One, have you sent a post yet to this week's Carnival of the Badger? Blog carnivals are great ways of getting the word out about your blog and what you're writing, while learning about other blogs and what other bloggers are writing.
This week the Carnival of the Badger is being hosted by Belle at Leaning Blue. There are now four ways (just the way I like my Skyline Chili) to submit your blog post to the carnival by, oh, 8pm-ish tomorrow night (you know how those young people go to bed early).
The Conservative Cat Form
The Blog Carnival Form
The TTLB form
Send an email to badgercarnival-at-gmail-dot-com
With that taken care of, I know more than a few bloggers are huge followers of the TTLB Ecosystem. For non-bloggers, the Ecosystem is a measurement used to rank blogs on the basis of the number of links to a blog.
For example, the ecosystem currently ranks me as a "Crawly Amphibian." For the longest time, I was considered to be an "Adorable Rodent," three rankings higher. The competitive goal is to reach the status of "Higher Beings", the lofty position held by blogs such as Instapundit and Michelle Malkin.
Anyone can click on my ranking to the left and see how my blog is doing according to the Ecosystem. They would notice in the list of links, however, a number of blogs that are not recognized by the Ecosystem as missing from the list. For example, Charlie Sykes' blog is not in the list of those blogs linked to me. Sorry Charlie.
Of course, this change in status comes as a time when my blog is more popular than ever. I see more traffic every day, and more links that are outside the Ecosystem. Heck, because of a link from Vodkapundit, I had 1444 unique visitors in one day yesterday. And the hits just keep comin'.
The drop in ranking is the result of NZ Bear changing the rules to eliminate counting inline trackbacks as links. He is also contemplating eliminating counting appearances in blog rolls.
If you look purely at traffic, according to the Ecosystem I rank #1273. When links are worked in, I currently rank #5027. Obviously the traffic number will come down as I go into a more consistent traffic pattern. I suspect, when links are factored and the maintenance is all done, I'll move up in the overall rankings.
Obviously, a regional blog like mine is never going to have the number of links (or traffic) of Instapundit. Accordingly, I've set much more modest goals. My goal is to have the biggest blog in Wisconsin, sell enough ads to buy a yacht, and then become the biggest blog in retirement cruising the Mediterranean. Short of that, life sucks, but it's well-measured. Kinda like ISO-90001.
For those that are really curious, there is a site meter waaaaaay at the bottom of the blog that is open to the public. I am also listed on blog shares. In the meantime, who's is willing to help me accomplish my goals?
Update! 12/3/05 Currently at 49 Unique inbound links, 357 daily visits, current rank overall of #6011, but #1170 in traffic.
Conservative Cat has some ways of increasing the ranking and traffic for bloggers out there.
Meanwhile, Marcus at Blogger Beer is feeling a little frustrated.
Then there's my advice to other bloggers. If a blog post of yours is really good. I mean really, really good, or has special inside knowledge nobody else has, find a bigger blogger that would be especially interested and e-mail it to them. They may not go with it (for whatever reason) but at least you got in front of them.
I started out real small and anonymous for the longest time and then I sent a post to Kevin at Lakeshore Laments (see? Who says I'm ungrateful?). After that, the shameless self-promotion began. So it's all Kevin's fault.
