The Politburo Diktat

TrackBack Dialectics

An email from Capitalist Patterico about his case of P.I.T.S. (Post Instalanche Traumatic Syndrome) reminded Commissar of fickleness of traffic. "Indeed," traffic often nothing more than the latest whim of proletarian masses following the latest bourgeois fad. ("Psst ... Want grainy videotape of Britney Hilton suing Michael Jackson for divorce because he abused Bennifer's secret love child?")

Instalanche is almost meaningless. Only slightly more meaningful is "serial mini-lanches," when several bolshoi bloggers send you traffic repeatedly. Like Chinese food, da? Tasty, but not satisfying in long run.

Bloggers like to look at peaks in their Sitemeter counts. More interesting are valleys, or recent minimum. Low point is MORE interesting? Da. Minimum shows "core traffic" aside from any effect of "this-lanche" or "that-lanche." Perhaps "weekday minimum" most interesting, since weekends & holidays usually have lower traffic. (Many bloggers not fully committed to meeting produktion quotas at local tractor factories, da?)

A List

Is regrettably Capitalist concept, but key thing is getting on bloggers' and readers' "A List." Blogroll is nice. But, whether done explicitly or implicitly, consciously or not, bloggers and readers (i.e. non-blogging readers) maintain "A List" of bloggers that they read frequently. Instapundit does not get 80,000 hits per day because of links from Drezner, Vodkapundit, Wizbang, etc.. Glenn is on "A List" of thousands of readers and bloggers.

"A List' is fuzzy, blogger may even reject idea that he has one. Exceptionally, some may not. Confirmed Blogaholics may survey scores of blogs equitably. When Commissar is gung-ho on blogging, he sets "Blogrolling Update" preference to 3 hours and checks all 100+, as they update, with Marxist equality --- for day or two. :) But most bloggers and readers check short list of blogs with Stakhanovite dedication.

"A List" is also dynamic. "Ah .. that Commissar, he used to be okay, but probably will just be another map. " and blogger moves on to read Heidi's Sauron post.

In sum, sustainable traffic flows from being on a number of bloggers (and readers!) "A List." But how to get there? And how to measure? How to tell if you are making progress?

Trackbacks

TTLB Ecosystem is starting point. Excellent resource, Kudos to NZ Bear. But is only starting point; heavily weighted towards Blogrolls.

Simplest, self-contained measure is Trackbacks. For Commissar any post with 10+ Trackbacks is bolshoi post. Khorosho! But, be careful. Trackback is transitory, almost by definition. As post recedes, so does impact of Trackback.

Important thing is Trackback shows possible "A" listing of your blog by Trackbacker. Consider. Takes some time and effort to Trackback. First, a blogger reads your post. That is achievement in its own right. Second, blogger likes your post. A lot. Third, blogger decides decides to invest her own time and reputation, by building link to your post in her blog, saying, "Hey, check out this by Post by BloggerX. Tremendous!"

Sure, you might get traffic from Trackback, but is more important that blogger has moved you closer to her (by definition, finite) "A List."

(There are more "social" bloggers that seem to engage in roughly even trackback exchanges. "Weekly blogroll link-love checkaround hot list." Is fine. Nothing wrong with it. But that is different kind of Trackback. Here, focus is on "earned" Trackacks, just from quality of post.)

Not sure of conclusion. No cookbook or recipe or gimmick to "generate trackbacks" or to "get on hundreds of bloggers A List." Only that some combination of quality posts, time spent, and consideration for other bloggers will build it.

Update: EGO tracks back.

Posted by Commissar at January 6, 2004 09:27 AM