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1. I've never paid much attention to Alexa except when doing research on sites that compete with a client's.
2. I use PageRank mainly to quickly check the legitimacy of people who send link exchange requests and things like that. It's a decent benchmark, at least for now. This week I've been reading that Google is not paying much attention to PR these days.
3. My blogging inspirations are many - these people come to mind: Liz Strauss, Karen Swim, Joanna Young, Amy Palko, Jan Germonimo, Phil Gerbyshak, Rosa Say, Robert Hruzek, Fred Schlegel ... the list could go on for miles.
The funniest thing, though: It took two weeks before my family noticed. I deliberately quit at 2 PM on a work day to avoid that "clean slate" mentality (you know, that "Oh, crap, fell of the wagon today, guess tomorrow's a new day, might as well finish this pack today and start over in the morning") and I told NO ONE. I was at my sister in law's house, and my brother in law tried to bring me an ashtray when I went out for a walk. I said, "No, I don't need that" and suddenly everyone realized they hadn't seen me with a cigarette in two weeks. My father in law about had a stroke - he thought he was losing it, mentally. "My fondest wish! How could I not have noticed!" I almost threw a pillow at him when he started discussing all the bad things about smoking and I could feel the "rebellion factor" kicking in. But all in all, I really lost all cravings for them - and I think what I explained in my post is why.
Using peppers as substitute to tame the craving was very unorthodox but effective. Beat all these fancy nicotine patches and nicorettes! :)
You are right that blogging is a marathon. One good day doesn't make your blog, but it also doesn't mean it's the only good day you're going to have.
You've been putting out a lot of great content. I'm sure soon you'll be breaking the top 100,000 daily. The longer you stick at it, the better.
Best of luck with kicking the smoking habit. It is one of the hardest things in to do. I know a lot of people who ease their way off of them, but they always seem to start back up. I think cold turkey is the way to go. Even though you'll be miserable for 3-7 days, when you're done you'll it will have been worth it. It shows that you REALLY want to quit.. not just forcing yourself to cut back.
This is I think because I am more than happy enough to see Wordpress blogstat and more than happy enough to congratulate those who made to the top.
Congrats to your milestone Jan.
As a defense mechanism coping up the heartache of not making to the top, I should embrace wholeheartedly the most important of all...
This is the yardstick that proves to be more life-changing than Alexa Ranking and Google Page Rank:
* Your Quit Date is: Friday, December 08,, 2006 at 2:00 PM
* Time Smoke-Free: 1047 days, 16 hours, 3 minutes and 26 seconds
* Cigarettes NOT Smoked: 17,810
* Lifetime Saved: 4 months, 16 days, 1 hour
* Money Saved: $3,785.90
Thank you!
I'm a bit hesitant to trumpet it as it might be construed as bragging. Well, in a way yeah, it's a little of that. It's just so hard when the blog doesn't even pay for coffee and the cost of electricity that little good news about web traffic always proves to make up for all the aggravation we put up with just so we can blog. :)
The days since your last smoke. Money saved. Approximate time added to your life. These are the more important statistics. I'm glad you liked that. :)
I owed my thanks to some really cool blogger friends who're there encouraging me along the way. I treasure them so much for being my readers / friends. If not because of them, I may not be where I am today and still persevering. It'll be a long way to go for me to reach my next milestone, but thanks for what you shared, hopefully we can support one another in various social network to step further ahead. Best wishes!
@wchingya
Social/Blogging Tracker
Congratulations on the Alexa Jan!
There's a good idea. Thanks a lot, Karen. And for sharing it in Twitter, too! :)
Obviously this does not put aside the milestones that all bloggers are constantly looking for, and your Alexa improvement is no exception. It is awesome that you broken the 100K mark. Did you know that Alexa themselves say that their metrics is actually accurate when it hits this mark? As to maintaining it, I'm sure you will have no problems, considering you have a great "mastermind" group, lol.
I do like what Heather had to say: "If they have the power to make me feel good about myself, they can also have the opposite power." Very true indeed.
Yeah, I've read it too. Although I wish every browser has this built in so we'd have a more "accurate" reading.
The metrics I have become obsessed with are my weight and my calorie intake as these have a direct effect to other metrics that my doctor would like to monitor. Come to think of it, our bathroom scale is still under the mud left by Ondoy. Oh well, such is life. =)
Lol, but I'm not one to claim I have done this perfectly - yes I DO obsess over Alexa and even keep my own tracking on excel - but hey, that's just me. Lol.
I went from PR0 to PR3 in 3 months (since I went backtoblogging in Jan09) then it stayed there. I have no idea how I got PR3. And since it never moves anyway (at least for me) I've just ignored it. Lol.
And I don't smoke. Haha. I never liked the way they smell. woot...
But CONGRATS to Holly for kicking the habit. It isn't called an "addiction" for nothing right, so Kudos. :D
And just like you, I don't know how I got my PR3. I used to think it was because I was with Blogger. Now, I'm on self-hosted WP blog and Google gave it back to me. Maybe we're instinctively doing the right things that Google approve of? LOL
Now I'm beginning to think everyone here who knows how to use excel is keeping tabs on his/her Alexa too. Fess up y'all. :p
I'd have some fairly good idea how much impact our group effort at promotion
on our blogs.
Well, let's see. I'd just put back Adsense in my blog. So you've company
now in watching the cents go by. Ahahahaha.
We're having fun here in our group, aren't we? That's a good metric in
itself.
*If you've suggestions, and this goes to everybody member in the group,
please feel free giving us your mind. Just shoot an email to the group and
we'd take it from there.
*On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 8:21 PM, Disqus <
My family and online friends alike inspire me on a daily basis. I've already internalized a few people who keep me honest. It's of critical importance not to get full of oneself, as that is a sure path to alienating those you care about. Conversely, it is critical to not berate oneself or minimize one's accomplishments. I know these things, but yet am far from getting to a place where I will feel comfortable with success. I am a master of self-sabotage. Hopefully this will soon be a thing of the past. :)
As far as Alexa and rankings go, I am just like the rest of the world. I'd be thrilled to see them rocket. But I don't want to give them power over me. If they have the power to make me feel good about myself, they can also have the opposite power. I am working towards interacting with interesting people who share my interests and challenge me to be better than I am. THAT will be a measure of success in my book.
Great post, Jan!
Well said. You're such an insightful friend. Your blogging group should congratulate itself just for the sheer luck of getting you on board.
When I was around 18, I smoked for like 2 months and quit when I realised that my skin wasn't looking that good. Nicotine strips vitamin C from your skin. I think my vanity saved me from becoming a real smoker.
Yeah, smoking is bad for the skin. I should know - I look at it everyday in the morning. :)
I'm just about to break 100k myself. My traffic is escalating very smoothly, which I like. No surprises. I do X, I get Y response. Beautiful!
Now, you have to hold it there!
You know, I think it's not so much my blogging buddies that keep me honest, as my group of non-blogging buddies. It's so easy to get obsessed by metrics and OMG! X linked to me! OMG, new page rank! and talking with folks who have no idea about that and are just wanting to know, hey is she delivering the entertainment or not keeps me grounded.
But between us, I still get giddy at all of that!
Jan, I didn't even realize you smoked! We need to devise a competition that gets you to quit and me to lose weight!
I have the same relationship with my friends now - I keep talking to them about blogging and they just smile and feign interest. lol!
But I think I've started to get to them - just recently some of them expressed interest in starting a blog although mostly because they want to earn from the net. lol. I haven't told them how crazy difficult that part is. Haha.
I may be off-topic here but I see you have Adsense ads now. Good luck on earning!
Is that a bad place to put it? I thought of putting it before the post body, but I usually have a picture or graphic there so I put it down here instead. Do you have any suggestion?
Your Quit Date is: Friday, December 08,, 2006 at 2:00 PM
Time Smoke-Free: 1047 days, 16 hours, 3 minutes and 26 seconds
Cigarettes NOT Smoked: 17,810
Lifetime Saved: 4 months, 16 days, 1 hour
Money Saved: $3,785.90
Well I do place some counters/ranks but what matters to me were the one's who stays... and may constant blog buddies... it's all about fun baby! jijijijiji
I need to put in more work.
For the common bloggers like us? Hard work! LOL. I already feel tired just thinking about it. :)
Thanks for the reminder. :)
Congrats too Holly.
The challenging part is to pass over the 100k alexa rank. You are running ahead towards that rank. I hope I can also achieve it. :)
nagtatanim ng patatas at nagmamakaawa sa mga kapitbahay na regaluhan ako ng
baka at manok. Ahehehe.... Oo nga po, mahirap din to blog in English. Di
ka pa nakakapagmumog sa umaga kailangan nang makipagtalaktakan in English.
Nakakapagod sa panga. LOL
Ang galing! And congrats for quitting the habit. Keep blogging!