PR vs email – what drives more blog traffic?

Since I started writing this blog four weeks ago, this week has been the highest trafficked week. It has been an interesting observing the traffic spikes on this blog and the reasons why. Below is the traffic summary chart as at 13 September 2008 at 10.20am.

My blog traffic

Last week started to get some traction with the social networks and blog searches that I had submitted the site to. The biggest traffic drivers were Facebook (I had updated my profile message) and Stumble Upon (I added the site to the mix). The keywords that were driving traffic were around social networking, agency checklists and my name.

The blog traffic this week easily doubled. This was due to a couple of factors: internal email sent around at M&C directing traffic to this blog, my new job being announced internally to Leo’s staff, The Australian article about the move and referencing this blog and trade press.

In analysing the traffic, the highest spike in traffic was from an internal email rather than any PR (articles). So some initial thoughts about this test are:

1. Emails drive more traffic because it is easier for the consumer to interact
2. Endorsement (via email) helps drive traffic
3. PR (articles) is great for branding/talkability, but unless a consumer is interested they won’t research or go online to find out more

HOW DO WE APPLY THIS TO CAMPAIGNS?

For every campaign that goes live (most will have a campaign microsite or associated landing pages), it is important to include the link in any online communications that are sent out. This could be:

AGENCY

• WOM/viral email sent to people who might be interested in the site (either marketing industry or consumers)
• Email footers that highlight a collection of new work
• Newsletter to subscribed people highlighting and communicating new work
• Social bookmarking the site/critical pages – StumbleUpon, Facebook profiles, Messenger profiles, etc

CLIENT

• Email sent to the customer database who have indicated they are interested in
• Email footers (gif or link) that highlights the campaign – Wunderman do this very well for Microsoft for all of their events

There are a number of other ways to get campaign microsites, blogs, landing pages out there, but this is a start.