Thursday, January 19, 2012

Surnames I Seek

I have had a surnames page on this blog since shortly after I created it. Originally I added few of my direct line names without any detail. Little by little I added a few more bits of information not knowing how useful it would be to my blog or to my blog visitors.

Recently while viewing my stats I realized something pretty interesting. When selecting to view my stats for "All Time", the Surnames I Seek page has the largest number of page views by a significant amount. So my creative writing and witty repartee hasn't been the most interesting piece to this blog? Apparently not.

Realizing that I am looking at a missed opportunity, I will now begin to add more names and details to this page. I shouldn't have assumed visitors would scroll through all my blog posts looking for a common surname. I can't rely on my labels to be a direct link to the information visitors may be searching for.

This time next year it will be interesting to see if I have moved from a missed opportunity to a window of opportunity.

19 comments:

  1. Interesting. Never thought to look at it that way. Yet, how obvious that is! Sometimes we need to think outside that darn box!

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  2. Such a good tip! I also have only a simple listing of names on my surname page. I assume that a person would conduct a search on my blog for common surnames, but why don't I make it easier for them! By the way, this is the first time I've seen the update to your blog...it looks awesome!

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    1. I was the same way. I put a search box on my blog and I just assumed 100% of my visitors would use it. Wrong-o! I designed the header myself using MyMemories software. Thanks!

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  3. Thanks for that knock to the head! I am going to check my blog stats and think about how to spice things up.

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    1. I tried to delete your duplicate comment. Now it looks like you said something bad!! We will let everyone think that, ok?? :)

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  4. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  5. I'm so glad you posted this. Such a great idea, yet so simple. I'm so happy that I have something new to add to my to-do list! Haha!

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    1. Sorry to add to you to-do list, but I hope it helps you connect with others!

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  6. Thanks for reminding me that I was going to put a surname page on my blog. ;-)

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  7. Every genealogy blogger should have a dedicated surnames page. They are very popular according to my own stats.

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    1. I need to look at others, to see what I'm missing, what I should add etc.

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  8. OK. You're right, I could do a better job of this. What a good idea. thanks!

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  9. Something I need to do, to. Thanks for the tip.

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  10. What a great idea! Thanks for posting. I think I'll just go work on that right now!

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  11. Hmmmm...never thought of putting a surname page on my blog. I will have to think about that! Thanks!

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  12. Thank you for all of the comments. Something so simple took me a year and a half to figure out!

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  13. Hi thanks for the reminder. I started a surnames page but got bogged down in how to display it. Do you get many emails about it? Also do you have you stat counter set to work on both your home page and your surname page? I used stat counter, but I wasn't sure if I had to write it for all my pages or just one for the entire blog.

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  14. My surnames page is also one of my top-visited parts of my blog. I listed names of grandparents through 3rd great grandparents, along with the years of their births and deaths. I've debated about adding locations since some of the names are fairly common.

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