Web Traffic Summary, May 2009

by John R. SedivycloseAuthor: John R. Sedivy Name: John R. Sedivy
Email: john@capecodbranding.com
Site: http://www.capecodbranding.com
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This article continues the trend of posting a summary of our monthly web traffic. This month was characterized by the following:

1. A “traffic chasm” – average traffic sandwiched by two high traffic days
2. Successfully rebuild of a solid web traffic foundation

All in all I would dub this month a success in that traffic levels are building momentum. Next month will focus on repeatability of high traffic days, May 2009 established a successful foundation on which to base these efforts.

Web Traffic Analysis
Let’s start out by reviewing our daily web traffic and overall summary of activity. Figure 1 provides a visual depiction of web traffic as measured in terms of page views.

Figure 1. May 2009 Daily Web Traffic

As may be seen in Figure 1 our highest traffic day occurred on the last day of the month, May 31, 2009 which corresponded to a total of 2,102 page views. The article posted on this date was “The Relationship Between Why & How”.  A close second in terms of web traffic occurred on May 12, 2009 with a total of 2,068 page views. The article posted on this date was “How To Conduct A Customer Survey”. The remainder of the month was characterized by daily traffic in the low to mid hundreds. I referred to this phenomenon as the “traffic chasm”, which hopefully has been crossed. This is an allusion to Geoffrey Moore’s “Crossing The Chasm.”

Our lowest traffic day was on May 4, 2009 with four page views. This is an improvement over last month’s low of one page view, but still not exactly where we want to be.

Let’s look at what we posted and when during this month and the corresponding daily traffic levels:

1. Web Traffic Summary, April 2009 – May 6, 2009 – 73 views
2. The Secret To Success – May 8, 2009 – 173 views
3. Resonating With Your Customers – May 9, 2009 – 560 views
4. The Customer Experience – May 10, 2009 – 670 views
5. Social Media Takes Off – May 10, 2009 – 670 views
6. Acausal Connections Made Simple – May 11, 2009 – 722 views
7. Content Is King – May 12, 2009 – 2,068 views
8. How To Conduct A Customer Survey – May 12, 2009
9. Freedom Isn’t Free – May 13, 2009 – 485 views
10. Facebook: How To Change Language Setting – May 14, 2009 – 616 views
11. Social Media: What Is Twine? – May 14, 2009 – 616 views
12. Leading From The Front – May 14, 2009 – 616 views
13. Propeller – How To Create An Account – May 15, 2009 – 601 views
14. 100! – May 15, 2009 – 601 views
15. Patience, More Than A Virtue – May 18, 2009 – 483 views
16. What’s The Perfect Blend? – May 19, 2009 – 195 views
17. Propeller: How To Submit A New Story – May 20, 2009 – 391 views
18. SEO Part I: Sites Vs. Systems – May 21, 2009 – 111 views
19. SEO Part II: Bots, Spiders, & a Big Fat Lie – May 22, 2009 – 270 views
20. SEO Part III: Useful Tools – May 23, 2009 – 304 views
21. How To Provide Great Service – May 26, 2009 – 309 views
22. Deformed Time Part I: Finding Meaning – May 27, 2009 – 427 views
23. Deformed Time Part II: Goals & Dangers – May 28, 2009 – 141 views
24. Deformed Time Part III: Challenges & Opportunities – May 29, 2009 – 329 views
25. Resilience Book Review – May 30, 2009 – 347 views
26. The Relationship Between Why & How – May 31, 2009 – 2,102 views

It is worth noting that the posting schedule increased dramatically from the previous month. May had 26 articles posted, some days having multiple articles posted, while April had only six articles posted for the entire month. This certainly made a difference as there was a dramatic increase in overall web traffic this month, refer to “Web Traffic Summary, April 2009” for an overview of Cape Cod Branding web traffic during the month of April 2009.

Also consider when reviewing the number of page views for a given day that the specific article(s) posted on that day usually serve as the majority of page views. An interesting trend for this month is that many page views are being spread across many articles, not just one or a few. Again, most page views still originate from the article(s) posted on that day, but it will be interesting to see if this new trend continues and if so it will overtake the original trend of most traffic originating from a newly posted article.

Now let’s check out some detailed numbers for the month of May as shown in Figure 2 below:

Figure 2. May 2009 Web Traffic Summary

Key metrics for Figure 2 are the average traffic per day which was 426 – a dramatic increase from 78 the preceding month. The highest web traffic day of 2,102 page views on May 31, 2009, and the lowest web traffic day of 4 page views on May 2, 2009. There was a 457% increase in traffic when compared to last month, more than enough to compensate for dip in traffic the month prior to.

Figure 3 provides the traffic summary by week; areas of interest for the month of May are 2009-19 through 2009-022.

Figure 3. May 2009 Weekly Web Traffic

Traffic during this period make be broken down as follows:

1. Week 19 (5/4 – 5/10): 1,807 page views
2. Week 20 (5/11 – 5/17): 5,618 page views
3. Week 21 (5/18 – 5/24): 2,032  page views
4. Week 22 (5/25  – 5/31): 3,686 page views

The highest traffic week occurred during Week 20 with 5,618 page views. Overall weekly traffic was much higher and averaged in the thousands, a nice improvement over April when weekly traffic was mostly in the hundreds.

Figure 4 provides a monthly view of web traffic for May 2009.

Figure 4. May 2009 Monthly Web Traffic

Here are the values to date for 2009:

1. January 2009 (2009-01): 19,070 page views
2. February 2009 (2009-02): 29,357 page views
3. March 2009 (2009-03): 12,589 page views
4. April 2009 (2009-04): 2,343
5. May 2009 (2009-05): 13,198

May showed a great increase in traffic when compared to April. We had not only surpassed April traffic, but March as well. A goal for June will be to surpass the January traffic level.

May 2009 established a great foundation of increased web traffic on which to build upon in future months!

-John R. Sedivy of Cape Cod Branding

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