Year In Review : How Did You Find Me?

Taking another look-back at the stats on this blog for the past month and the year (or at least since Blogger added Stats) has shown some interesting developments.

As I mentioned in my last look at the stats on this blog, I've been using Twitter to tweet about posts.  I also started using Feedburner that will read the RSS feed and tweet the updates.  Linking posts to Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIN has also driven traffic to the blog.

My top referring sites are Google, Find1Friend and Facebook.  I was not familiar with Find1Friend, apparently it aggregates all social media.

The most popular search terms this year include:

• blogger : self-explanatory

• forrest chew salamonia indiana : Forrest is a member of my Chew family.  I wish whoever searched for him would have contacted me.

• travis lemaster : who is looking for me?  an old girlfriend?

• mary prevost : I have no idea how they found my blog through these search terms.  There are no references to the Prevost surname here.

• lambertson and wilson families of new jersey and ohio : Yes!  These are my people.  Who are you?  Why didn't you contact me?

There is now a new most popular post, GeneaLeaks, which rose quickly to the top after being highlighted by Randy Seaver over at Genea-Musings.  Thanks, Randy!  Clearly, being mentioned by a popular blogger will lead to page views.

Just in the past month, there have been three posts that have received a great deal of interest, quickly moving them up to the top of my popular posts.  Once again, I find that once a post makes it to the sidebar as a popular post, it continues to receive more 'clicks'.  

Besides the previously mentioned GeneaLeaks, other posts with recent popularity include Applying SWOT Analysis To Your Genealogy Research and Building My 2011 Research Template.  I will be interested in seeing how 2011 stats pan out.

Thank you to everyone who has stopped by and commented on my blog posts. May you all have a productive research year in 2011!

Analyzing Blogger Stats

The information provided by Blogger's Stats over this past month has been pretty interesting to analyze.


My most popular post this month was my review of the Flip-Pal scanner.  Not surprisingly, this scanner has become my favorite new genealogy toy.  I'm sure that this post has been one of the more popular because of my posting a link on Twitter.  Using Twitter to post about blog posts has increased some traffic to the blog.


It would also appear that by using the widget for "Popular Posts" has allowed some of those posts to have even more page views.  In other words, the popular posts end up becoming more popular.


Some of the search terms and links that have caused people to land at my blog are pretty interesting as well:

Most of the referrals have come from Google, but Facebook and Geneabloggers are well represented.


One of the more interesting search terms was "suicide daughter married james dwiggins"!  Why didn't this person contact me?  This sounds like a great mystery.  I'm not aware of any suicides involving the Dwiggins family in my research.  Two searchers were looking for "Dr. Chew Salamonia Indiana" - my ancestor.  Who were you?  You didn't leave any comments.  


I'm glad that I've added this feature to my blog, and I've turned off my own tracking, so in the future this will be even more accurate.  I'm glad to see that links to my Facebook profile and occasional tweets have also brought visitors to check out my blog.

Weekly Genealogy Blogging Prompt # 30

Prompt: Write about your experiences with social networking tools for genealogy purposes. Do you use MySpace, Facebook or Twitter? Are you a wiki kind of person? None of the above? Tell readers about your experiences with these tools and watch your social network grow.

I'm not cool, but I don't care.

Social media may appear to be for the young and not the young at heart, but to hear my kids complain about it - now the 'old' people are taking over. I think that it bothers them that I'm on Facebook.

Facebook has allowed me to connect with old friends, relatives and co-workers easily and for free. For the genealogist, social media allows you to connect with fellow researchers and family by sharing your photos and blogs to a wider audience. I've been able to make new friends and trade research ideas, as well as discover a few new cousins online through my Facebook connections.

Because of these Facebook connections, I've been able to share photos of ancestors and tombstones I've taken for Find-A-Grave as well as share memories with living cousins. Fellow genealogists have helped with lookups of information in distant locales after reading my posts and have offered suggestions for further research.

I have my blog posts linked to appear on my Facebook page as 'Notes' so that all of my networked friends will have the ability to read what has been posted without accessing my blog. This exposes my research to my friends and relatives who may not have been aware that I was blogging. Often I use the 'Networked Blogs' application as well to periodically highlight a particular post.

I haven't ventured into the Twitter waters yet, but if I do, I'm sure that I will enjoy that technology as well.

Overall, my experience with social networking and genealogy research has been a positive one. I have been able to expose my blog and my research to a wider audience and have received positive feedback. I've also received research tips and offers of help. Some of my Facebook friends that are not genealogists have asked for tips on how to start their own family history research, and my far-flung cousins are able to read about my research through my linked blog posts.

I would highly recommend using social media as another tool to put your research out there. You never know what genealogical treasure may be turned up through these casual connections, and the friendships that develop can enrich your life and expand your research.