Heading to Thailand, Blogging & Thailand Blogs

While you’re reading this I’m on a plane headed to Thailand. No need to search for Waldo as I’m easy to find with this big smile on my face. Over the next couple of days while flying half way around the world I thought I would share a little bit about this blog as well as some other great Thailand and Travel blogs I read on a regular basis.

I started this blog on Thailand to share my love of the country and hopefully the things I’ve written and shared here have helped some people looking for information or at the least given some of you a smile with a humorous story or nice photo.

google analytics Feb-March 2009I’ve worked pretty hard on this site and I think it shows in how well the blog has done over the last year and a half. From one visitor a day in the beginning, probably me, to now where the blog sees anywhere from 500 to 1000 visitors a day and 30 to 50 thousand page views a month with 15 to 20 thousand unique visitors. A blog is nothing without the people coming to explore it and I want to thank all of you that have stopped by and shared in the articles and stories with your comments and insights.

I think a big part of blogging is the community around the blogger. There are quite a few Thailand bloggers and the great thing about that is the varied views they all bring to the table. We might all be writing about a particular story in the news but you’re guaranteed to get a few hundred different viewpoints.  The Thailand blogging community is pretty small in comparison to say technology or cooking which is nice because it makes it more of a family kinda thing.

AWSTATS statistics for thailandlandofsmilescom 2008

When it comes to blogging there are all these different metrics to tell you and other people how well the blog is doing. The big ones are Google Page Rank and Alexa. The truth of the matter is neither is good at quantifying or qualifying a blog. Both metrics are cold and calculating based on how many back links your blog has gotten or how many people that use the Alexa toolbar visit your site. As an interesting aside every spyware program out there sees Alexa as a virus or spyware…pretty telling because it actually is.

Quantcast stats thailandlandofsmilescomWhile I have a decent page rank of 3 and an Alexa score that has been all over the place from as low as 43,000 to an average of 107,ooo, they really don’t concern me much anymore. I’m more interested in where my readers come from and how they use the blog. Right now the blogs traffic breaks down at 66.62% from search engines, 18.10% from referring sites and 15.28% from direct traffic or back links to the blog.

The only metric that truly matters to me are the return visitors to the blog and the community I blog within. The Thailand blog community is pretty small as far as niches go and you would think that the bloggers would keep more to themselves to stand out from the rest. The exact opposite is true in the Thailand blogging world. It’s like 6 degrees of separation. Click the More Thailand Blogs thumbnail over in the side bar and you’ll see that you can get to any of the Thailand blogs out there by just clicking through to one site and following the bread crumbs to the next.

If it wasn’t for other Thailand bloggers linking to me in the beginning of this blog I wouldn’t have done as well as I have I think. If it wasn’t for other Thailand bloggers still linking to articles I write or putting a link in their sidebar or in a post to my blog I wouldn’t continue to do as well.

It’s not a battle of the blogs in this little niche we have it’s more of ” This is what I have to say and now check out what this blogger has to say”. It’s a nice and supportive niche to be in. Over the next few days while I’m trying not to blind people with this gigantic smile plastered on my face I’m going to point out a lot of these blogs,  not because they have linked to me,  because they deserve to be pointed out for adding something special to the community.

Until the next post you can click on the More Thailand Blogs thumbnail  in the side bar( it changes to a new blog with every refresh ) or you can visit the links page to check out some great blogs on Thailand and Travel.

Tomorrow I start naming names :)

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5 Responses to Heading to Thailand, Blogging & Thailand Blogs
  1. Villa rental Koh Samui
    March 27, 2009 | 5:17 am

    Wow great work

  2. Mike
    March 27, 2009 | 6:28 am

    Talen not sure when you will read this hopefully safely on “our” side of the other pond! Great post that says it all.

    How I wish I could get somewhere near 500 views a day.

    I appreciate your hard work and the support you offer me and other bloggers.

    Have a great visit.

    Mikes last blog post..Full Head of Steam onThailand Railways

    • Talen
      March 29, 2009 | 4:51 am

      I am indeed safely on your side…and I’m stayin. Flying for damn near 24 hours is absolutely not fun but the Japanese stewardess’s are beautiful.

      You have a great blog Mike and you’ll see over 500 a day soon enough. It just takes time and patience.

  3. Koh Samui Sunset
    March 27, 2009 | 9:05 am

    Congrats! Those are sensational results after a year of hard work. As you say, particularly for such a niche type of blog.

    Enjoy your trip – certainly recognise the “Are We There Yet” syndrome.

    Koh Samui Sunsets last blog post..Koh Samui restaurant review | “Had Bang Po” in Maenam

    • Talen
      March 29, 2009 | 4:54 am

      The Thailand niche really is niche but I think anyone will do well in any small niche as long as they keep at it.

      You don’t even know how many times I kept uttering that phrase yesterday from Washington D.C. to Japan to Bangkok…and then finally they said “We’re here”

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