When Jonathan Ross greeted the audience of his Friday night chat show wearing an eye patch last night, I had no idea it would spark a flurry of visits to my blog. Ross explained that the reason for the patch was an infected follicle in his right eye, which hopefully staved off a barrage of phone calls to the BBC duty log from The Royal National Institute of Blind People and a phalanx of Daily Mail readers, intent on complaining about the offensive gag they were no doubt expecting.
Still, whatever the reason for the patch, it gave me a glimpse of what the visitor figures for my blog would look like if people actually read it!
After I'd watched his Friday night show, I logged on to Stat Counter to see if anyone had visited the blog in the couple of hours since I'd last checked, and was astounded to see that my visitor figures were well above normal. I can usually expect between 15-30 visits a day (small fry), but as the witching hour approached, I was nearly hitting 90 (with over 150 page views)! Trust me, this was big news for my small blog.
Excited and intrigued as to what could have sent so many readers my way, I checked the 'Recent Visitor Activity' and discovered that my January post about Jonathan Ross was getting lots of hits as a result of Google searches for "Jonathan Ross eye" (for which this blog was the top result). Depressingly, even though it was a thrill to see my blog analytics clocking up so many visits and page loads, it was obvious 
(with each visit only lasting between 0-7 seconds) that this was nothing more than a fleeting surge based on a chance combination of search terms. It was the ultimate flash in the pan.
(with each visit only lasting between 0-7 seconds) that this was nothing more than a fleeting surge based on a chance combination of search terms. It was the ultimate flash in the pan. Palpably disappointed, I returned to the figures and dreamed of what it would be like to command a bigger readership. Given that Jonathan Ross fully explained the nature of his eye infection, I have no idea why so many people were fascinated to learn more? In fact, I don't really care. But I owe that infected follicle a debt of gratitude for giving me a brief flash of success.
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Surely an opportunity missed to link through to a condition entry you must have written for EB? Though now I look at it there isn't an entry for infected eye...that's another one for me to write up then...I wonder if it will do for infected hair follicles what Jade Goody's done for cervical cancer?
ReplyDeleteYou're absolutely right, it perhaps was an opportunity missed!
ReplyDeleteEven though there isn't a condition entry for 'infected [eye] follicle' (I clearly only did half a job on EB), I should have at least linked to other eye-related conditions, such as: blepharospasm, squint and watering eyes. That would've been something!
I think Goody's got the edge on Ross's infected hair follicle. She hogged the front page of yesterday's Sunday Mirror and is all over the front page of today's Daily Mirror as well (being pushed around in a wheelchair by Jack Tweedy, with the caption "true devotion"). It's amazing what passes for 'must-read' front page news these days...
So,what happen on his eye is it feel better now? I been conscious when it comes on my eye because I dont it to be infected,need an extra careful.
ReplyDeletejayn