How Did You Find Sportsman’s Blog?

Perhaps one of the most interesting aspects of blogging is discovering how people learn of your existence on the massive world-wide web.   Certainly some who read my blog drop in from links made from other blog sites.   Others pop in for a visit after I mention my blog to them in person and tell them to check it out.   Still, the vast majority of Sportsman’s Blog viewers land on the site after doing a search engine look-up most often on a topic related to the outdoors.

Before I get into some of these searches, let me explain that most blog site owners have the ability to see some limited information about who is visiting their site.   In my case I don’t know people by names, but I certainly can track them by I.P. address and by watching what referral web site sent them my way.   This is one of the ways that a blogger can determine how many hits they are getting and to somewhat monitor viewer trends.

Over the last 20+ months I have certainly had some unusual reader searches.   Take for instance a few days ago I saw that one individual did a search on how to remove oil stains from driveway cement.   That search brought them to my blog…but how?   I certainly didn’t remember talking specifically about any oil removal techniques during my nearly 300 past blog posts.   But I did…way back in March of 2005.   I spoke of the many uses of WD-40 and lo and behold removing driveway oil happened to be one of the claims.   I sure do hope the web searcher found my home fix-up suggestions useful. 

Occasionally I will also come across a search engine query something along the lines of “outdoor sex.”   WHAT!   Now I certainly didn’t remember giving away any romance secrets or perhaps disclosing a hidden pornographic tendency.   Of course, now that I’ve used these words in my blog once again it will cause people to give it even more hits.   Imagine their surprise when they discover the sex I usually talk about relates to deer or some other wild critter…and more importantly, it has nothing to do with illicit sex.   (Don’t you just love how I try to get all these key words in here?)

Actually, there’s a couple of searches that I get quite frequently and it does make me wonder about the popularity of the product.   It seems whenever I mention a product specifically it does tend to get several hits during the future months.   In particular, I mentioned Gerber’s Carnivore Blood Tracking light in my 2006 SHOT Show wrap-up and I’m amazed at how many hits this light seems to be getting.   Leads me to believe that this is likely going to be one hot selling new item on the market come this fall’s hunting season.

Of course, after the SHOT SHOW my blog was ranked in the top five for folks doing a Google search for “SHOT SHOW 2006.”   I’ve dropped several pages because I don’t consistently mention my attendance at the SHOT SHOW to keep high rankings, but it does sort of make you realize the power and influence a blogger has in gaining a targeted audience of readers.

Another product for which I get a tremendous amount of hits is the Leech Lake Fillet Knife made by Don Canney.   I did a blog on this a few months ago and hardly a day goes by that I don’t get someone landing on my site to read about this knife.

Just for instance, now today would-be blog readers have found my site by doing the following searches:  “Dicks Sportsman’s Stores”  “Ward Burton”  “Scandinavian Egg Coffee”  “Sportsman’s Camp”  “Hamm’s Beer Jingle”  “Are Shooting Ranges Properly Marked”  “Wildview Extreme II”  “Deer Crossing Road Sign”  “Walleye Fishing Blog”  “Prank on a fishing buddy”  “Investment ideas for sportsmen”  to name just a few.

I guess no matter how you ultimately found my Sportsman’s Blog site I’m very appreciative that you did and that you occasionally take the time to read it.   As I close in on hitting the 20,000 unique viewers mark it helps me to refuel my engine, so to speak, knowing that folks are out there actually reading the thoughts I place on the Internet.   Now don’t be shy…I know you’re out there…so take a quick moment of your time to leave a comment now and then and stop just being an Internet lurker.

© 2006 Jim Braaten.  All Rights Reserved.   No Reproduction without Prior Permission.