"If we ever forget that we're one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under." - Ronald Reagan

Monday, February 4, 2008

Who can it be now?

Sing along with me, folks! "Who can it be knocking at my door? Go away! Don't come 'round here no more. Can't you see that its late at night? I'm very tired and I am not feeling right."

So, I am paranoid. We all know this. Also, I am pretty nosy. Nothing new there. And I am married to a computer geek. Scene is set, let's see what happens:

Around Christmas, I was staring at my blog (as I frequently do when avoiding laundry, dishes or small children) and I wondered who actually looks at it. Sure, I know some of my good buddies read it but...who else? (And I forgot to mention before that I am also pretty vain and believe everyone should think I'm wonderful...'cuz I am!) When the Man was trying to go to sleep that night, I kept talking, mentioning random things that happened during the day; typical stuff like who pushed who and the daily poop tally. The usual for an SAHM. I also wondered out loud about my blog readers. Possibly in an effort to shut me up about it, the Man promises to load something on my blog that will track visitors.

Me: You can do that?
Man: (slightly annoyed that I doubt his genius, ignores me a pretends to sleep.)
Me: Can you do it tomorrow?
Man: ZzzzzzZZzzzzz...
Me: Okay, so tomorrow, then.

About three weeks later ('cuz we must include the Man factor, which causes everything to take exponentially longer than first thought), he puts a script on my blog. You can't see it. It's like a ninja script, tracking anyone who comes to my blog, how they got here, watching what they look at, timing how long they're here, and chucking throwing stars at people who leave without commenting. Just kidding...maybe. Better leave a comment to be sure you don't get one in the back.

And the obsession begins! The script is from Google Analytics. I can check daily/hourly/whateverly and see who is looking at my blog. Here are some cool facts:
  • Since I started tracking on Jan. 5th, duckduckcow has had 1,671 visitors.
  • Average visitor spends 2 minutes on my blog.
  • The current favorite page is the archive for my London visits.
  • Approximately 58% of visitors come from referring sites. These are basically sites that linked to duckduckcow and people click on the link. This also includes people clicking on my site through comments I've left (got an interesting spike in visits when I commented on a mega blog - that was fun!).
  • You can also get to my blog through search engines. Currently "duck poems" is the most popular search keywords...although I am not entirely sure why it comes to me...there's only been one or two poems - neither of them about ducks. Various FHE searches are also big hitters.
  • While less than half of the visitors are here for the first time, I have some loyal fans, 12% of which have come here 26-50 times since I started tracking.
  • My fans (if I can call them that) hail mostly from Utah and Texas - no surprise - but what is very surprising is the number of visitors coming from Washington. I know one family in Washington. They don't have 56 members, either.
  • I've never had a visitor from Maine or North Dakota. If you know anyone in those states, send them the link, okay? It would sure help my visitor map look prettier.
Pretty cool, huh? It's easy to get started, if you are interested in knowing or are just as obsessive as I am! But I warn you...you'll start imaging all kinds of random things about your visitors, like why Washingtonians like poems about ducks.

Also? There's some new cakes on The Cake Cow, if you haven't been there lately. And I got an email from a lady wanting to know what it would cost to ship a teddy bear cake to Arizona...yeah, that was interesting...

13 comments:

Amanda said...

YOu should not flaunt a YUMMY cake at a pregnant woman!!!!

Popcorn House said...

HELLO??? North Dakota is represented well. We can't believe you forgot us. Looks like Google Analytics isn't catching all your visitors (we visit at least once a day)!

Kristie said...

That is so cool!! I figured that there were things out there that could do that but I am not smart enough to figure it out!!! :)

Debi said...

Hey, cool!! Some blogs have the number of visitors listed on the first page of the blog. I think that is neat, too.

Jen said...

3 thoughts. 1.I need to be more creative with my blog. 2.I'm glad I'm not the only one that has to download the events of the day to my hubby before bed while he starts drifting off to sleep. 3. You should ship a cake to Josh for his 1st Bday. I'm sure it would be beautiful by the time in got here:)Hehehe.

Lindsay said...

I bet all the WA visitors are my MANY friends! Cuz I have a lot. (lol) Anyway, very cool stats. I should try it on my blog page! Hope you are doing well.

Holly (2 Kids and Tired) said...

I haven't seen the google thing, but I use site meter on mine and I have a feature that shows the google searches that send people my way. Have you done that? It's hysterical. I periodically post about them. I came over from LDS Blogging Women, by the way!

Jessica G. said...

Wards - hey, that's odd! I asked the Man about that and he said a whole bunch of technical terms that made my eyes glaze over...but it boils down to you may be in North Dakota but you're ISP isn't...or something.

Jen - hey, why not just fly me out and I'll do the cake? ;)

Rupper Family said...

Jess, I love that you're tracking your readers. Before I had my baby I started looking at the blogs of friends of friends-mostly looking to find cute names I could steal or good recipe ideas. I still do it alot because I like to sit idly while my kids are napping instead of hitting the mountains of laundry or attacking the dishes. I need some me time. We all do because there are A LOT of us blogging these days!
I love you. Love reading your blog too, I feel connected to you again even though I haven't seen you for years! Technology is the coolest ay Cindy?
-Wendy

Emma said...

My paranoid friend, you are the best! Weird how it traces the ip adresses not even near where some people live. I have thought about doing this with ours but I really don't think many people look at it but you never know. Love the cakes. Ummmmmmmmmmmm chooooocooolate!

Anonymous said...

Kinda strange being tracked and not being the one doing the tracking... so this is how all those people feel. About sending the cake; When I was in Afblamastan we had a teacher send us cake and it was in a jar. It took 4 weeks to get to us so it wasn't in the best condition, but If you could figure some way to overnight it you might be able to get to to work. If you need to experiment I will let you send me cakes until you get it right! I'm sure Benny P would like one for his 1st b-day too!

James and Angela said...

I came over from lds women bloggers. You are hilarious. I'm glad I found your blog. I also have google analytics on my blog. I've had people from Germany, England, Australia, and Spain looking on my site. Pretty cool.

Jason said...

I have been using this for a while...i too have a creepy obsession to find out who knows my secrets...

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