Year End(ish) Report for Mortal Mist

[pj]

This is yet another result of the original Newb Dilemma thread.

As of today, December 16, 2009, here is where the Mortal Mist community stands:

367 members, with 118 having checked in at least once in the past 30 days
69049 posts, 2395 topics, 111 average posts per day
10,515 lucid dreams logged by the DreamCatcher, 12,603 non-lucids and 4747 fragments
The Dream Journals are the most active areas here by a margin of well over 4:1 to the next most popular board

We have received three private donations since our inception: one covering the cost of securing our .com, .net and .org domains for two years, a $40 donation used for server memory upgrade, and a $50 donation to be used to begin an AdWords campaign when we are ready.  All donors have wished to remain anonymous.

MortalMist has seven domains at its disposal currently:  mortalmist.com, mortalmist.net, mortalmist.org, lucidwiki.com, luciddreamspot.com, deepdreaming.net and luciditynow.com.  Ipsoscope.com is currently in use for a test site, but is not part of the MortalMist domain collection.

From Google Analytics, Nov 15 to Dec 15:

    * 5,529 Visits

    * 834 Absolute Unique Visitors

    * 49,292 Pageviews

    * 8.92 Average Pageviews

    * 00:10:22 Average Time on Site

    * 27.08% Bounce Rate

    * 12.46% New Visits

Top traffic sources are, in order:  Google, Bing (MSN) and Search.  Google is by far the dominant source.

Our "front page" positions on google (first 10 returns) are:

mortal mist     1
mortalmist      1
mnemonic initiated lucid dream    1
mnemonic-initiated lucid dream    1
mortal mist forum    1
brain flooder    1
can-wild technique    2
mes tarrant    3
d48l relay    4
dild dream    4
technicolro    4
lumibeat    5
extra dream    6
lucid dreams forum    6
lucid forum    6
mild dream    6
lucid dream tutorial    6
www.computerdild.de    6
lucid dreaming forum    7
lucid dreaming tutorial    7
meil strauss    7
lucid dream forum    8
lucid dreaming forums    8
dream-initiated lucid dream    8
mist acronym    8
lucid dream forums    8
deild lucid dream    8
dreams mnemonic    8
driver d210l    8
lucidquiz    8
mild dreaming    8
seekers corner    9
exploring the world of lucid dreaming    9
bvm-l171    9
colorless green dreams sleep furiously    9
dusty d172    9
l185f-mr    9
mortal forums    10
wake initiated lucid dream    10
wake-initiated lucid dream    10
wild technique    10
wake initiated lucid dreaming    10
acronym for dream    10
centarous high school    10
forum mist    10
mnuemonic lucid dream    10
pj 08s15    10
tom brochal    10
www.alexlou.com    10

[Sean999]

Interesting... Is this just out of interest or is there anything that jumps out?

[pj]

Hey, Sean!

Yeah - something jumps out. . . the number of new visitors in the last month specifically, as compared to the half-dozen people who have actually hung around here.

The "bounce rate" might be of interest too.

Our front page search engine positions for anything even remotely related to lucid dreaming is a huge accomplishment, by the way - especially considering how many sites out there are scrambling for recognition.  The question now is how to refine that visibility and best make use of it to bring in the sorts of people we wish to be reaching out to.

[Josh]

[pj]

Interesting - I look at that 27% as pretty awful. . . but I'm used to analyzing based on commercial interests.  27% would have me considering firing myself for any of our business sites.

I guess for what we're doing it isn't as bad as all that!  Good to know you consider it acceptable.

(For those who don't know the lingo, Bounce Rate is a measure of those who touch the "landing page" from the search engine results and then leave without digging any further.  It doesn't necessarily mean they didn't find what they were looking for and stay to read it, but it does mean they weren't interested in exploring any further.)

[StarSeeker]

We could put mortalmist in the Lucid Dreaming references on Wikipedia.

[pj]

That's easier said than done.  Wikipedia is very very guarded about people exploiting what they are doing to drive traffic to specific sites.

No harm in trying - but know in advance somebody will very likely edit it right back out.

If you're comfortable with it, feel free!

[StarSeeker]

That's easier said than done.  Wikipedia is very very guarded about people exploiting what they are doing to drive traffic to specific sites.

You're right... I've been checking the history and the talk page and they just don't allow it

But the Portuguese page has external links to some lucid dreaming communities.

[Josh]

Interesting - I look at that 27% as pretty awful. . . but I'm used to analyzing based on commercial interests.  27% would have me considering firing myself for any of our business sites.

I guess for what we're doing it isn't as bad as all that!  Good to know you consider it acceptable.

(For those who don't know the lingo, Bounce Rate is a measure of those who touch the "landing page" from the search engine results and then leave without digging any further.  It doesn't necessarily mean they didn't find what they were looking for and stay to read it, but it does mean they weren't interested in exploring any further.)

Well, certainly it could be better, but one of my client's sites  has been sitting at about a 50~% bounce rate for a few months now, and it's static pages with a photo gallery. I've done everything short of a total copy rewriting to get it down, so that's the next step.

For a site of this type, you're looking at nearly an even 3 out of 4 people continuing to read. Only 1 in 4 bounces, and that bounce rate doesn't necessarily mean they didn't find what they were looking for. I'd say that's pretty decent for a still-growing community the size and age of Mortal Mist.

[Burned up]

This is yet another result of the original Newb Dilemma thread.

As of today, December 16, 2009, here is where the Mortal Mist community stands:

367 members, with 118 having checked in at least once in the past 30 days
69049 posts, 2395 topics, 111 average posts per day
10,515 lucid dreams logged by the DreamCatcher, 12,603 non-lucids and 4747 fragments

LOL how many of those fragments are mine?

The Dream Journals are the most active areas here by a margin of well over 4:1 to the next most popular board

We have received three private donations since our inception: one covering the cost of securing our .com, .net and .org domains for two years, a $40 donation used for server memory upgrade, and a $50 donation to be used to begin an AdWords campaign when we are ready.  All donors have wished to remain anonymous.

MortalMist has seven domains at its disposal currently:  mortalmist.com, mortalmist.net, mortalmist.org, lucidwiki.com, luciddreamspot.com, deepdreaming.net and luciditynow.com.  Ipsoscope.com is currently in use for a test site, but is not part of the MortalMist domain collection.

From Google Analytics, Nov 15 to Dec 15:

    * 5,529 Visits

    * 834 Absolute Unique Visitors

    * 49,292 Pageviews

    * 8.92 Average Pageviews

    * 00:10:22 Average Time on Site

    * 27.08% Bounce Rate

    * 12.46% New Visits

Top traffic sources are, in order:  Google, Bing (MSN) and Search.  Google is by far the dominant source.

Our "front page" positions on google (first 10 returns) are:

mortal mist     1
mortalmist      1
mnemonic initiated lucid dream    1
mnemonic-initiated lucid dream    1
mortal mist forum    1
brain flooder    1
can-wild technique    2
mes tarrant    3
d48l relay    4
dild dream    4
technicolro    4
lumibeat    5
extra dream    6
lucid dreams forum    6
lucid forum    6
mild dream    6
lucid dream tutorial    6
www.computerdild.de    6
lucid dreaming forum    7
lucid dreaming tutorial    7
meil strauss    7
lucid dream forum    8
lucid dreaming forums    8
dream-initiated lucid dream    8
mist acronym    8
lucid dream forums    8
deild lucid dream    8
dreams mnemonic    8
driver d210l    8
lucidquiz    8
mild dreaming    8
seekers corner    9
exploring the world of lucid dreaming    9
bvm-l171    9
colorless green dreams sleep furiously    9
dusty d172    9
l185f-mr    9
mortal forums    10
wake initiated lucid dream    10
wake-initiated lucid dream    10
wild technique    10
wake initiated lucid dreaming    10
acronym for dream    10
centarous high school    10
forum mist    10
mnuemonic lucid dream    10
pj 08s15    10
tom brochal    10
www.alexlou.com    10

Weird.

Seriously, I don't know what to make of those stats.
I'm thinking that visitors probably find the site because they're actively searching for something dream-related.  (And don't assume that many people know what "lucid" means).  If we're losing 27% then some will have arrived by accident but many will have been put off for some reason.  The slow-loading image could be one thing, but how will we ever know?

[pj]

For what it's worth, Google and Bing are both reporting our front page loading in less than .6 seconds, which is in the best 20th percentile of everything on the web.

Not sure why the image drags for some people - it really isn't all that huge at 117.43 KB (120244 bytes), we are on a very fast server and we have good bandwidth.

[Burned up]

For what it's worth, Google and Bing are both reporting our front page loading in less than .6 seconds, which is in the best 20th percentile of everything on the web.

Not sure why the image drags for some people - it really isn't all that huge at 117.43 KB (120244 bytes), we are on a very fast server and we have good bandwidth.

I notice it mainly on my phone.  But my home bandwidth is only 512k and that may be feeding 4 connections.

Just tried it.  The text appeared in a flash.  Then I counted 4 seconds for the image to appear, and I'm the only one on my hub just now.