Author Archives: Jordan

Tracking your blog: using the data

by Jordan on 21 May 2012 - 1 comment

Oh my goodness, I almost forgot! Throughout May, you can win a 15-page critique from me just by commenting! Winner will be drawn at random; each comment from April 30 to May 31 counts as one entry; winner to be announced on the blog June 1. So come join in the conversation!

Whether you use Blogger’s stats or Google Analytics, you’re collecting information about your blog visitors, and that information can be put to good use for you. If you understand how and why people are using your site, you can try to target and appeal to your visitors better.

The first step is always to dig into the data (hooray!). First we’ll take a look at how people are finding your site, then at your most popular content.

Note: At the top of the page in both these programs, you can adjust your time frame. I like to use a month for my data, which is the default in Google Analytics (Blogger’s default is one week).

How people are finding your site

In Blogger, you’ll want to go to Stats > Traffic Sources. In Google Analytics, it’s Traffic Sources > Overview. The Blogger version lists only the URLs and sites sending traffic to yours, followed by the search engine keywords. Google Analytics sorts the incoming visit sources. If you click on Traffic Sources > Sources, you’ll see some of these categories: “direct” visits, i.e. when someone types in your URL; referral visits, when someone clicks on a link to visit your site; and search engine visits.

Dig into your referring sites. Are your guest posts generating traffic for you? Critique partners’ sites? Random people? One thing I like to do is to visit the referring sites, especially if they’re blog posts. I love finding people who’ve linked to my site and thanking them!

What do I do with this information? I really like Google Analytics’ information here: it shows the proportion of your visits from the various source categories. If you’re getting more referrals than search visits, you can decide whether you want to try to attract more search traffic, or pursue referral traffic even harder with guest posts, hunting for links, etc.

Searching the search engines

I hope some part of your traffic is coming from search engines! But more than just knowing that they’re coming from a search engine, you want to know why—you need to know what they were searching for. And that might be more complex than it sounds—we can’t always tell what someone who typed in “oneida” is looking for. (Google it; there are lots of options.)

Take a look at the Keywords report. In Blogger, it’s at the bottom of the Traffic Sources page. In Google Analytics, go to Traffic Sources > Sources > Search > Organic. [You might think it's under Search Engine Optimization, but that's for the integration with Webmaster Tools. We'll come back to that—if I ever run out of other things to blog about!]

There you’ll find a list of the keywords people type into search engines and end up on your site. Note that just because people come to your site from that keyword, it does NOT mean you necessarily rank well (though one would hope there’d be a correlation between a lot of visits from a keyword and a high ranking).

What do I do with this information? Look for trends! On my website, I’ll tell you, nearly all of my top 10 keywords have to do with plotting methods. (It’s almost as if I did a month-long series on the subject or something!) What do you think I should write about? (Yeah, we’ll see.)

Of course, with Blogger, it can sometimes be a little tricky. I have a whole series on plotting, but how can I tell which post on the subject of the Snowflake Method my people are landing on? Google Analytics makes it easier—you can figure out what pages on your site people are landing on based on keyword. In the Organic report, find the line that says “Primary Dimension.” Keyword should be selected. Below that, there’s a pull down menu for a Secondary dimension. Under Traffic Sources, click on Landing Page.

(If you want to see it the other way around, you can make Landing Page the primary dimension and keyword the secondary, too.)

What people are doing on your site

This might be the most important part. No matter how they find your site, no matter what they typed into a search engine, once they’re on your site, you want to know where they go and how long they spend there.

The average time on site is on the Audience overview page in Google Analytics (Sorry, Blogger). It gives you a simple stat, in hours, minutes and seconds, to let you know how long people are spending on your site.

Also important is the New vs. Returning user report, under Audience > Behavior. (Again, sorry Blogger peeps.)

Finally (something we can all get on board with), you want to know what people are looking at. In Blogger, this is under Stats > Posts. In Google Analytics, the full report is under Content > Site Content > Pages.

Here you’ll find a list of the most visited posts or pages on your blog.

(Google Analytics has lots of other cool things, like letting you know how many pages on average your visitors visited—broken down by what page they first landed on when they came to your site—comparison to the average time on site, etc. etc.) (It’s really cool.)

What do I do with this information? Again, look for trends. What makes these posts your most popular? The subject? The tone? The search engine presence? Was it informative? Social? Fun? Funny? Personal? Then do that again!

If you have the additional data you find in Google Analytics, take a look at how many of your visitors are “hit-and-runs,” or never return. Granted, a good proportion of your visitors might not need your content, or might get all they need by simply reading a single page and then navigate away. There will never be a 0% bounce rate or a 100% return rate.

But if you see that certain posts turn away visitors significantly more than average, take a look at those posts. You don’t necessarily have to change them, but you might think twice about using such a negative tone or writing about that subject again.

We’ve barely scratched the surface of what Google Analytics can do, but there’s something useful here for everyone!

What do you think? How do you use your site analytics?

Posted in Marketing | 1 Comment

Book review: Class 11 by TJ Waters

by Jordan on 18 May 2012 - 3 comments

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve been doing a bit of research on the US Central Intelligence Agency for a book. Okay, maybe more than a bit:

Thank you, libraries!

Class 11 was actually not on my list to check out from the library, but like a good little researcher, I looked at all the books with similar call numbers to the ones I’d researched. Voila. By chance, I picked up Class 11 because I figured there might be some relevant info, and it was probably one of the most recent looks at CIA training.

On that same logic, I cracked this book first when I got homey—and I only stopped reading for a quick dinner break before I finished the whole book.

Class 11: My Story Inside the CIA’s First Post-9/11 Spy Class (aff) details the training of the first class of CIA officers hired after September 11, 2001. The worst attacks on US soil prompted a lot of people to apply to the agency—military, civilians, professionals, single moms, even a former pro athlete. Author TJ Waters was among that class.

As with the last CIA memoir I reviewed, several reviewers found Waters’s self-description and overall attitude grating. I honestly didn’t notice, but I was kind of mining the book for information as I read, so my focus could have been very different than those readers’. (Plus I’m kinda of the opinion that pretty much all autobiographies tread a fine line between self-congratulatory and totally depressing.)

Having studied a few other CIA memoirs now, I think this is probably one of the most recent, in-depth reviews of several of the tradecraft techniques taught at the Agency. That alone made it worth reading for me. I was disappointed to not get to see the tradecraft in action in the field (and like the author I was sad they didn’t get to do the paramilitary course, which seems to be far shorter than it was in decades past), but it seemed that Waters didn’t serve as a case officer in the field, and frankly, the subject of the book was the CIA class’s training, not their time on the ground.

What do you think? How do you research?

Posted in Book reviews | Tagged CIA, memoir, nonfiction, TJ Waters | 3 Comments

Dream. Big.

by Jordan on 16 May 2012 - 1 comment

Once upon a time, I went to college. (Hooray!) I studied humanities. (Hooray!) In case you’re not aware, this isn’t exactly a lead-in to a six-figure job.

I looooved college, and studied as many things as I could. This resulted in several trips to the college advisement center to change or add another major or minor. (It wasn’t that many, I guess: I majored briefly in communications studies, in a different college, and then I changed to a linguistics major, then added an American studies major, and a Spanish minor, and an English minor. Four years, why?)

On one of these trips to add one of these humanities programs to my already full Major Academic Plan, the advisor who had to okay my plan was very hesitant. I was in a hurry—I needed to get to class and expected this to be a simple “Okeedokey!” Instead, the advisor eyed me and my academic records (which were pretty dang good, thank you very much).

“And what do you want to do with your degree?” she finally sneered.

It was a little hard not to laugh in her face. I mean, the woman was an academic advisor in the college of humanities. What did any of the students of English or Classics or Italian Studies plan to do with their degrees?? Why should I, in keeping my options wide open (and without prolonging my time to graduation), be denigrated?

Figuring I probably had little to lose in the office of a woman whose name I hadn’t even bothered to read, I told her the truth: “I want to be a writer.”

It was a little bold, considering I’d abandoned my first and only attempt at a novel two years before, and wouldn’t seriously come back to writing again for four and a half years.

The advisor looked at me over the rims of her glasses. Obviously I’d made a mistake: this woman who had never seen me before and would never see me again sized me up, then held out a hot pink pamphlet. “You might want to take this.”

The trifold advertised a career development class. The message was clear: even in this department of subjects you studied for the love of it, being a writer was not a viable career option.

But I got my second major/minor/whatever it was, and never again darkened the door of the advisement center or the recommended class. I ended up getting a job in writing for marketing for several years, but eventually came back to my first love: writing fiction. And while that’s definitely a crap-shoot and by no means is my success assured, I’ve gotten at least a couple votes of confidence.

Booyah, lady.

I thought of this recently while doing research for yet another novel. I had to dig into my character’s alma mater’s website to figure out what she could’ve majored/minored in. When I visited their version of the college of humanities, the College of Language and Letters, I found this at the top of the page:

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great. —Mark Twain

(A smaller person would probably comment here about the career ambitions of a College of Humanities Academic Advisor, but I’m above that. And also I can’t think of anything particularly clever and concise.)

Who has belittled your ambitions? Feel free to vent here!

Photo credit: soooo not the actual lady described in this post! by Judy Baxter

Posted in Publishing | Tagged ambitions, college, mark twain, quotation, support | 1 Comment

Tracking your blog: Using Google Analytics

by Jordan on 14 May 2012 - 1 comment

If you’re serious about blogging, it’s important to focus on your visitors. How much do you really know about your visitors? Do you know where they come from? Why they came to your site? How long they stayed? How many pages they looked at? How many came and immediately left?

Last week we looked at a very basic solution for finding this web analytic information: Blogger or WordPress.com’s built-in stats packages. There are many free web analytics packages out there. In my opinion, Google Analytics offers the most comprehensive solution. It may be a little overwhelming for someone just starting out, but it’s really not hard to find the most important numbers you need to be keeping track of. Click on the picture at right to enlarge it to see a sample of some of the important, but easy to read, reports that Google Analytics generates.

Before you say, “Oh, numbers; I can’t deal with numbers!” or “Oh, coding; I can’t deal with coding!”, let me tell you that these numbers are good to know—and very useful in growing your blog readership. And let me tell you that these numbers are easy to find, use and understand with a free web analytics package (software installed on your site that tracks what visitors do on your site)—no coding, just cut and paste.

Here’s some of the information you can see in a single report, from one of my actual sites (not this one, though):

This report is the dashboard, a customizable overview of several reports. There are dozens of more in-depth reports available in Google Analytics, and even I only scratch the surface of this awesome web analytics program. I have a basic overview of how to install Google Analytics in my free PDF The Quick Guide to Google Analytics for Bloggers. I originally wrote it in 2007, but updated it with newer, easier installation procedures today. Check it out!

Next week, we’ll take a look at some of my favorite reports, and how to put all this data to use.

Posted in Marketing | Tagged blog content, blog tracking, blogger, free guide, google analytics, guides, marketing mondays, pdf, web analytics, website tracking, wordpress | 1 Comment

Tracking your blog: using Blogger or WordPress.com stats

by Jordan on 7 May 2012 - 0 comments

One of the most important things you can do with your blog or website is to track it. You need to understand where your blog or site visitors are going on your site, what they’re reading, and what they like if you’re going to keep them coming back for more.

Free blog platforms like Blogger and WordPress.com include some basic blog stats, and that’s a good place to start. Next week we’ll look at a more thorough and flexible way of tracking your site, and then we’ll move on to what we should do with all this information.

Blogger

In Blogger, go to your blog and find “Stats” in the left-hand navigation. In the Overview, you’ll find info on your pageviews, audience map, top posts and referring sites. (Click on any image for a closer look!)

What are pageviews? Pageviews indicate the number of times a single page on your site—your About page, your main page, a blog post, etc.—is loaded on someone’s computer (including your own, unless you click on “Don’t track your own pageviews”; always a good idea). Your pageviews are probably higher than your visitor numbers, because most visitors will view more than one page on your site (we hope, anyway!).

Below the pageview information, you can find the Posts list, showing your post popular posts and how many views they have. Traffic Sources tells you what websites are sending you visitors, and Audience shows you where those visitors life. Each of these reports have their own pages, as well.

The Posts page gives you a longer list of your most popular posts, listed by most pageviews. This also includes the date and number of comments for your information, too. This is one of the two most important report pages you’ll want to focus on.

The other page to keep an eye on, the Traffic Sources page, shows you where your traffic is coming from. The Referring URLs report shows what exact web addresses are sending visitors to your blog. (If you see a blog post in there, click through and say thank you!) The Referring Sites report aggregates the data from the URLs report. For example, the URLs report will show each individual Google search URL, but the Sites report adds all the Google searches together to show how influential Google really is in people finding your site.

Scroll down further to find the Search Keywords report. This report tells you what words people are typing into search engines and ending up on your site. (It’s important to note that this report does not necessarily mean you rank well for those words, but tells you how many people arrive on your site after typing them in.)

Finally, you have the Audience page. This page gives you a little information about your visitors—what countries they come from, what web browser they use and what operating system their computer/phone runs on. This information is largely fun, but it’s important to remember to check your blog in the top browsers to be sure it displays well.

WordPress.com

Self-hosted WordPress doesn’t come with a stats package onboard (though you can certainly add one with a plugin), but WordPress.com features a stats report under the My Stats tab. The reports are largely the same kind: the top chart shows your traffic. Views by Country is like the audience report above. Top Posts & Pages is like the Posts report for Blogger. Referrers show sites that sent visitors to your site.

The Clicks report shows what links to pages off your blog visitors click from your site. Search Engine Terms is the Search Keywords report from above. Tags & Categories shows you what tags or categories on your posts are most popular with your visitors. It’s like the Top Posts & Pages report, but it aggregates those posts by their tag or category.

Finally, the Totals, Followers and Shares report shows you how many posts, comments, categories and tags you have, as well as your followers. The Shares sub-tab gives you a count of how many times your posts have been shared.

I wish I could give you more information and better examples here, but I don’t really use WordPress.com much (obviously) so I have no data to dig into.

What do you think? What do you see here you can use? We’ll talk more about a more in-depth tracking package next week, and then we’ll follow up with how to use this information!

Posted in Marketing | Tagged blog content, blog tracking, blogger, marketing mondays, web analytics, website tracking, wordpress | Leave a comment

Getting the most out of writers conferences

by Jordan on 4 May 2012 - 0 comments

I’m at a writers conference today, so I’ve pulled out a great guest post from the archives, which originally appeared as part of the writing resources series.

by Samantha Clark

I love going to writing conferences. There’s something so inspiring about sitting in a large of group of people who all share your same passion. No matter whether it’s a big conference or small, both have their advantages.

My first writing conference was a biggie. Back in 2007, I was living in Los Angeles and attended the big summer conference for the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators there. Three days of information, inspiration, fun, jokes, motivation and creativity. I sat in the big and small gatherings and soaked up everything I could, every word from the speakers as well as the every ounce of excitement in the air. By the end of the conference, I was hooked. It was like drinking a giant Slurpee cup of creativity, and I wanted more.

Since then, I’ve moved away from Los Angeles, but my love of conferences has continued. In my current home near Houston, I’ve found wonderful single-day conferences that give me just as much as that big summer conference, with the added benefit of a more intimate setting. At these smaller conferences, there’s much easier access to the speakers. Generally, at the summer conference, the attendance is so huge, the speakers are swarmed after every appearance. But smaller events are much more relaxed. Our annual Houston SCBWI conference holds a dinner where attendees can chat with the invited speakers over fajitas. What better way is there to get to know someone?

From conferences, you obviously get access to the information the speakers provide, which could be anything from an editor telling you what they’re looking for to an agent giving query letter writing tips. But there are lots of other benefits:

Friends. Writing is solitary, and conferences give us an opportunity to get together with other people like us.
Writing help. As well as the writing tips speakers often give, conferences usually offer critiques with professionals, including agents, editors and published authors. These usually require additional payment, but they can be worth.
Contacts. Conferences are a chance to meet agents and editors you might work with later. Writers have made connections with editors at conferences and later sold them a book or been asked to write on assignment.
Inspiration. Every writer has bouts of doubt and times when our creativity pool dries up. Going to conferences is like getting a shot of inspiration in the arm. This is a business of passionate people, and that passion brims over to attendees at conferences. Without fail, even if I haven’t heard anything new at a conference (which is rare), I’ve always left feeling energized, and that was worth the price of entry.

How do you prepare for a conference?

First, research the conferences in your area. The SCBWI website has a list of the group’s events, but you can find others with an Internet search. Research the speakers and make sure they’re people you’d like to hear. There’s no point going to a conference focusing only on picture books if you write novels.
Once you know which conferences you want to attend – and can afford – register early. If you plan to get a critique, registering early means you’re more likely to get the person you want. Also, many smaller conferences sell out, so registering early secures your space.

A few days before the conference, research the speakers again. The conference will have their basic bio, but look around on the Internet for interviews and read their blog, if they have one. Jot down some notes in the notebook you’re planning to take. This way, when you see them speak, you’ll have a better idea of who they are.
If there are any speakers you would like to talk to, perhaps to ask a question or just compliment them on one of the books they’ve worked on that you’ve read, seek out this person in a nice, polite way (i.e. not in the bathroom, not while they’re eating unless you happen to be sitting at their table, and not interrupting their conversation). If they’re talking to another attendee, stand by and wait your turn. Once you have their attention, introduce yourself, tell them what you love about their work, ask them your question, then thank them and say goodbye. Keep it short, sweet and professional. In my experience, speakers are more than happy to talk to attendees as long as it’s on a professional level.

Going to conferences can be a very rewarding way to boost your writing life. Take advantage of the conferences offered in your area, and when you get home, your brain will be begging you to start writing.

About the author
Samantha Clark writes middle-grade fiction and blogs about writing, children’s books and writing conferences at DayByDayWriter.wordpress.com. You can subscribe to DayByDayWriter to read more.

Photo credits: SCBWI conference—Rita Crayon Huang; click—Jordan McCollum

Posted in Technique | Tagged prepare for writing conferences, samantha clark, scbwi, writing conference, Writing resources | Leave a comment

Beating Writers’ Block

by Jordan on 2 May 2012 - 2 comments

This post originally appeared as a guest post on Carol Garvin’s blog, Careann’s Musings. I realized I never shared it here!

The kids are in bed, the house is clean, you’ve spent some quality time with your spouse and you’ve watched your favorite show. Now it’s your time—time to write with nothing hanging over your head. You sit at your computer, fingers poised over the keys and—

Nothing happens.

What do you do? Spend the next two hours checking email and blogs, playing Text Twist and Minesweeper, coming back to your story every half hour without anything new to add and drifting away again until you can’t face your computer anymore and go to bed, strangely empty and guilty?

No! You don’t have to succumb to writers’ block—you can fight it, and you should. What makes a writer vs. a wannabe is perseverance (and the same is true about revisions, finding an agent, getting published, selling books, etc., etc.). Working through writers’ block makes you a stronger, better, more creative writer. And here are eight ways to do it.

Come up with more ideas
Easier said than done, I know, but try brainstorming new events and directions for your story. I recently came across an analysis of the story conference for Raiders of the Lost Ark. The surprising thing about this conference is the sheer volume of ideas—the writer, director and producer threw out ideas while brainstorming, not worrying about how outlandish or stupid they might sound—you never know if it could be made workable.

Recycle an old idea
Did you have an amazing plot twist you never got to use or used in another (preferably unpublished) work, or one you love in someone else’s story? Find a way to work that idea into this story. The mine cart chase scene in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom originally came from the conference for Raiders, but they didn’t use it there—an instant source for later ideas.

Look for more connections within your work
I got stuck in one WIP when I needed a task for my hero. He’d agreed to do something for the villain in exchange for a hostage, but I was drawing a blank as to what that should be. I tried to think of something the villain could send him after—but finally the right answer came to me. It shouldn’t just be something, it should be something related to the plot. And I had a subplot that could tie back into the main plot (and a minimystery that could be solved) right here.

Write something
You may have to take some time away from your WIP to get the creative juices flowing. You can work on another idea—writing or plotting or planning—or you can find writing prompts to get started. Sometimes focusing on another story idea will give you the boost or idea you need to progress in your first story—just don’t get sidetracked for too long!

Write nothing
Do something mindless—like playing Text Twist or Minesweeper, or doing house or yard work. Do something creative—if you play an instrument, practice. If you do a handicraft—knitting, needlework, woodcarving, knapping—make something. Occupying your hands while letting your mind roam can have great creative rewards.

Erase
As hard as this may be, maybe you’ve written yourself into a corner. Maybe there just isn’t anywhere for the story to go now, and you need to delete the last paragraph or scene or chapter. (Ouch!) Look at where your story took a turn for a dead end and brainstorm another direction.

Read (or watch)
Look for other ideas (and beautiful writing) in other works, in or outside of your genre. You can also watch a movie or TV show and play the “what if” game—what if something happened differently in this scene. (I came up with a whole story idea this way.)

Plot
You can often avoid getting stuck if you plan out where you’re going in advance. Not always, of course—I’m a plotter, and I can still get stuck in the gray areas of my outline. But back before I started plotting out my stories, I began with an ending in mind, but sometimes I spent weeks stopped in the middle, trying to figure out how to get there. Even loose plotting can help to keep the big milestones in mind to keep you moving toward your goals. Plus you can brainstorm in advance and save all those ideas for any lulls.

Beating writers’ block can be tough, but you can do it—and if you’re going to finish, you have to.

What do you think? How do you beat writers’ block?

Photo credits: paper ball—makedonche19; blank page—Chris Blakeley;
I can’t think—Alyssa L. Miller

Posted in Works | Tagged writer's block, writing environment, writing process | 2 Comments

Would you profile your blog readers?

by Jordan on 30 April 2012 - 0 comments

When we write, whether on our blogs or in our books, we are looking to connect with an audience. In fiction, generally we do this by working within a genre. On blogs, we do this working within a niche.

But could we do it more granularly? Of course—we could breakdown our target audience by more than just the niche of “reader” or “mystery reader” or “Regency romance lover.” We could look at demographic data—whether we get that from our Facebook page (yep, it’s in there) or Amazon data, we might be able to figure out a description of our readers that’s a lot more specific.

Livia Blackburne talked about profiling readers on her blog, sharing John Locke’s teaching on a profile of his readers. Following his example, Livia wrote out this profile, which is fairly extensive:

My target audience consists of young women, from high school through early 20s. They read to be transported to other worlds, and they actively seek sword and sorcery with female protagonists. They like to read about – for lack of a better term — girls kicking butt. My readers are attracted to strong, larger than life heroines, and they like reading about my main character Kyra because of the cool things she can do. They’d love to be Kyra for a day or two. My readers shy away from situations that are too cut and dry. They’re drawn to moral complexity, hard decisions, and inner conflict. They like a heroine with a dark side (no Pollyanna heroines please), but they still expect good to triumph in the end. My readers want fast-paced action and adventure, with high stakes and lots of plot twists. They don’t want to be bogged down with things like setting details and overly flowery prose.

Livia pulls this knowledge from beta reader feedback and her own knowledge of her story and genre. And then this reader profile can inform not only your current WIP, but future works—and your blog. As Livia explains:

Once you have your psychological profile, you can come up with themes that resonate with your target audience. In my case, it might be girls kicking butt, larger-than-life heroes, and tough moral decisions. And you’d would write a blog post that encapsulated these themes. The idea is that you write blog posts that resonate with your target audience, making them curious to read your book.

As with almost all things, this is easier said than done. Knowing what kind of blog post you’re looking for is definitely a great way to start and can help you generate ideas, but I worry the connection might be a little too abstract (though obviously well-known and well-selling self-publisher John Locke disagrees).

On the other hand, that can be a strength: harping on our books all the time is definitely a negative, while providing the same emotional experience as our books is a great way to set up a promise with our books. Locke calls this a “loyalty transfer.”

What do you think? Would you profile your readers? How would you translate your profile into blog posts?

Starting today, and throughout May, every comment is an entry to win a 15-page critique from me! Winner will be drawn at random from pool of commentators from April 30 to May 31, to be announced on the blog June 1. So come join in the conversation!

Photo (person in profile) by Sean Dreilinger

Posted in Marketing | Tagged marketing mondays, profile, reader expectations, reader profile | Leave a comment