Friday, May 01, 2009

April Statporn: A Record Month But...



A Third As Popular as Guido!

Guido's webstats for April were simply astonishing. I thought mine were good, but they were only a fraction of his. If you judge a blog by the number of visits it gets, he is now the undisputed number one British blog - not just the number one political blog.

For this blog it was another record month, with 128,574 absolute unique visitors, nearly 41,000 more than the previous best month, March.

Year on Year Absolute Unique Visitors +60%
1 May 2008-30 April 2009 743,640 1 May 2007-30 April 2008 463,641

Absolute Unique Visitors +65% year on year
April 2009 128,574 - April 2008 53,255 - Mar 2009 87,801

Page Loads year on year +132%
April 2009 963,809 - April 2008 414,848

Here are my top 30 linking sites (ie incoming hits) for April, according to Google Analytics.

1. - Guido Fawkes 79,199 (37, 781)
2. - Spectator Coffee House 21,295 (15,789)
3. +2 PoliticalBetting 19,791 (12,059)
4. -1 PoliticsHome 19,458 (14,681)
5. -1 ConservativeHome 15,395 (14,078)
6. +2 Twitter 6,289 (4,451)
7. -1 Dizzy Thinks 6,216 (4,772)
8. -1 Facebook 6,175 (4,618)
9. +1 Old Holborn 5,473 (3,704)
10. +1 Daniel Finkelstein & Red Box 4,434 (2,023)
11. -1 Obnoxio the Clown 3,170 (2,338)
12. N Bloggerheads 2,192
13. - Tom Harris 2,107 (1,450)
14. +2 Telegraph blogs 2,066 (1,235)
15. N Biased BBC 1,807
16. - Devil's Kitchen 1,680 (1,249)
17. N Plato Says 1,319
18. N Paul Waugh 1,274
19. -2 Ambush Predator 1,206 (977)
20. N LabourList 1,176
21. N Adam Smith Institute 1,169
22. N Tory Bear 1,080
23. N Donal Blaney 1,050
24. -4 Boulton & Co 954
25. N Daily Referendum 945
26. -7 SNP Tactical Voting 938 (761)
27. N Nadine Dorries 880
28. -13 Archbishop Cranmer 862 (1,259)
29. N Bob Piper 832
30. N John Redwood's Diary 832


Source: All figures are from Google Analytics. Absolute Unique Visitors broadly means people using over 128,000 different computers visited this blog at least once. Some people may be counted more than once (eg, home and work computer),whilst some people may not be counted (eg, two different people use the same computer, or someone reads the site through a feed reader without ever actually visiting it).

17 comments:

The Grim Reaper said...

I find it very distasteful you're prepared to link to LabourLost, a website which is still edited by a psychotherapist who thinks it's "absolutely totally brilliant" to spread vicious and untrue rumours about politicians and their wives. Then again, he is on intimate terms with the 17 people who count in this government, we musn't forget!

Though funnily enough, I notice that there's no mention of Dolly on the website at all right now. The Unite-funded dump also seems to have been taken over for Union Day. Now I wonder where they got that idea from?

Anonymous said...

I hate to say it Iain, but it is because Guido gets original news stories, whereas you seem to focus on comment and analysis.

'Nowt wrong with that - you do it very well - but if someone is tuning in to find a 'Westminster Insider' then finding out about all the other projects you are involved in is not what getting the inside track on the 'Westminster Village People Gossip' is all about.

But I guess there is only one of you, and you can't be everywhere at once - but you do need to decide what your priorities are or you risk becoming a 'Jack Of All Trades'.

Guido doesn't twitter or podcast or do radio [though he has been media tarting of late] but he does have a clear 'mission statement'.

Maybe you need one, David Brent style ?

Old Holborn said...

Stop sipping skinny Latte's at Millbank, twittering about nail varnish at the WI and dig up a good story that makes the 646 really uncomfortable for a change.

Sorted

Old Holborns International Blog Consultancy PLC

(invoice in the post, 30 days please)

Old Holborn said...

PS Pictures and names of Baby P's killers over at my place

Martin S said...

Very good figures, Iain. Well done. I think Guido is a very special case.

My own site http://thatsnews.bogspot.com has done better than I thought. 39,945 visits over the past 12 months. Plus 42,120 page reads.

The Grim Reaper said...

Anonymous said "I hate to say it Iain, but it is because Guido gets original news stories, whereas you seem to focus on comment and analysis."

Yes, but that argument could apply to almost all blogs. The reason blogs have a niche audience is because it's mostly "commenting on comment", as Guido Fawkes put it himself in the past.

At the end of the day, Iain Dale is not a man based in Ireland with a laptop who has a fondness for Guiness, he's a shameless media whore who has a great fondness for Anna Booting instead. ;-)

Old Holborn said...

Bloody Hell,

I'm still sending you THOUSANDS of readers every month, yet never get a mention on the Daily Dozen.

I've just done a great feature on what Australians think of us too As if they matter. The sunburnt belching bread thieves.

jaydeeaitch said...

Iain

OH wants to scratch your eyes out.

I love both of you.

Old Holborn said...

Stuff that

I got 480,000 readers last month AND held down a proper job.

You won't see my sorry arse hauled to Osterley at 11pm for 10 minutes on Sky News Reviewing the Papers on a Sunday midnight show competing with the ten minute free porn on every other channel

Plato said...

Teh interweb is terribly competitive isn't it!

I'm confused - I thought you were persona non grata on LabourLost, how are you getting incoming from them?

And blimey, did I really visit your site that many times? :)

Congrats on another excellent month, those who bitch and moan need to start a blog...

Anonymous said...

Yeah, but you're three times as polite in your critical analysis of the political classes.

Anonymous said...

@ Grim Reaper

Have you noticed how the postings on LabourLost seem to follow themes?

I little while ago it was all about the youf vote, now it's Unions.

Pathetic!

Doug said...

Oh, could it be because in April the MSM he affects to despise kept sending people to visit him

Anonymous said...

I think political betting gets more hits than both of you and also more comments

Iain Dale said...

PB gets more page views than me because of the number of people hitting refresh constantly. But their Absolute uniques are way below mine and Guido's. Having said that Guido beat them on page views this month for the first time.

Archbishop Cranmer said...

Mr Dale,

You are welcome.

His Grace's URL is 'archbishop-cranmer'.

You have robbed him of a Technorati link!

Dave H said...

"9. +1 Old Holborn 5,473 (3,704)"

So, The Bastard's in your top ten? Be afraid, Iain, be very afraid.

Even the uniformed would have noticed that the comments on Guido's blog have gone from tens to hundreds over the past few weeks. (And yeah, like his ego was on the Threatened Species list in the first place?)

Unchanged, however, is the fact that his commenters (inc. myself) are a fairly unwholesome bunch.