110. I reach the most readers when I blog about relationships — and other interesting statistics from the blog
Today, I’ve looked into some numbers.
On average, my blog posts are read 398 times and have 670 views (people who don’t read them all the way through). That means that around 65% spend the time to read through the entire post. Of those, who are Medium users themselves, 5 end up pushing the little green heart, and recommending.
I have no idea whether that’s good or bad, and I don’t even know what kind of scale I’d be using to measure that. I’m very happy that so many people engage with my writings, and at the end of the day that’s the important thing. Looking at the numbers also provided me with some insights.
Top 5 posts (reads)
77. The fun-shaming must stop
2.7k reads
105. How being in an open relationship has taught me a lot about understanding privilege
2.5k reads
33. If you went to my larp and didn’t like it, here’s what I’d like you to do
1.8k reads
41. So I sent this letter to HBO
1.8k reads
94. 10 things I like about Tinder — and some words of caution
1.3k reads
Two of these posts are about dating and relationships, and two others deal with interpersonal relations. It seems that I should write more about people and how they deal with each other. At least, according to these numbers.
Top 5 posts (Read Ratio)
29. Six comments on a burlesque club experience in Dubai
91.25%
18. How to do something memorable by caring
91.03%
27. Ten things I’ve learned as a film producer in Abu Dhabi
89.08%
9. On shoes and airport security: some thoughts
87.97%
51. Eight lessons from the Abu Dhabi airport
87.73%
Four of these were written during trips to the Middle East. The last is about an experience I had at Richmond Airport. One interpretation is that the Middle East is still exotic enough to most of my readers, that they read to the end. ;-)
Top 5 posts (Recommends)
77. The fun-shaming must stop
93
105. How being in an open relationship has taught me a lot about understanding privilege
26
61. No matter how you create your fiction, it will be wrong
15
6. Starting with Buying Something
12
31. I was a warlock at a Game of Thrones larp in Italy
11
My two most read posts are also my most recommended ones. However, the fun-shaming post has been recommended more than three times as much as the one about open relationships — even though the difference in number of readers is less than 10%. Apparently that hit a nerve with Medium readers.
Top 5 takeaways from this?
- I still can’t tell what will be read by many people and what won’t, before I post it. The interest of the crowd is still opaque to me.
- If I want to be read by many people, I should write about relationships more, and about larp less.
- If having a high Read Ratio is important to me, I should write more about my experiences in the Middle East.
- My least read posts ever were about blogging and getting five hundred followers. Obviously, I’m not exactly at expert at making blogging itself interesting (yet). ;-)
- Since January, my number of followers on Medium has 20x’ed. That feels kind of surreal, but in a very nice way!
If you like my writing, and want to free up my time, so write more, you can do exactly that, by supporting me via Patreon.
