to post PR stunts on April Fools’ Day for the following reasons:

1. It leads gullible readers to fall for your jokes - the main intention, but nevertheless evil.
2. Your credibility will go down the drain - either for covering a story that was ill-written as a joke.
3. Respectability will go down - people don’t want or need to spend their whole lives on the Internet.  They want to visit their favorite blogs, and don’t have eternity to stay on one, so don’t go screwing with their screens.
4. Frequent visitors won’t find the joke amusing unless they are inclined to laughing along with you.

Another important part of this year’s jokes that was significantly different form others was the fact that most were simply repeats, with slight alterations between them.  Where was the creativity?  Where was the respect for the readers?

People following multiple blogs that are categorized the same niche may have fallen for the same joke - multiple times - losing time/work (money), and the elements already addressed.

I generally liked April Fools’ Day in the past.  However, because of the few ignorant blog writers, at this point I either feel indifferent or feel some hatred towards the day.  I fully understand that bloggers want to have fun too, but why not pull a joke that is somewhat believeable and cause visitors to respect you further for your personal sense of humor instead of your “I need to fit in, so I’ll do that, too!” mood.

I also respect the following bloggers for not fitting in with the crowd and coming up with their own pranks (more at Super Blogging TIps):

• Daily Blog Tips - [Acquired for $168,000]
• ShoeMoney - [Making $1,000 in One Hour - video intentionally blurred giving away the secret to making that much money]
• Matt Cutts - [iPhone Can Connect to Anything, I'm Skipping April Fools This Year, and My Firefox Tattoo]
• Super Affiliate Zac Johnson - [Blog Affiliate Program - pays you $0.75 per visitor sent via your site]
• ProBlogger - [Pay Per Tweet Program and The Results / The Opportunity Cost of Not Participating in Web Events]
• Read Write Web - [Google Dream Ads]

It is completely your decision as to whether you will serve your readers BS on April Fools’ Day or deliver them the same quality that you normally do.