Welcome to the Travel Forums


Why join TravelBlog?

  • Membership is Free and Easy
  • Your travel questions answered in minutes!
  • Become part of the friendliest online travel community.
Join Now! Join TravelBlog* today and meet thousands of friendly travelers. Don't wait! Join today and make your adventures even more enjoyable.

* Blogging is not required to participate in the forums
Advertisement


What is your most overrated/underrated blog?

Advertisement
Do you have a blog that is not your finest work, but for some reason get loads of hits? Or a blog that you were especially proud of, but people didn't seem to notice? Please share them here
10 years ago, August 30th 2013 No: 1 Msg: #174574  
My most overrated blog: My life in Shenzhen, China
This is my most popular blog, with 5600+ hits, but was really nothing special. I had only been teaching English in Shenzhen for a few months, the pictures were not great, and it was one of my first blogs ever. I think there isn't lots of Shenzhen info out there, and my blog must come up on Google because people always e-mail me questions asking about teaching English there.

Another one: Kitty Coffee Shop
Somehow this one slipped through the Travelblog cracks. It has no writing; I only inserted 1000s of "Miaos" to meet the Travelblog minimum for front page publishing. It only has about 500 views, but probably deserves none. It also sparked some angry comments (which I didn't publish). A few good cat pics though!

My most underrated blog(s):
Fundamentalist Iran
Tourist Iran
The Real Iran
I did a 3-part blog on my experience backpacking Iran, and I felt it was some of my most moving travel writing and best photos ever taken. It is true that each one has accumulated 1000+ hits, but I still find them far superior to other blogs of mine that have 3000+. Also, most of my photos from that trip were stolen when my apartment was robbed in Taipei, so I have an emotional attachment to these, forever preserved on Travelblog

[Edited: 2013 Aug 30 08:40 - nickkembel:103181 ]
Reply to this

10 years ago, August 31st 2013 No: 2 Msg: #174608  
B Posts: 2,064
Interesting question.
Underrated blogs for me tend to be those where I really enjoyed the travel and spent much time writing the blog, but it gets very few hits. Some examples:
The New South - History of the American South after the Civil War
The Wright Stuff - Frank Lloyd Wright's early years as an architect
The best raft trip in the United States - The name says it all

Overrated blogs are generally those I wrote to cover a day entirely on transport, but get lots of hits; for example: The Prettiest Interstate in the US

I'm not sure what category these fall in. Occasionally, I'll write multiple blogs about the same place, and one will get significantly more hits. I wish I could figure out why 😱
Waterfalls and Trees One of four blogs about Olympic National Park, has almost double the hits of the next most popular
Welcome to Sunrise One of three blogs about Mount Rainier, has more hits than the other two combined
Granite Majesty One of two blogs about Sequoia National Park, has five times the hits of the other. Reply to this

10 years ago, September 1st 2013 No: 3 Msg: #174642  
I certainly haven't figured out why some of my blogs get a lot of hits...nothing like your numbers...and others don't. My most popular is Alaska Inside Passage Cruise May 2008 with 777 hits, about a week long cruise I summarized in one blog.

Perhaps it is because I had posted 170 blogs about all my travels from 1949 to 2011 before I got recognized by the TB community. The blogs cover my 18 years in Asia, 18 years in Europe, and 13 trips around the world (several RTW's covered in just one blog each), so there are many more fascinating blogs than my Alaskan cruise.

Once I was recognized, few readers have bothered to go back to these earlier blogs; although this last month someone read every one of the 194 published to date...this has happened before. Keep Smiling told me he was going to read them all, but you never know who. I suppose if there was a way to delete and republish these blogs, they would get more hits, but that's too much work! Reply to this

10 years ago, September 1st 2013 No: 4 Msg: #174643  
That's very interesting, Home and Away. I also back-blogged a little when I first signed up, but weirdly enough some of those backblogs got a lot of hits. I've come to learn that there are several reasons for this: using keywords in the titles that might come up in searches, using eye-catching photos especially for the first 4 that might show in the front page, and more so than anything, sharing your blogs on other websites. For every blog I publish, I post it on my facebook, and then follow up by posting photos from that blog individually on facebook over the next few days, again with links to the blogs. People like photos way more than shared links, and individual is better, because the Travelblog link will show up right it people's newsfeed, while if you post several together, people have to actually open them to see the link. People are lazy, so you need to guide them to your blog. Finally, you can take advantage of the subscriber's list on Travelblog (you can add all your friends' emails--many of them are listed on Facebook) but it is time consuming and some people might not appreciate it. Last but not least, I also have a personal website and a website for my book, where I also share my blogs.

Oh, and one more thing - if you can get the attention of the regular users/moderators of the site, particularly by participating in forums, you can also up your visibility by getting awards or front page visibility. It is likely that you just posted a high volume in a short period of time, as you said, and that is not conducive to maximizing visibility. Sounds like you have decades of experiences to share, though, so that's no easy task!

In response to: Msg #174642
[Edited: 2013 Sep 01 03:31 - nickkembel:103181 ]
Reply to this

10 years ago, September 1st 2013 No: 5 Msg: #174644  
B Posts: 1,309
I don't think we have any blogs that I rate more highly than others in content or style, however if the destination was a loved place I tend to have a soft spot for that particular blog. I've had a quick look at our stats and I like the fact that our most viewed blog (nothing like Nick's numbers mind you!) is one of our most loved destinations (Ko Yao Noi in Thailand), however it also has the word 'drunk' in the title - so chances are that's why it comes up in searches. 😊

The stats addict in me is slightly regretful that until a year or so ago we used to set our blog to 'private' while not travelling... Reply to this

10 years ago, September 3rd 2013 No: 6 Msg: #174727  
Most overrated blog - Easily Sex in the Gulf. Nearing 90,000 hits, it is the 8th most read blog on the entire site. As the saying goes, "Sex Sells" and it certainly did with this blog.

Most underrated blog - Slightly harder to answer as my blogs tend to accumulate slowly and over time, so I cannot count my most recent entries. They Have Ghosts was a blog I wrote in 2006 but still doesn't have 300 hits. It describes a visit to an exorcism temple in India.

Reply to this

10 years ago, September 7th 2013 No: 7 Msg: #174830  
B Posts: 25
An interesting forum topic - I like it.

I think one of my underrated blog might be this one, mainly for some nice photos: http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/Palermo-Soho/blog-682611.html

It's a blog from Buenos Aires.

My most overrated is from Singapore. Perhaps because of the title "Singapore Sling:"
http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Singapore/blog-256675.html Reply to this

10 years ago, September 7th 2013 No: 8 Msg: #174832  
Shane, is there a list of the top-10 most read blogs on TravelBlog?
In response to: Msg #174727 Reply to this

10 years ago, September 7th 2013 No: 9 Msg: #174833  
B Posts: 2,064

In response to: Msg #174832
Visit http://www.travelblog.org/info_blogs.html and scroll to the bottom. The current leader, with over 15,000 hits and counting: Sign up for Skype!!!. I'd love to know their magic formula 😊 Reply to this

10 years ago, September 7th 2013 No: 10 Msg: #174836  
Had to be the title...people Googling "Skype" and getting this link. I can understand "Sex in the Gulf" also showing up on a lot of searches, but there didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason for most of them. Reply to this

10 years ago, September 11th 2013 No: 11 Msg: #174935  
Our most overrated blog entry might be one we wrote when we were in Paris a few years back. It's not bad but it isn't really worth the number of hits (more than 2.100) it has either.

In our most popular blog entry John Holmes is mentioned by the way. Probably another indicator that sex sells.

Most underrated: A blog entry from New York. Not an award winner or anything but surely worth more than the sub 100 hits it has received in the years its been on the blog. Probably there are so many blog entried published from New York that it just disappeared.


[Edited: 2013 Sep 11 19:40 - Ake Och Emma:27950 - typo]
Reply to this

8 years ago, October 6th 2015 No: 12 Msg: #193409  
That is an interesting question. Both blogs in question come from my time in Japan.

My most overrated blog is

<A HREF="https://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Japan/blog-325817.html">Being White in Japan</A>

Now it's not like it is terrible, just that it's not worth the amount of hits it gets.

Conversely, a blog from my time in Japan called

<A HREF="https://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Japan/Tokyo/blog-186169.html">The Watch of Fuji-san</A>

is much more interesting and gets far less hits. Go figure. Reply to this

8 years ago, October 6th 2015 No: 13 Msg: #193410  
In response to: Msg #193409

Well obviously coding is not my specialty

overrated: https://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Japan/blog-325817.html

underrated: https://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Japan/Tokyo/blog-186169.html Reply to this

8 years ago, October 6th 2015 No: 14 Msg: #193411  
B Posts: 1,309
In response to: Msg #193410

Hi Tommy
To attach a blog link, copy and paste the square brackets with blog=xxxx (under your profile info on the right hand side of the page).

Being White in Japan
The Watch of Fuji-san Reply to this

8 years ago, October 6th 2015 No: 15 Msg: #193418  
B Posts: 132
One of our blogs sort of grew legs, it was nearly 7 years ago now and was called little India and has had 4600 or so hits.

It was nothing special and only had 1 photo, we can only assume its popularity was beacuse it had the word India in it.

Our regards to our fellow travellers

Kangaroojack Reply to this

8 years ago, October 6th 2015 No: 16 Msg: #193422  
In response to: Msg #193418 40%!o(MISSING)f TB hits are from India so you are probably right. Reply to this

8 years ago, October 8th 2015 No: 17 Msg: #193459  
My favorite blog is perhaps from the least interesting place we've gone, and consequently one of the least read by others: In the Footsteps of the Pioneers
It marked a difficult transition in our lives and the drive through the western plains felt in many ways like defeat, but ultimately figuring out how to write about that particular destination helped me to frame my attitude about life at the time. It shared the front-page for over a week with tropical sunsets and southeast Asian temples, and I recall looking at the paltry number of views and thinking "I don't blame ya. Who wants to daydream about Nebraska?"

We've had several overrated blogs over the years - some go in spurts (Opportunities of Solitude - Into the Rain Forest was really popular during the Twilight craze) but our blog about San Francisco Bay Breeze, Bread and Bears has been consistently viewed since it was published. It's very much a "here is what we did" blog and the photos are really some of our worst - it's probably one of my least favorite now for that very reason.

I'd like to think my best blogs are yet to come. I've found I write much less frequently then I did years ago, but when I finally do get around to publishing a blog (on average, two years after the fact - despite having drafts started almost immediately ugh!) I find I have something more substantial to say, the result of letting my personal reflections infuse my writing rather than staying "guidebook neutral/positive" as some of our earlier trip reports tended to do. Reply to this

8 years ago, October 11th 2015 No: 18 Msg: #193519  
My most overrated blog is Teaching ESL Camp - Activities, Tips, and Experience, but I think folks find it to be a good stepping stone if they are new to teaching ESL overseas or just looking for new ideas.

I would say my underrated blog is Parallel Universes and Infinite Possibilities on the Island of Stub-Tailed Cats. It has the most uninteresting photos, but was one of the most memorable travel experiences of my life and favorite blog to this day. I suspect it's underrated because it was a very personal experience -- quite surreal -- and it completely changed how I proceeded in my travels. Reply to this

8 years ago, October 13th 2015 No: 19 Msg: #193576  
Hello,

My most overrated blog is this one from Ljubljana:

https://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Slovenia/Upper-Carniola/Ljubljana/blog-845435.html

I got over 100 hits which is more than double or even tripple of the average of this south-east-europe-journey of mine in 2014. Of course, I wont complain.

My most underrated is this one from last october in Paris:

https://www.travelblog.org/Europe/France/Ile-de-France/Paris/blog-859927.html

Of ourse Paris is a very popular and maybe common tourist attraction but 12 views in one year are really not very much taking into account that it has a nice pic of Notre Dame on it.

All in all I am very happy with travelblog.org and I have created nearly 200 posts with 1700 pics. It is a good way to show them to family, friends and other interested persons and to archive them that way in case my laptop/smartphone/usb-stick brakes up. I am just a little bit sad that I didn't make digital photos before 2008 although.

Thomas

Reply to this

8 years ago, October 14th 2015 No: 20 Msg: #193600  
Our most overrated blog was Shopping in Shanghai - guess people want to know about shopping! This had 2661 hits with the next closest only gaining 1442 hits - The Train Trip to Tibet - Qinghai-Tibet Railway. I think it's a result of people googling the topics and getting to the blog that way.
Our most underrated blog is also one of the longest (that might put people off) or perhaps it's the boring topic of eating in Denver... Eating our way through Denver The only ones that come close to the low number of hits (19) are recent ones and the blog that was only published today Airlie Beach to Cairns has 39 hits already. Perhaps people are interested in the grand adventure Rags is having helping to motor a boat from Airlee Beach to Perth (while I am in Perth :-().

Cheers,
Judy

Reply to this

Tot: 0.202s; Tpl: 0.009s; cc: 44; qc: 52; dbt: 0.0733s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.2mb