A year ago, when this blog celebrated its first birthday, we were slightly bowled over by it having 11,400 hits.
Today, with the second year almost up, that actually seems quite unimpressive because over the past year we've just over another 25,000 hits - twice as many as last year! That's just shy of 37,000 hits in two years. And, at the moment, that means round 70-100 hits every single day. And all this for what is - by and large - a site that concentrates on the activities of one relatively small junior girls rugby team. Okay occasionally it does stray a bit, but even so.
One effect of this is that, when you talk to coaches and managers at other clubs, you invariably find that they know us rather well - even if we've rarely or never played them before. Whether this is good or bad I'm not sure, but it is unnerving at times! And I've given up counting the number of these coaches who have say that they turn to us first to find the latest news (ie. before turning to official sources like the RFUW!)
Which is very flattering - but worrying though, but the fact is that finding out what is going on can been astonishingly hard. What with the enormous media coverage the game gets (NOT!) everyone relies on the 'net, but even here there are very few outlets for information about the adult game never mind junior girls rugby. The main source (RFUW) seem to suffer from an not only an overstretched HQ staff, but also from having to use the RFU's system -which was probably was the latest thing about three-four years ago but now seems very inflexible. In the world of blogs and wikis is ever so slightly old hat (it doesn't even have an newsfeed!).
I've no idea how our site compares with others. In global terms Saturday's a Rugby Day and Your Scrumhalf Connection will be far more popular - but they are adult women's sites, and US based too. There are a growing number of UK blogs starting up, especially in the last year - but if any other girls rugby sites (other than maybe the RFUW!) in the UK that gets anything like the traffic we do then I'd be fascinated to who they are...
PS: I notice that Your Scrumhalf Connection - a blog run by Wendy Young, who is now the scrumhalf for the US national team - started in the same month as us. Interesting article up at the moment that shows that its not just in the UK that the game suffers from rampant media bias...
Saturday, March 08, 2008
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John,
ReplyDeleteI'll be honest in that we used your 'model' in setting up our team, the blog and the communication strategy.
Our blog site which has run from September has had just over 3000 hits, or just over 500 hits a month.
I have your site linked to my blackberry on RSS feed and do use you as a form of information. It is often the case that interesting bits of information don't always come from the obvious places first.
Also from a knowing you point of view I think the blog does provide a window into the club and a form of community view even if we haven't met yet.
Please keep up the good work on the blog.
cheers
spike
Thanks for the shout-out! Just as a clarification, I am one of the USA scrumhalves, merely in the USA eagle pool. I hope to play again under the big lights soon though!
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