How to make a blog boom
We learned a fascinating lesson yesterday with the launch of our new websitewhere we are providing news via a feed from our Dispatch Now. Prior to the launch the blog, run by Online News Editor Jan Hennop, was doing ok, sitting around 100 in the Amatomu rankings.
Within an hour of the site launching the blog started soaring up the charts. By this morning it had hit 31 on Amatomu - a gain on more than 60 places in 24 hours - and at the top end of the charts which anyone who blogs will tell you is a pretty tough place to gain rankings.
We had 4082 page views in one day! To put that in persepctive for our blog in the whole of December we had 9500 or so page views.
What does this tell us? Well, for me it says that blogging is a great medium for breaking news and that it does not appear to bother users if they link out of the webpage into a blog environment.
The great thing is also that all our blogs are seeing significantly increased traffic - especially since we run our blog comment master feed on the front page too, so users can see the unfolding conversations as they take place.
Needless to say we are all stoked at how this has worked out.
Scridb filterManto timeline
Gregor Rohrig, deputy multimedia editor over at The Times, has produced a really great Circavie timeline of the Manto Tshabalala-Msimang saga which gives a good insight into how this story has unfolded.
I find this tool amazingly useful and have used it for a Biko Timeline and for a timeline on the Race for ANC president. Other journalists may find it interesting that we were able to use the ANC president race timeline recently to quickly reverse publish a timeline for print very late in the day which proves the additional value of putting some effort into these.
The campaign gathers pace
Amid the furore over the threatened arrest of Sunday Times editor Mondli Makhanya and deputy managing editor Jocelyn Maker, there is a vibrant campaign unfolding on the internet. Here is an interesting blog post which captures some of the impetus in this direction. It also mentions my yellow ribbon campaign (where I am rather flatteringly, if incorrectly, described as the editor of the Dispatch)
Epozini – Is this a first for SA?
Hi.
We've just launched our first - and maybe the first in SA - news blog in isiXhosa. It is being run by news editor Bongani Siqoko so check it out. He's already fired off a post about black rugby players ending up asTV commentators rather than stars in the Bok squad.
We're fascinated to see how this works out as there is common thinking in our media profession that there is little demand for media produced in isiXhosa.
Scridb filterUp and bloggin'
Dispatch editor Phylicia Oppelt is up and blogging with her Caxton Street Days blog. Check it out.
Scridb filter