I got bored tonight and started checking my stats (David Cooley has a heart attack now! Yes!! You CyberCoding fool, I spent some time checking my stats! LOL!!!) He always gets on to me for never using trigonometry to analyze my stats.
Anyway, I was amazed to discover that a very low percentage of my traffic are from regular readers via RSS compared to the total amount of daily traffic my site gets.
Almost 60% of my traffic come direct from search engines. These typically are first time visitors who stumble onto an older post that I have written, read it and never come back again. 
We’re going to change that!
The above shot is for Monday, showing that I had 4,743 visits with 7,860 pages views. The very first shot shows that almost 60% of my visits came from search engines.
This screen shot came from FeedBurner which basically says that my RSS feed had been requested 801 times in a 24 hour period. The reach, from what I understand, basically says how many times things were clicked via the content in RSS.
Regular RSS Reader traffic doesn’t account for much against my total amount of daily traffic. The way I see it, the number of RSS requests equates to the equivalent of around 16% of my normal site traffic.
What does that mean? Well, it actually means that I am doing a piss poor job with self promotion. I should be focusing MORE on advertising my RSS feed and getting this 84% of traffic to subscribe to my RSS feed.
How can I get get more people to subscribe? Simple… informing them about it will help. I don’t really need to pitch people about my RSS feed. It is more of an issue of awareness. What I am going to do is put myself into the shoes of an incoming reader direct for a search engine and make a small advertisement directly above and below my individual posts.
The advertisement on the top of the page will say this:
“After you finish reading this page, take a moment to subscribe to my RSS feed.” or something along those lines.
The advertisement on the bottom of the page will say this:
“If you enjoyed reading this page, you might consider subscribing to my RSS feed. This is a quick and easy way to receive more articles like the one you just read.” or something like that.
Wish me luck, I really want to buckle down and work hard (and smart) on increasing my readership. I have been wanting to get my RSS numbers up to 1,000 for a long time and it is almost there! But I have been stuck in the 700’s for a long time. I am ready to put forth some real good effort towards increasing to 1000! (This is the part where you cheer me on.)
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Date/Time: 3-12-2008 06:17:25 Comment #12318
The reason for this is, you shouldn’t expect RSS Subscribers to come here unless you write new informative content.
Date/Time: 3-12-2008 07:17:20 Comment #12319
I am writing from the Hospital, lol……
Next thing you know you will start reading your email first thing in the morning, OMG !
How do you compare the value of RSS Subscribers to search engine traffic when a site is trying to make money?
Date/Time: 3-12-2008 09:44:26 Comment #12321
See that is where the trigonometry would kick in, I guess.
Date/Time: 3-12-2008 10:29:16 Comment #12322
I am considering putting either an in context subscribe box or even a floating subscribe incentive for people who visit via search. I have a box (similar to yours) on a few of my sites, but I want to test to see if I can get more RSS and email subscribers from my search traffic with a more “in your face” approach.
I will GLADLY cheer you on to increase your RSS readership. 1,000 is a great goal and can generate a ton of interest and traffic. What strategies on increasing your RSS are you thinking about? I’d love to hear.
P.S. I also subscribed to your feed.
Date/Time: 3-12-2008 11:34:30 Comment #12329
Hi Aaron,
Thanks for the comment and subscribing.
Take a look at my post titled, When Shoud I Display FeedBurner Subscriber Numbers for more tips related to your question.
Date/Time: 3-12-2008 12:28:06 Comment #12332
Thanks Gary,
Tennessee? I live just north of Knoxville.
Do you bleed orange?