I noticed today that Blognetnews (BNN) is no longer ranking the various Red County sites as one site – it’s about time! Now each Red County website is being ranked individually. That is not good news for any of the 38 Red County sites. None of them are now ranked in the BNN Top 20 “California Most Influential Political Blogs” list!
Inexplicably the Liberal OC blog is ranked #2 by BNN this week. But let’s take a look at their own Sitemeter data: the Liberal OC has had 4.065 visits to their blog this week and 6,706 page views. By comparison, the Orange Juice blog has had 6,854 visits this week and 15,660 page views, according to Sitemeter!
You want a second opinion? OK – let’s see what Alexa, the number one website traffic ranking service in the world, has to say. This week Alexa is ranking the Liberal OC blog at 439,183, while the Orange Juice blog is ranked 203,413. The 38 Red County sites are ranked together at 249,771. That’s right – our one Orange Juice blog is trumping a combined 38 Red County blogs! Talk about David beating Goliath…
But never mind site visits, the page views tell the real story. Orange Juice readers, on average, read 4.6 Orange Juice articles each week, currently and over 9 stories per week over the last three months, according to Alexa. Red County’s readers read only 1.9 articles per week and only 1.7 articles per week over the last three months! The Liberal OC has similar numbers. Their readers read 1.7 articles per week.
Why is the Orange Juice blog such a huge success compared to the massively funded Red County and their hyper-partisan sister the Liberal OC? I think a lot of our popularity stems from the fact that we have Orange County’s most diverse blog team. And we have started to add more bloggers from outside of central Orange County. I am looking to add even more in the next few weeks. Moreover, many of our posts have an edgy quality that is absent at both our red and blue counterparts. It isn’t easy keeping our blog going, but nothing good is easy.
Our future plans include not only adding more bloggers from all over Orange County, but also focusing on more local coverage. Our new webmaster, Terry Crowley, is doing a great job and we are now looking to make even more changes to our blog. I am thankful for Crowley’s help and for all the work that all of our writers do for this blog. I also greatly appreciate our readers! Thanks to all of you for making the Orange Juice the number one political blog in Orange County!
Art, thanks for a great blog and congratulations on your rankings and success. The recent changes took me by surprise as I was away most of November and missed what I can only assume were fireworks.
Oh well…
Anonyms,
Yep it got a little crazy there. Thomas Gordon, Sarah and Carl Overmyer removed their content from the OJ and took it elsewhere in a suprise move. At least it was a suprise to me and i think it was mostly a suprise to everyone else, too.
That’s my cliff notes version 😉
Art,
I see a steady build-up in readership and participation on your OJ! blog.
I would like to see a forums section added, where the conversations on different subjects could continue. But the current set up is quaint and easy for the followers that do come here.
Best of luck going forward and in the New Year!
I have to laugh at thses posts by Art, but first let me point that this doozy:
“That is not good news for any of the 38 Red County sites. None of them are now ranked in the BNN Top 20 “California Most Influential Political Blogs” list!”
Given that most RC blogs aren’t in California, that would tough to do.
Art, everyone who reads this blog knows that when OJ doesn’t rank well on BNN, you either ignore, claim there’s something wrong with BNN’s ranking system, or attack the guy who founded BNN.
When OJ does well, all of a sudden its a credible ranking system.
The only consistency is your obsession with what is transparently a clever marketing scheme by BNN — which, by the way, doesn’t claim to be a traffic ranking.
Matt/Jubal,
However Alexa.com IS a traffic ranking system. And you always ignore their data, don’t you?
I have said it before, if you want to dispel with Alexa’s data then you ought to post your own data. Most other blogs use Sitemeter. You ought to as well. Otherwise it sure looks like you are trying to hid the fact that the Red Emperor has no clothes…
Face it Matt. This is not a Red Country. Your brand is based on a goofy premise. Good luck with that.
Red Vixen,
You have been a HUGE part of our success and I thank you for all your help. I like the forum idea. Terry and I are still trying to figure out our software but I will look at this option.
Thanks, Art. That’s a bit inflated, but I appreciate your compliment. I enjoy hanging out with you and your group of writers. It’s been fun and interesting.
“Huge” – would be like 10K visitors/day. Which is nearly a tenfold increase. That’s what I’d like to see for you in the future. I notice that you hit 3k visitors right around election time.
I imagine Mr. Jubal is pretty agitated when he ranks below you, yet he thinks you are totally wrong all the time. Must be frustrating to be him – always trying to compete with someone he thinks is so below himself.
“That is not good news for any of the 38 Red County sites. None of them are now ranked in the BNN Top 20 ‘California Most Influential Political Blogs’ list!” – Given that most RC blogs aren’t in California, that would tough to do.
Lame, Jubal. What WOULD have been a “doozy” is if Art had said, “Most of them are no longer ranked etc…” It IS notable that NONE of them are. (That would include OC Blog, wouldn’t it?)
However Alexa.com IS a traffic ranking system. And you always ignore their data, don’t you?
Art, you have the same attitude toward Alexa. You only talk about it when OJ scores well. That’s why you stopped your “Real OC Political Blog Rankings” farce.
You don’t understand the limitations and flaws of Alexa, but are happy to flog it whenever it suits your “we’re number 1!” pretenses.
It’s pointless to re-hash the “post your data” argument” with you because through out that debate, you always refused to disclose the single most revealing metric: the Absolute Unique Visitors number in Google Analytics.
As for Vern and RV: I haven’t paid attention to the BNN rankings since a few days after it first debuted, when I realized it is a marketing gimmick aimed at getting gullible bloggers to give BNN a free blogad.
I realize none of you are willing to admit it, but no one in OC politics takes this blog seriously. You’re fortunate the term “orange juice” is part of the blog’s name. if it weren’t for that and what’s SMS did to this site, OJ would be stuck at the same traffic level it had mired in for years.
Must be frustrating to be him – always trying to compete with someone he thinks is so below himself.
LOL!
From the start, OC Blog has had pseudonymous bloggers, and policed the comments (for abusiveness and gossip, not opinions).
Art virulently denounced pseudonymous blogging — until he suddenly decided it was OK when he needed it.
Art loudly bragged that he didn’t “censor” commenters — until it turned out he did, and then announced it was OK to do so.
Well, it’s always entertaining to watch the convenient evolution of Art’s standards.
Yeah, yeah, the little foibles of Art, God love him.
Yeah, yeah, the little foibles of Art
Whatever you have tell yourself, Vern.
From the start, OC Blog has had pseudonymous bloggers, and policed the comments (for abusiveness and gossip, not opinions).
Art virulently denounced pseudonymous blogging — until he suddenly decided it was OK when he needed it.
Art loudly bragged that he didn’t “censor” commenters — until it turned out he did, and then announced it was OK to do so.
Well, it’s always entertaining to watch the convenient evolution of Art’s standards.
“Stay the Course!” no-matter-what, mentality is so last presidency.
It is actually OKay to change one’s mind on things, Mr. Pseudonym. Art is no longer a Republican, he allows Doppleganger posts, and he has banned some dummy named Stanley who is an anti-social blog detractor. OMG. Radical.
And your site ranks lower than his because you’re so together.
Red, the unfortunate thing about commenting here is that someone often beats me to the response. You just did, again! The best part is you always do it better than I would have. Thank you.
Oh for chrissake Art, this shallow bragging is really pretty boring.
#13,
And yet, 13 responses later, here you are. And three of those comments were made by none other than Red County Editor Matt/Jubal Cunningham. Guess there’s not much going on over at Red-Faced County…
What are those red thingies? They appear to be pointy caps – can’t tell what they are.
junior,
It is a popped red balloon…
It is actually OKay to change one’s mind on things, Mr. Pseudonym.
Of course it is. But normal people do it over a period of time, after a great deal of thought. Art does it with a suddenness reminiscent of how the old Soviet Union would liquidate a top official and immediately airbrush that man out of official photographs.
Come on — Art denounces pseudonymous blogging repeatedly for a couple of years, in black-and-white, no-room-for-doubt terms — and then, overnight, it is acceptable. Give me break, RV. Stop rationalizing. Art is as changeable as the wind.
Guess there’s not much going on over at Red-Faced County…
There’s plenty going on, Art — I just don’t waste posts on the weekends.
And your site ranks lower than his because you’re so together. As I said, no serious person takes the BNN rankings seriously. And Art only does when OJ does well. Or have you forgotten the jihad he was waging against BNN founder Dave Mastio because OJ’s rankings weren’t as high as he thought they should be. You guys are like a cult.
Matt/Jubal,
We like to give our readers new stories every single day. Apparently you have a different work ethic.
And again you dodge the Alexa info. At least you are consistent.
But thanks for reading the OJ today! We appreciate the hits…
We like to give our readers new stories every single day.
When traffic declines significantly. You’re a blog genius, Art.
And again you dodge the Alexa info. At least you are consistent.
Uh, yeah. Check Alexa again, boyo. I don’t know where you got those numbers you post, because they’re different from the ones you link to. You might try re-writing your post for the third time.
A note on the page views, Art: it’s not hard to artificially inflate them when you have crappy site navigation that forces readers to “view” more pages than they would have to on a site that was easy to navigate.
Keep trying to convince yourself, Art. And no one is going to hold their breath on the Absolute Unique Visitors metric. You’ll never give it up, because it will let all the hot air of this particular balloon you like to blow.
#17
Mr. Jubal,
If there’s really nothing here to see, then why spend all that energy to keep making that boorish point? Your particular “issues” with Art and his blog seem to be pretty much contained to just you.
You don’t waste your time doing stories on the weekend. Got it. Art’s numbers of visitors are all wrong, but you don’t give an alternative objective way of measuring, otherwise. Got it.
Then for your final “Gotcha!” you drag out the “you guys are all in a cult!”.
For what? having a little bit of a community on the OJ blog? Really, is that all it takes in your mind for a cult to develop? Some posters get together and share some articles, share some views, take time to post some opinions and thoughts and suddenly we are all “just a cult”?
Unlike you 28%’ers who will support George Bush while he absolutely destroys this country year after year. You’ve defended every lousy decision he’s made and you’ll continue to cover for him all the way up to when the guy actually vacates the building. And you’ll now tell us how great Sarah Palin is. Despite her meanness, her dishonesty, her nonsensical rants, her grifter ways and the crushing debt that she’s put on her state that makes her now demand help from the feds.
Yep, there’s a cult all right. In YOUR world.
Mr. Jubal,
Don’t you have something better to do like get fundraising into full swing for the “Palin 2012!” Election grassroots effort? She IS the face of the Republican Party going forward. She’s the poster child of who is left in the GOP. If you think it’s lonely over at Red County now, just wait until the stench of Palin’s “leadership” is aired out in the coming months.
Some of us don’t really care about how “popular” a site is perceived by others in order to read and post. In my opinion, Content counts. Agreeing with everyone else is not the object.
Welcome to the 21st Century. Change is in the air.
Art: We like to give our readers new stories every single day.
Jubal: When traffic declines significantly. You’re a blog genius…
So now we’re blog dullards because we post stories on the weekend and you don’t. Life doesn’t stop on the weekend. We post stories whenever we think we have something interesting to say. Apparently Jubal consults some Hayek supply/demand curve before copy-pasting one of his OC GOP press releases or blessing us with one of his thoughtful prognostications. A wise, wise blogger. Oh well, different strokes…
Vern and RV:
You guys are cultish in your inability to discern how Art foments these these tiffs here.
The weekend blogging criticism, for example. It has escaped the notice of you both — big surprise — that it was Art who raised the subject by taking a shot at Red County for not doing much on weekends.
I respond that I think it is a waste of time, and now I’m the bad guy. If you guys can’t take the critique, why raise the subject?
And Vern, next time Art posts a press release — which he does regularly — or generates a post by adding some commentary to an MSM news story, I’ll look for you to take him to task in the comments.
Post away on the weekends, for all I care. My preference is to save the posts for when more people are actually reading the blog.
And RV, it’s hard too know where to start with your rants, because they make hysterical claims like this:
You’ve defended every lousy decision he’s made and you’ll continue to cover for him all the way up to when the guy actually vacates the building.
Really! Every lousy decision? I’ve never criticized Bush? That just shows how little you have read of what I have written about President Bush.
In the meantime, RV, continue stewing in your Palin hatred. Vern, keep flexing your vocabulary while occasionally saying something of interest and insight.
LOL, I could keep going all day, but I’m done Jubal-baiting for now. It’s Monday, brother! Time to mind your own ship!
OK.
BTW, Vern, I do like you, even though we disagree politically — and more seriously than that, despite the fact you went to Mater Dei.
Shoulda let me into Schubert-Flint. Now we’re enemies forever. Kidding.
Wow so the liberaloc came in second statewide huh? That is pretty awesome… I wonder if this is the first time we’ve ever come out that high or if it’s a regular thing?
Matt is busy over here at OJB on weekends – thats why he doesnt work on RC then. He comments so frequently he’s almost like a guest blogger.
Liberal OC – whats that? Centrist lite?
Vern. Now the picture is clear. Thank you Jubal for that inside information. Now I understand why Vern is so unhappy.
Tesoro knocked his alma mater Mater Dei out in the CIF Quarter Final 38-35.
For those who enjoy high school level football keep your eyes on St. Margaret’s who just tied Mission Viejo Diablo’s Orange County record of 41 consecutive victories. They go for the record at 29 Palms this weekend.
St. Margaret is a college prep Catholic School of around 400 students located in San Juan Capistrano. Two of their football team coaches are members of our church.
PS: I wonder what’s tougher winning 41 straight or losing 14 in a row as happened to the Washington Huskies team over the past two seasons.
Totally off topic….Vern you went to Mater Dei? Really?
Yes, yes, Em, haven’t we all been over this? Your sister and I argued about the entrance exams, your Dad and I talked about Mater Dei at length over lunch the other day.
Awe in all honesty I probably wasn’t paying attention, and I didn’t go there. Go Rosary Royals haha. Oh I do remember something about everyone getting in or something but must have missed that you went there. But just an FYI my daughter friend did not gain entrance this year her grades were just up to par, even after attending a Catholic grade school.
That’s nice to know though, my daughter seems to like it so far but only 3 months so we got years left.
Art-
Sorry for running away on an off topic 😉
Yeah OK.
Mr. Jubal comes to a party here at OJ!blog and gives out negative comments on what the other guests are saying, how they are saying it…. Mr. Jubal, you may as well take a big dump on the carpet while you’re at it. You’re starting to come off as a cad.
See you next weekend!