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Mystery of blog heads that work

Posted by Andrew Grant-Adamson on January 22nd, 2007

Richard Sambrook tells us that four weeks after experimentally putting up the post heading “Britney Spears, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt Exclusive!” it has not significantly boosted the hits on his SacredFacts blog.

He says: “Perhaps I should be heartened by the quality of my regular readers.”

I tried a similar experiment, putting “sex” in a headline. That too failed to bring in more readers. But words and phrases like “citizen journalism”, “religion” and “blog” seem to boost visits.

But the longest, thickest tail belongs to “Among the dinosaurs and evolvers of journalism“. It was posted back in early August and this month is still at number five in the list of most visited pages.

I really don’t know what heads are going to work best but I suspect that the rules people give for news sites don’t necessarily apply to blogs.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 22nd, 2007 at 10:24 am and is filed under Blogging. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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2 Responses to “Mystery of blog heads that work”

  1. Telegraph Blogs: Technology: Shane Richmond: January 2007: Links for 2007-01-22 Says:
    January 22nd, 2007 at 8:34 pm

    Kramer auto Pingback[…] Shane Richmond Blog Home Shane Richmond More Technology blogs Shane has been News Editor of Telegraph.co.uk since December 2005. Having first joined the Telegraph in 1998, he left for a brief stint as Editor of an internet start-up before returning in 2001. He writes about media, technology and blogging. Technorati Profile Email this page RSS feed for this blog Print this page Links for 2007-01-22Posted by Shane Richmond at 22 Jan 07 19:00  Tags: Blogging, headlines, video games, simplicity, genealogyTaking on the demablogsAdrian Monck takes on the “demablogs”, such as Michelle Malkin, who are ”ready to analyze every line, take issue with every statement [written by the mainstream media], not to better understand what’s going on, but to paralyze any attempt to even discover what might be happening”. Are these bloggers watchdogs or propagandists? Perhaps they’re both.Analysing blog headlinesAndrew Grant Adamson and Richard Sambrook have been pondering the words that make a successful blog headline. Richard tried putting “Britney” in a headline and saw no increase in traffic, while Andrew offered “sex” and didn’t get many takers. I haven’t had time to examine my data today but a post I wrote months ago titled “What’s wrong with using the c-word?” attracts a steady supply of Googlers. No doubt they are deeply disappointed when they find the c stands for content.Up,Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, StartAs an avid video gamer myself, it’s always satisfying to read reports that suggest that video games aren’t going to melt my brain or turn me into a delinquent. Techdirt says the media typically prefers to concentrate on the ones that argue the opposite. They link to eight reports that suggest that games are good for you after all.Putting Geni back in the bottleFamily tree website Geni, which I blogged about last week, has encountered a few teething problems. Disappearing data, no room for adopted children, divorces or gay marriages and a few others. It will recover, writes Michael Arrington at TechCrunch, but this is a big setback.Learn simplicity from Rothko, Mondrian and LennonI love Signal vs Noise for their insightful posts about creativity. This one looks at the develop of the careers of three artists and points out how they all became better at expressing their ideas when they simplified the way they expressed them.Posted by Shane Richmond at 22 Jan 07 19:00Post to: del.icio.usDiggNewsvineNowPublicRedditComments [0]Back to top […]

  2. Megite Technology News: What's Happening Right Now Says:
    January 24th, 2007 at 2:39 am

    Kramer auto Pingback[…] Andrew Grant-Adamson / Wordblog :   Mystery of blog heads that work 40. HP Pavilion tx1000 10 hours ago   permalink Reviews.cnet.com The bottom line: […]

  3. Shane Richmond : Technology : Telegraph Blogs Says:
    February 7th, 2007 at 5:48 pm

    links from Technoratitake issue with every statement [written by the mainstream media], not to better understand what’s going on, but to paralyze any attempt to even discover what might be happening”. Are these bloggers watchdogs or propagandists? Perhaps they’re both.Analysing blog headlinesAndrew Grant Adamson and Richard Sambrook have been pondering the words that make a successful blog headline. Richard tried putting “Britney” in a headline and saw no increase in traffic, while Andrew offered “sex” and didn’t get many takers. I haven’t

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