CSotD: Report to Stockholders
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As it happens, this rerun of The Big Picture, by Lennie "No Relation" Peterson, ran at GoComics yesterday and I snagged it as a fitting illustration for reporting back on the results of the non-poll poll.
I say "non-poll poll" because it's ironic that someone who hates those bogus, short-sighted "comics polls" in newspapers is using basically the same thing here. So let's start there.
It wasn't a poll. It was an opportunity for people who wanted to leave me some feedback to do so. But it only measured the opinions of people who (A) already visit the blog, and (B) decided to participate.
Which would be (and way, way, way too often is) a pretty stupid way to decide on changes, but what I wanted to know was "Is there anybody out there?" plus a little "How'm I doing, folks?"
For that, it pretty much works.
There are sites that claim huge numbers, but some — maybe a lot — of those "visitors" are wandering spambots. I make this claim with some confidence, because my host put in a new spam filter about a year ago and my hits dropped by at least a third.
Kind of funny, actually, because I'd just started hitting a level where I could qualify for some advertising banners. Should have signed up while my numbers were still inflated.
However, web stats in general are, well, pretty slippery. I think that's a polite way of saying it.
Example: I've had a couple of times when something here was passed along on Reddit and I would suddenly have a huge surge of hits, but none of them seemed to stick — I'd see my traffic triple or quadruple or more, but two days later, it would be back to normal.
I've heard other people suggest that Reddit traffic is pretty useless and appears to be people idly clicking on links they then don't even bother to read, kind of like when you're giving a class and someone opens the door, sticks their head in to look around, then closes it again. Thanks for coming by; hope you enjoyed it.
This is not to be confused, for instance, with the time I blogged about the New England Webcomics Weekend. I got a rush of traffic and some nice mentions, but, while I often feature web comics, this site is mostly about syndicated strips, so it's not surprising that not a lot of that traffic stuck. Some probably did, and welcome if you're one of 'em!
The people here evidently want to be here. Apparently, about half the people alleged by my web analytics to come here each day checked in via the non-poll poll, which, if those analytics are at all accurate, would indicate a very high level of engagement. "Half" is an extraordinary turnout.
So here's what they (you) said:
I had asked about frequency of visits, but, given that I didn't leave the thing up for a full week, it would be fatuous to expect the "once a week" or less often responses to be representative of much. Most of the people who responded said they were daily visitors, which, given the brief window, they'd kind of have to have been.
But there was no point in dragging things out, once the main questions had been answered: Given the usual percentage of participation you can count on, I'm confident that my visitors are humans rather than spambots.
The numbers aren't huge, but, for a blog that doesn't feature a lot of snark or very many pictures of famous boobs — and where a long blog roll of cartoonists' sites would likely stimulate some mutual promotion but would also appear to be (more) unseemly favoritism — they are respectable, and the level of engagement among those few, those happy few, that band of readers, is strong.
I'm good with that.
According to you, the bulk of my visitors are comics fans, which, again, is no surprise.
About six percent are (A) amateur or semi-pro cartoonists and seven percent are (B) either professional cartoonists or in the business.
But avid cartoon fans (C), make up 47 percent of readers, and casual comic readers (D) are another 31 percent. The remainder took advantage of the chance to define themselves in a variety of ways, all amusing and generally informative but here clumped as (E), "other."
The vast majority (93 percent) of readers are from North America. Not a huge surprise, given that even the overseas cartoons I feature are ones that would make sense to a North American audience.
And, while I'd love to have two or three thousand (legitimate) hits a day, I didn't get a lot of indication that I need to make many changes. Maybe increase the number of boobs and declare things SHOCKING more often. But I enjoy what I've been doing, and indications are that it's working well as a solid little niche blog.
F'rinstance:
I was concerned that maybe people were coming for the comics and skipping the text entirely, but that doesn't seem to be the case. Nobody selected the "read the comic and move on" option, while only a quarter said they read the comic and scan the text, an answer I thought I'd see more of.
But of course the people who take the time to read the whole thing are also the ones most likely to complete the poll, given that it wasn't a poll (Have I mentioned that?).
In any case, the Blabbiness Issue came out quite a bit more in my favor than I expected. 12 percent (C) said they might read the whole thing more often if it were shorter, and 22 percent said their take on the length varied depending on how they felt about the topic, but the rest (A) chose "Fine. Not an issue."
I'm gonna still wish for 750 words and try to keep it under 1,000, though not today, I see by the growing counter.
And I'm still going to go for a mix of serious, important links with some eccentric stuff mixed in.
The majority of respondents, 49 percent, check the links to see how I document what I'm claiming (A), and those are the links I really feel it important to provide.
But 27 percent (B) said they checked out links if they seemed likely to be amusing and 17 percent (C) even said the links are one of their favorite features. Only seven percent don't bother with the links,and that's okay, too, but obviously links are something I'll continue to dig up and add.
The most important stat was also the most encouraging. I asked if people were following any comics now as a result of having seen them here.
I figured, given that I knew I had some serious comics fans here, that some visitors already were very familiar with what's out there, but only about six percent said that was the case for them (C), while 20 percent (D) simply said they hadn't started following anything new. Fair enough.
But 40 percent (B) said they'd picked up a few new comics, while 34 percent (A) upped that vague measure to "several."
Which means that the blog is managing to introduce new strips to about three-quarters of its visitors. That's awfully good, I'd say.
So thanks for the feedback, those who provided it, and, for everyone, tune in tomorrow.
Please.
Because this is fun, especially knowing you're out there.
And speaking of why I do this:
In the job that actually does pay the rent around here, I assigned this review, and was delighted to see my 11-year-old reviewer add this blog entry last night.
Yes, comics matter. And, if a kid is going to have a couple of heroes, that's not a bad pair.
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