Why Do You Show Your FeedBurner FeedCount?
Every couple of weeks (or so it seems) I come across a blog that mentions the drawbacks of showing your FeedBurner FeedCount before you have a large number of subscribers.
I most recently came across this topic at JohnTP.com and HarpzOn.com, and both of these websites agree with the popular consensus that showing your FeedBurner FeedCount when you’ve got few subscribers actually hurts you.
I don’t know about you, but I can only respond to this notion with:
Are You Kidding Me?
I fully agree with the idea that we live in a me too society, and that by showing you have a large number of subscribers a reader is more likely to subscribe to your feed based on this number alone (this is one of the reasons why I can’t believe I hadn’t heard of Copyblogger sooner).
I don’t, however, buy into the notion that showing your FeedCount when you’ve got a small number of readers will actually hinder your efforts in obtaining subscribers.
If someone doesn’t want to subscribe because I’ve only got 30 or so subscribers then this blog probably isn’t for them. I have subscribed to plenty of small blogs because of their content, not the size of their ego (I mean FeedCount).
This now leads me to the point of this post: Why do you show your FeedBurner FeedCount?
I show my FeedCount because I like giving everyone a rough idea as to how many subscribers I’ve got. When I say everyone I include myself, as I hate having to login to FeedBurner to see this stat.
Why do you show your FeedCount? Do you think that having a small FeedCount is hurting your efforts in obtaining subscribers?
Tags: feedburner, feedcount, hurts, blog, are you kidding me?
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8 Comments so far »
HMTKSteve said
on March 20 2007 @ 5:03 am
I show mine because it saves me a few clicks to find out my current numbers. Just call me lazy!
Ryan J. Parker said
on March 20 2007 @ 4:13 pm
Call me lazy, too.
Robert Irizarry said
on March 22 2007 @ 7:47 pm
I don’t show it because I think it should be irrelevant whether I have 5 or 500 readers. That said, I can appreciate the argument of leaving it off if you have low subcriber counts. For some, it gives the impression that counts are low because quality is low. Of course, this isn’t necessarily the case. It also leaves out all the other ways that readers can stay in contact with a blog.
Nate Whitehill said
on March 27 2007 @ 2:46 am
Great argument, Ryan. I also read many of the smaller blogs, not because of their ego (cough Feed count), but because of their unique and interesting content.
Jon Lee said
on April 4 2007 @ 4:06 pm
I find the Feedburner count to be unreliable at times.
During the early days of my blog, the count jumped from 4 to about 200. Then to 3,000. Then back to 500 now it has leveled off at around 50.
I hide it as to not confuse my readers!
(Although I did show it when it was in the 3000s, just to show off.)
Paul said
on April 6 2007 @ 12:26 pm
For me, I show… just to get more subscribers. Not to confuse them. Lol…
Gaz said
on April 10 2007 @ 2:54 am
@Jon Lee: Ha! And there was me thinking that I just had waves of people unsubscribing from time to time… mine is often in the 40’s, occasionally in the 60’s and every now and again it dips into the low teens. I guess the way feedburner counts subscribers is flakey for low numbers?
used tires said
on November 12 2009 @ 10:13 pm
I guess its one way blog owners can measure your success… but its only one way…
Till then,
Jean
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