If you choose to use Blogger over WordPress (which is what I did), then one of the biggest downsides are the stats. You won’t get the instantly updated stats of WordPress. Like any blogger, you will want to see how many views you are getting, and what keywords you’ve hit it big on. Google Analytics is the solution.

Google Analytics is the accepted ‘universal’ stats system. The ability to set up accounts for potential advertisers to look at the stats is a huge feature. It can be the difference in landing the advertiser, or them being suspicious of fake numbers and passing your blog up.

There are many features that Google Analytics has that the default WordPress stats system doesn’t have. Even if Blogger does not provide you these stats, in some ways, Google Analytics is better. Some of the bigger features I like about it are the different breakdowns they will show you. They will show you which countries are viewing your content, which pages are being viewed, where each and every visitor is coming from (the page they were on before yours), and of course, search engine terms. They also keep track of the unique versus page views, because there really is a difference. WordPress will just show how many pages were loaded. You never know if your visitors are viewing one page and leaving. With all this additional information from Google Analytics, it doesn't matter whether you're using Blogger or Wordpress.

I suggest signing up for a free Google Analytics account right now if you haven't already. Right after you are done setting up that account, click on "My Account" and set up your Google Analytics stats system. It's pretty self explanatory and simple. After you’ve done that, you may also like to add my blog to your iGoogle RSS reader. :)

-Aud

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The reliability of Feedburner in the past month that I've had it is questionable. There are several reasons why I am suggesting either using two or more feed counters to get a better idea as to how many feeds you actually have. I am not an expert in the area of feeds, but it’s really not hard to understand why I am doubting Feedburner.

After tracking certain blogs for a few months, I started noticing the daily rising and falling of their Feedburner subscriber count. On certain days it would drop three or four subscribers, and the next day it would gain a few more. I trust my Google Analytics stats to be 100% accurate. If this is the case, I doubt I have the chance of gaining several subscribers in one day.

Another thing I noticed when observing other people's trends was, who deletes feeds that quickly? I have some feeds that I’ve probably never clicked on sitting right next to the ones I visit everyday. If my content was worth the trouble for a user to subscribe, wouldn’t it be likely that they would give me a chance to bring them some content they enjoyed?

Apparently, people shouldn't rely too much on their feed count. It’s just a number. Instead, focus more on your comments. Comments are worth money, but they should be enough to keep you going. If you have many people commenting on your work, then it will be much more entertaining and fun. It may be better to only check your feed count once every week so you don’t get discouraged by a sudden drop, or get too confident if there happens to be an increase in subscribers. Just something I noticed. :)

-Aud

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