Sunday Sermon: Turning Readers into Followers... help!

Did Jesus have enough followers? If he had more the Romans would've been screwed!

Hello readers and followers... yes there is a difference you see. I have been studiously checking my Google Analytics now for months and months, it's what out of work researchers do! What I've noticed is a very confusing trend. My blog attracts an awful lot of 'unique' visitors. They come and read maybe 7 or 8 of my articles and in some cases significantly more. It's not rare to have somebody read upwards of 15 of my blogs in one sitting, very, very brave souls indeed! Then they sod off. I'm not sure if any of them return, but I'd suggest that my followers actually only make up about 20% to maybe 25% of my overall 'hits' counter on my blog, although they do provide 87% of my comments. Then there are the repeat viewers, or the silent lurkers as I like to call them. These guys and gals (I don't get gender stats off of Google Analytics) are arguably the most frustrating to us bloggers, and to me personally. They come back time and time again to read your various articles, and I'm massively grateful they do, but there's a nagging doubt with these people...

Luca Giordano, 1860's - National Gallery

They turn up and read your stuff, which is great! Not so great is the fact that they don't follow your site, which is some sort of sign that what your doing isn't approved by them in some way! Or that's how I, and others I've spoken to interpret it. They seemingly never comment either, so there are this silent mass of people out there, reading my blog... and I have literally no chuffing idea what they're thinking about it. Fundamentally I'm a very insecure soul. No really I am, although I write this blog for my own reasons, I also write it to entertain, inform and maybe even educate people. So having this rather large bunch of 'customers' shall we say, that I know literally nothing about is a little frustrating. I guess that's the researcher in me coming out. Although I guess I could view the fact that they seem to return as a sign of positive approval I guess. Let me be clear I'm not exactly after more followers for more followers sake. Although it's always nice when someone decides to actually follow your blog! No I want to convert some of this mass of somewhere between 600 to 800 lurkers into followers. But I tell you what, it's proving bloody harder than turning water into wine.
Read more �