Is everyone's traffic down this winter?

[Horton]

My traffic has sucked since the election. I have seen this in previous election years but this year it is really bad. My Page Views numbers are 60% of what they were 12 months ago.

Does anyone else see this?

 

[Pete]

I think it really, really depends what niche you're in and whether there are relevant localised changes that affect your forum.

So, what niche are you in?

(For example, the forum I'm currently working on, we just launched a little over 2 weeks ago and we're doing great. 140 posts might not sound like much but for our niche, this is doing *pretty good* because there's a lead-in time between people registering and people making posts because there's other stuff they need to do first. This is 110% normal in our niche. But across our niche, there's been a general uptick in activity in the last year in particular; pandemic has been good to our niche as a form of escapism and we're pretty good at encouraging each others' creativity.)

 

[mysiteguy]

Elections have had no impact on any of my sites traffic.

 

[zappaDPJ]

Elections usually lead to a significant increase in traffic on most of my (UK) forums. Interestingly the last US election had more of an impact then Brexit on one particular forum. It's worth saying I do allow political discussion so I guess increases are to be expected and they tend to drive other areas of the forum.

 

[woody]

My single-day pageviews (highs of 193k in Jan 2021 and 191k in Feb 2021) were over 10k greater than any day in 2020. So, no traffic concerns here

 

[TLChris]

Traffic across my personal sites have grown quite a bit YOY, since the election a number of them have taken off mostly from what I consider to be Google Algorithm changes.

Might depend on the vertical. Which is yours in?

 

[DigNap15]

My forum is general and political
With political being by far the most popular
I saw a big increase in traffic over the last 6 months as we had our elections, then the USA ones
There is so much happening in the world politics wise, so I hope it does not drop off.
Covid-19 did have an effact with people at home with nothing to do.
Also I find that if its a real nice sunny weekend day, not so much traffic - as they are all at the beach (Malls are quiter too)

 

[Harvey]

Our is a ski site so traffic is always in winter. But this year it's off the charts 60% higher.

My theory: We focus on NY and because VT has strong travel restrictions, more people are curious about skiing in NY.

 

[Horton]

interesting. I absolutely forbid any governmental politics in my forum. my theory has always been that the elections and then the ensuing political change is taking up screen time that my readers would spend on my site. maybe that's wishful thinking.

 

[Abizaga]

Actually it's funny. Over the last few months my viewership has gotten steadier and my alexa rank has been growing fairly steadily.

 

[Shawn Gossman]

I'm getting daily activity even though I'm not on it daily. But my forum is new still so.... But it is hiking topic so I figure it will be as active as it can be when we're not out in the woods lol

 

[DigNap15]

Actually it's funny. Over the last few months my viewership has gotten steadier and my alexa rank has been growing fairly steadily.

How much do you pay for Alexa
I used to look at it years ago
And then Amazon bought it.
And now it clashes with Alexa their assistant!

 

[Abizaga]

How much do you pay for Alexa
I used to look at it years ago
And then Amazon bought it.
And now it clashes with Alexa their assistant!

I don't actually. Its a pretty nice service.

 

[Demon_skeith]

Mine seems to have only increased, but being a gaming site would help with that.

 

[Abizaga]

I will say though, starting November last year we suffered a steep drop in rank. We had a full recovery since, luckily.

 

[Zelda]

Winter is not entirely over with, but we are nearly there. Reviewing my analytic statistics shows general site impressions and unique hits raised throughout 2020. There was a steady incline throughout the winter season (2020-2021). The membership and activity grew throughout 2020, and there was a steady incline throughout this winter season.

My website remains consistently in the #3 place Baidu when searching using the keywords designated for my community. I cannot say I rate as high in Google or DuckDuckGo. I have all but given up trying to get Google's attention.

 

[Horton]

My traffic July traffic is 25% less than July last year. My first decline in 10 years. I can't figure it out. I haven't changed anything. I guess I attribute it to the pandemic and whatever else is going on in the news. anybody else seeing big declines?

 

[Harvey]

Up a little.

 

[DigNap15]

My traffic July traffic is 25% less than July last year. My first decline in 10 years. I can't figure it out. I haven't changed anything. I guess I attribute it to the pandemic and whatever else is going on in the news. anybody else seeing big declines?

How do you measure your trafiic?
What systems do you use?
And what records do you keep?

 

[Horton]

I just look at Googe Analytics page views. It is the one metric that I think I trust.

Actually, all my metrics on Google Analytics are bad compared to the same time period last year.