Last week, Mack Collier explained that he was switching his measurement for the Top 25 Marketing and Social Media blogs away from Technorati to Feedburner subscriber numbers. This has seen a big change in the blogs that make up the Top 25 — I am guessing this is mostly to do with the fact that many blogs don’t publish their subscriber numbers (or perhaps don’t even use Feedburner).
Now, I don’t actually publish my subscriber numbers — but it has not been a hard and fast decision. What do you think? Should I? What does it mean to you? Does a subscriber count influence your decision to read/subscribe? Does it influence the way you feel about a blog?
For the record, one of the reasons for not publishing is that I had setup three feeds very early on. I was able to consolidate down to two, and now have both running about neck and neck (about 600 each). And while I have tried to consolidate the feeds, I can’t quite get it to work. All new subscribers, please use this feed.
Mack’s list for week 120 is as follows. Congratulations to all on it!
1 – Duct Tape Marketing – 220,000 (LW – 6)
2 – Church of the Customer – 209,000 (LW – 8)
3 – CopyBlogger – 42,780 (LW – 2)
4 – Search Engine Guide – 12,173 (LW – 4)
5 – Chris Brogan – 8,319 (LW – 3)
6 – Influential Marketing – 6,985 (+12)(LW – 7)
7 – Logic + Emotion – 3,564 (LW – 5)
8 – Converstations – 3,219 (LW – 20)
9 – Drew’s Marketing Minute – 3,203 (LW – 15)
10 – The Viral Garden – 3,063 (LW – 25)
11 – Experience Curve – 2,775 (LW – UR)
12 – Conversation Agent – 2,713 (LW – 12)
13 – Techipedia – 2,300 (LW – 13)
14 – The Social Media Marketing Blog – 2,079 (LW – 19)
15 – Emergence Marketing – 1,829 (LW – UR)
16 – The Social Customer Manifesto – 1,672 (LW – UR)
17 – Techno Marketer – 1,367 (LW – 23)
18 – Social Media Explorer – 1,332 (LW – 18)
19 – Movie Marketing Madness – 1,231 (LW – UR)
20 – Daily Fix – 1,111 (LW – 10)
21 – Customers Rock! – 849 (LW – UR)
22 – Shotgun Marketing – 721 (LW – UR)
23 – Biz Solutions Plus – 541 (LW – UR)
24 – Resonance Partnership Blog – 301 (LW – UR)
25 – MediaPhyter – 116 (LW – UR)
Personally, I’m sad to see the way that lists likes these have changed the way people use their blogs and the links they create or the comments they make to aid rising to the top. I think it’s fabulous seeing a list of ‘others’ so you know what to read, but I don’t really need to know who’s at the top or who has the most subscribers, for what it’s worth.
It’s a good question. And I’ve seen many answers as varied as, “Only post your details publicly when you have 1,000 subscribers or more”.
I have mine for viewing, but I think it’s more so for myself than anyone else. I suppose I’m also rather proud with my small following, and I guess that’s why I keep it up.
I’d be interested in seeing what others thing.
I have one subscriber to my blog (and that’s me).
Funny, Conversation Agent has not changed place. I must be predictable on this list. Because in life I am everything but 😉
I don’t change what I am doing so I can make it on one list or another; I just try to focus on my readers and make them happy. 🙂
I publish my subscriber numbers so people who land on my blog can see that there are others who like it there!
Good luck with your feed issue, Gavin. I know a really smart tech guy here in San Diego if you want some help sorting it all out.
Angus … I think the only way to build links, for the long term anyway, is to create quality content and engage with your community of readers.
Zac … I can always see my own stats via Feedburner, but it is always thrilling to gain new readers and commentors.
The Kaiser … I have a subscription to both TheKaiser and to BeAlwaysOpening. That makes two.
Valeria … Your readers would say otherwise — you are known for a predictable high quality 😉
Becky … yes. That was really my point. I have a few hundred readers per day and I am interested to know whether a subscriber number has any influence over their decision to subscribe. Mack Collier seems to think it does — though I am still to be convinced about the relative merits of publicly displaying my reader stats.
http://www.blogger.com/profile/02723628321171539590
Kaiser — make that three.
Gavin — in a world of a bazillion blogs, like Becky I think it reassures first time readers that others find the water just fine. I also think it says that you’ve been around for awhile and aren’t going anywhere.
Drew
Drew, Gavin – ssssshhhhhh! Everyone will want one!
Kaiser — they may WANT one, but can they HANDLE one?
No.
Gavin – my thoughts are similar. i don’t post fb stats on diva. just never had .. no particular reason. if i were to monetize diva i would of course. as to increasing readership .. i’m not sure to what extent it does. i read because of content and community plays into that to some extent. will have to think about it some more. thanks for your post and the conversation.
Gavin I also think looking at subscriber numbers gives use a different view for how a blog’s readership interacts with the blog. For example, Duct Tape Marketing and Church of the Customer have huge sub numbers. My guess is that John and Ben/Jackie add a ton of subscribers from their speaking, and that many of these subscribers view their blogs as a resource, likely sharing the information on these blogs internally at their companies.
Course on the flipside, someone like Chris Brogan seems to have an audience that’s geared more toward bloggers and people that are actively using social media, which I would guess is why all his posts receive dozens of comments(of course, great content has something to do with that as well).
I still think that we haven’t seen the ‘perfect’ system for measuring the ‘influence’ of a blog, yet. I do think subscribers are a very important metric, but still would like to see links and comments somehow incorporated into the soup.
Maybe some day…BTW thanks for the shout out!
Hmm. For the record, I was directed to this post from a link on Marianne Richmond’s blog, which would support Technorati’s approach. Subscribing to a blog takes [minimal] effort – but what if someone subscribes to your blog and never reads the posts? If Feedburner subscribers are used as a measure of influence, I think you’d need to go with the “reach” metric instead of gross subscribers. To date, I think the Power 150 does the best job of using multiple metrics to derive a combination of attention, influence, and authority.
But as someone who’s put a few lists together here and there – being on one doesn’t matter much unless you’re in the top three or so…
nice stealing of my photo. ps. i twittered your theft. 🙂
hi, my apologies i feel i have over re acted here. even though i would prefer it credited under the photo, i’ve spent hours messing with code because im not tech literate to properly credit photos back which is why i got upset i apologize for being rude it does link directly to the photo so i should i should just relax. 🙂
Pete … Yes, I think the AdAge 150 is one of the best aggregated metrics around. But you are right, if you aren’t in the top handful, it really has little relevance.
Gusgreeper … Windows Live Writer strikes again. I would happily credit, but it provides no option. It just includes a direct link (which is, I presume, how you found it).