Are there particular Ask MeFi posts that drive the bulk of the non-member traffic?

January 14, 2011 2:57 PM

Are there particular Ask MeFi posts that drive the bulk of the non-member traffic?

It's interesting that, according to the infographic, over 3/4 of the non-member traffic is from Ask MeFi. I'm wondering if there are particular posts driving the bulk of this traffic (like, for example, if a ton of traffic came in because of the Russian Incident, or, if the traffic is pretty evenly spread out as Google users search for ways to train their poodles or pick a good wine, etc). I'm also wondering which Ask MeFi posts are getting the most traffic.

posted by Ashley801 to MetaFilter-Related at 2:57 PM (16 comments total)

The traffic is cyclical. Around major holidays we get lots of traffic to holiday-themed questions. Otherwise, it's no specific post or dozen or even couple dozen posts. It's spread across the entire Ask archive, and yeah it's coming from people who are searching at Google. We haven't done any sort of deep analysis of the traffic, this is just my take from looking at stats a couple times each week.

We do get a bump in traffic when some MetaFilter happening spills over into other sites. But even those are a small blip compared to the bulk of traffic that comes from people doing Google searches.
posted by pb (staff) at 3:05 PM on January 14, 2011

I want to train my poodle to pick a good wine.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 5:03 PM on January 14, 2011 [1 favorite]

Why do you want this?
posted by killdevil at 6:13 PM on January 14, 2011 [1 favorite]

does anyone read the posts down here?
posted by ob at 10:02 PM on January 14, 2011

does anyone read the posts down here?

No.
posted by Slap*Happy at 10:17 PM on January 14, 2011 [1 favorite]

My poodle whines.
posted by AugustWest at 10:46 PM on January 14, 2011

I'm one of those like pb mentioned, found meta-filter after a google search on some computer problem I had, an old Dell laptop, I was in short order amazed at the high quality of the people here, the answers to questions I nosed through, etc and etc. I didn't even really know about The Blue until after I joined, didn't find MeTalk until like last year...
posted by dancestoblue at 1:02 AM on January 15, 2011 [2 favorites]

That's how I found metafilter - I was looking for an answer to some question (long forgotten) and was charmed by the whole idea of Askme.
posted by b33j at 3:05 AM on January 15, 2011

pb can confirm (or not) but if MeFi is like most sites, the large spikes in first-time non-member traffic rarely have a significant lasting effect wrt converting those to visitors to members. In fact, the bigger the spike (like a ./ or Digg reference) the less significant and the visitor rates typically go back to pre-spike levels after a few days. So, if anything, a "popular" thread is a lousy corollary for the "popularity" of the site.
posted by victors at 6:06 AM on January 15, 2011

I left my cat on the counter overnight. Is it safe to eat him? If so, can anyone give me suggestions for an awesome cat-dinner mixtape?
posted by Cat Pie Hurts at 6:29 AM on January 15, 2011 [2 favorites]

Probably not. The claws come out overnight if not in the fridge.
posted by theichibun at 10:02 AM on January 15, 2011

Eponysterical.
posted by sveskemus at 12:18 PM on January 15, 2011 [1 favorite]

HELP!!! I need to come up with THE MOST AWESOME cat-dinner-mixtape costume for a party tomorrow night!
posted by ErikaB at 8:41 PM on January 15, 2011

Also, Valentine's Day is coming up soon. I'm getting desperate for gift ideas! Please help me find the best cat-dinner-mixtape-costume present!
posted by ErikaB at 8:43 PM on January 15, 2011

Holy shit is that Russian Incident thread amazing.
posted by dfriedman at 2:51 PM on January 16, 2011

My partner has a cat-dinner-mixtape-costume fetish and wants me to do things I am not really comfortable with. [More inside]
posted by LarryC at 1:29 PM on January 17, 2011