Friday, March 9th, 2007...12:02 pm

Want to be more productive with your blog?

Stop checking your stats!

I’ll admit it, I check my stats way too often. But I’m betting you do too.

The success of a blog these days seems to be defined through the amount of traffic it receives so it’s natural to be anxious about how many visitors you’re getting. The problem is this time could be better spent actually creating content for your blog. Without content you won’t attract any readers, and if you don’t have any readers you don’t really have a blog.

Write or die. It’s that simple.

From now I’m only going to check my stats twice a day. Once in the morning and once at night. I suggest you try to do the same.

The same goes for your adsense and affiliate reports. Willing those numbers to tick over won’t work as well as old fashioned hard work and creativity.

Here’s an idea. Try to replace that old habit with a new and more productive one.

Try this. When you are reading someone elses blog try to leave at least one comment. Make sure it has some substance to it, not just an “I agree”, but something that is either insightful or will generate further discussion. This will help get you into the habit of writing, as well as kickstart some creative thinking. It will also help you promote your blog. Being active in the blogging community is a big part of being a blogger, so the next best thing to writing on your own blog is to write on someone else’s.

The blogging world is more like a small hive than a scattering of isolated islands, so you might want to get to know your neighbours.

One thing I’ve learnt is people will be more inclined to both visit and comment on your blog if you make the effort on theirs. I know if someone takes the time to comment on my blog at the very least I’m going to go visit their site. At worst I won’t find anything that interests me, at best I’ve just made a new contact, and opened up a new potential network to explore.

Happy hunting.

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29 Comments

  • I can see getting addicted to seeing your blog stats and having to check them every hour. Sometimes that can be depressing. It’s like weighing yourself everyday - it doesn’t really do you any good and can only drive you crazy. I’d argue that checking them weekly is plenty.

  • Yeh once a week is enough but I have to slowly ween myself of checking hourly. Baby steps. :)

  • Thank you for the reminder! I was just thinking today that I’ve become a statistic addict. Just imagine trying to check the stats on eleven blogs and two websites everyday! I realized that I was wasting a great deal of time. I’m going to take your advice and just check in the morning and at night!

  • GREAT post…speaking of leaving insightful comments…here’s one ;-)

    I can relate well to this…often I’ll check analytics every hour. I quit after I realized I was getting a little obsessive compulsive about it. Along with this…it helps not to look at the time a lot, but rather just work without looking at the time. You’ll be more productive this way too.

    I wrote a post about procrastination that expands well on this.

  • Checking the time isn’t an issue for me really. I tend to work till I’m about to pass out and then push on a little further. Fitting everything I want to do into the one day is becoming impossible and is so frustrating.

  • Nice issue you raised up here. I’m one of the stats counter addicted. Most of the time I checked on it just to see how many people had drooping by. Drooping by isn’t enough as we want them to read the article we been published. I totally agreed with you. You give idea how to make people come back to my blog. Cheers!

    5 ***** for you!

    Qumang.

  • OMG someone addressed my addiction:) I have to admit like some of the previous posts, that I am addicted to stats and this has only gotten worse for me since I joined MyBlogLog (more stats to check lol). I have been working on not checking stats as much for a week now, but you are right, if we spent that time commenting on other blogs or writing posts for our blogs it would be time better used.

    Great Post.

  • everything you mentioned is true :)
    blogging is addicting and sometimes it is very difficult to stop !
    Just don’t forget that you have priorities !

  • James MyBlogLog is so addictive too. There are just so many people and new blogs to discover. The problem is the more I find, the more I add to my reading list and that compounds the problem :)

  • Very true Joe, but how do you prioritize your priorities :)

  • Oh yes, you are so right. Hour upon hour can be spent doing the wrong thing but because you are busy it feels like achievement.

    I have a “Must Do Today” list - the same things for every day. It comprises, amongst other things:

    Write 1 article for each website I run
    Post min of 1 blog article to each blog
    Leave at least 3 messages on other blogs
    Update my Squidoo lenses
    Seek backlinks from other sites
    And so on

    These are all “action” points that will move my business forward - not “feel good” get me nowhere - “I got 2 extra visitors today” type of busy.

  • That’s a good way of keeping productive Wizzer.

    I have a “must do” list of sorts. The main point being to write this blog. Writing is something that becomes comfortable through discipline and practice and I’m trying to allocate the majority of time to to doing that.

    Just gotta avoid those distractions.

  • Good stuff, I check my stats to often as well sad.

  • Good advice.
    I think every new blogger is addicted to stats.
    I try to get myself to only log in once a day.
    Like with my investments. But I would like to get it once a week.

  • You know what?….That is awesome advice! Great post!

  • That is some nice advice. Sometimes, I’m guilty of doing it as well.. :)

  • [...] hate to admit it after what I wrote yesterday but I also installed two other plugins, FireStats and WordPress Reports. Both of these are really [...]

  • I check my stats daily. Google’s main three: AdSense, Analytics and Webmaster Tools. I also check Technorati, MyBlogLog and FeedBurner.

    I just love statistics so it’s why I check them daily. I can see by traffic etc what type of posts people seem to be interested in and what they don’t seem to care about. Where they come from and where they are going.

  • Great post you have there! Not only the post but the whole blog! Congrats! I’ll drop by more often in oder to learn lots of things from you… Take care…

  • Ahh the joys of checking your stats frequently, only to see that hardly anyone has visited.
    I have personally noticed myself that since I have started commenting on other sites I have had a slight increase in traffic,and it has also resulted in extra incoming links, not only from the top commentators list (if installed) but also other people visit my site and may find something interesting which they may intern end up linking to. The effects of commenting in effect start to snow ball. Btw your so right about the commenting generating ideas, I’ve just a great idea for a post.

  • Hey dude, check it out man…I will definitely live for BLOGS…

  • I really appreciated this article. As someone who’s just getting their feet wet in blogging, any resources I can find that will help me learn to be a more effective blogger are a real treat. I especially liked the idea of taking the time to comment more often when reading blogs. I’ll admit I need to be a little more proactive in that area. I guess this comment is a good start ;)

  • [...] through Dan’s list of “Popular Posts”, you’ll find some great articles on productive blogging, building backlinks, and the advantages of being a girl on MyBlogLog. For this review though, I [...]

  • [...] Want To Be More Productive With Your Blog? [...]

  • [...] Want to be more productive with your blog? - The Wrong Advices “Stop checking your stats! I’ll admit it, I check my stats way too often. But I’m betting you do too. … Write or die. It’s that simple. … From now I’m only going to check my stats twice a day. Once in the morning and once at night. I suggest you try to do the same” [...]

  • I find I check my stats when I’m bored–or worse, supposed to be doing something I don’t want to do. The advice of replacing that habit with something more productive is a good. I’ll try to remember to do that, as soon as I get done checking my stats…

  • Hi, My name is Red, and I’m a statoholic. The advise you give is good. I just need to figure out what I’m doing and how to do it. Basically all I’ve been doing for the three weeks I’ve been blogging is whining and telling stories. Now all I have to do is figure out how to make that pay and I’ll call it a day. What are the next eleven steps to this program, does anyone know???

  • I will admit too, i check my stats every hours.

  • I have quickly flipped thru a number of your posts on blogging, I think I have found a gold mine. I have only just arrived on the blogging scene and almost as a adjunct to other things, i.e. adding a blog to my web site, etc. But as I have added posts (probably without any readers) I have come to find that it is a marvellous way of getting my thoughts out. The fact that somebody may read them gets the juices flowing, creative or otherwise. I have seen so much good advice here that I will have to consider a ” proper” blogging site. I have come across many in the past few days, but does anyony have any advice for a raw begginer regarding ease of use, or are they mostly comparable? - John

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