26 comments

How’s the Blog Doing, Anyway?

Happy Friday everyone. You probably feel pretty tired from the ambitious week of challenges we have done to this point, and perhaps you are still recovering from the complete and permanent loss of visits to Starbucks I imposed on you yesterday.

So today, I thought we could take a break and I’ll let you in on some entertaining facts from behind the scenes.

When you write a blog like this, which I only started doing on April 6th of this year, you get a neat little statistics page that tells you how many people are visiting each day and how they got there.

It turns out this is pretty addictive and even casual bloggers like me end up getting caught up in the nightly report card of how many “reads” you got. Bloggers also read the news and the blogs of other people to get and share ideas, and they post comments wherever they like, and some of these comments lead to still more visitors.

In the last couple of weeks, I was very pleased to receive mention from some like-minded and much more established blogs like Early Retirement Extreme, Brown Girl in the Lane (cycling), Consciously Frugal, and Wake up to Frugality.  All of these links brought me an entertaining crew of new readers, so thanks guys! There were also some successful posts to Reddit.com which caused massive spikes in readership, some of which stuck around to read more.

The biggest thing that causes a blog like this to last or fade out is readership – so if readers actually are motivated to click “like” on facebook, or share it on reddit, digg, stumbleupon, twitter, or any other social things they are part of, that starts chain reactions. Once you have enough of these reactions, you get embedded into the very fabric of the Internet itself and Google starts forwarding you thousands readers who are searching for “early retirement” or “frugality” or other common terms. Then you can keep at it and keep having fun for years,  because just like Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel, you are motivated by how many people are there watching you dig.

A few more tidbits from the scoreboard:

  • 5,767 views all-time
  • 409 views today (this has grown very unevenly in a line from 0 on the first day to this level today. I think this is very encouraging!)
  • 1,157 views on your busiest day, May 10, 2011

The top search terms that led various web searchers to Mr. Money Mustache, and how many times they were used:

Search Views
mr money moustache 20
mr money mustache 14
mr. money moustache 9
mr mustache money 6
mrmoneymustache 4
mr money 3
hasselhoff 2
how many millionaires drive a toyota tacoma 2
money moustache 2
earth logo 2
mister money mustache 2
mrmoneymoustache 1
“too cheap” petrol or gas 1
mr money mustache blog 1
how much electricity do you waist per hour with 100 whattz 1
mr.moneymustache 1
money mustache 1
profitable leisure time 1
wealth, fuck you money 1
mr money mustach 1
how to make mustache in calculator 1
mr. money mustache 1
www.mrmoneymustache.com 1
what if i save 100 dollars a week 1
what does early retirement mean 1
mr mustache retirement 1

 

Even though only a tiny portion of the readership is coming from the search engines so far, some of these results are  Quite entertaining. But why does everyone keep calling me “moustache”? …And if people already know that Mr. Money Mustache exists, why do they keep searching at all instead of just typing in mrmoneymustache.com? Ahh, Mysteries of the Internet World.

 

  • herbert salisbury May 16, 2011, 12:22 pm

    even wikipedia spells it moustache:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moustache

    Reply
    • MMM May 16, 2011, 2:22 pm

      You Dare to question Mr. Money Mustache’s Very NAME!?

      From the first paragraph of your Wikipedia article, I see the valid spellings are:
      A moustache (US play /ˈmʌstæʃ/ or UK /məˈstɑːʃ/; American English: mustache

      As you probably noticed, Mr. Money Mustache is written in “American English”. He actually prefers the non-US spellings of many words like colour and labour, and thinks Kilometres are much cooler than “miles”. But when it comes to Mustache, the American spelling kicks ass. MUST STASH. Not a weird drippy cow with a MOO-STASH.

      Plus, when trying to help the citizens of the world’s greatest ultraconsumer, one must write in US English.

      However, I also like that super-cryptic version in the pronunciation guide: “mʌstæʃ”. That will be his name if the world is ever destroyed and we all become medieval-armor-wearing robots living in metal huts with laser towers under a permanently dark and thundering sky.

      Reply
      • Dylan August 10, 2016, 11:45 am

        Must. Stash. Holy shit it all makes sense now. I’ve been reading your blog for about a year or so now and I just now realized that.
        Thank you for pointing that out.

        Reply
        • The Elf August 24, 2016, 3:05 pm

          Ha! You’re not alone. I’ve been lurking around here for just over a year and I didn’t put that together either.

          Reply
        • Leda May 4, 2017, 7:10 pm

          This post is amazing.

          Reply
      • Adam Arold May 9, 2018, 5:16 am

        Wow. It took me 3 days and reading this comment until I realized what’s up with this mustache thing…MUST STASH. Wow. I really like puns but I completely missed this one.

        Reply
  • The Dutch Clean Shave May 21, 2011, 12:26 am

    Dear MMM,

    First things first: loving the blog, keep it up. Saw a link via twitter in between work stuff and was immediately hooked.

    Assuming you have the Google Analytics package, if you drill down in your traffic source statistics, you should be able to see the % of new visitors per keywords used on website entry via search engine.

    And yes, in my experience of helping run an online career portal and a consulting agency’s website, it is quite usual for people to just keep filling in keywords in a search engine, especially since Google allows you to get lazy and just type in a word in the browser (say, “Facebook” instead of http://www.Facebook.com), and that counts as a search query if your browser is preset to redirect to a search engine. This is obviously a nifty way to eliminate the problem of people not finding a website, but it does result in return visitors becoming lazy and just typing in “mr money moustache” in the address bar, knowing they’ll find you in the Search Engine Results Page (SERP) anyway.

    As a side note, I might have a question for you later on in the upcoming weeks with regard to eliminating college debt, moving abroad, deciding on whether to do a Master’s degree (abroad) and other post-college stuff (versus the Stash).

    TDCS

    Reply
    • MMM May 21, 2011, 9:00 pm

      Hey there, The Dutch Clean Shave!

      Very nice to hear from you and welcome to the blog!. Thanks for the tips on search engines it is very interesting to hear from someone with experience on them. I also heard from a friend that you shared the word on Twitter – thanks for that too.

      Your upcoming question sounds interesting. I have a couple of Dutch friends here in Colorado that moved from Europe about 4 years ago. It seems efficiency and frugality is much more part of the culture in Holland than it is here. Perhaps many potential MMM readers over there, although I should really be trying to convert the ultraconsumers, rather than preaching to the already frugal :-)

      cheers,
      MMM

      Reply
      • Leda May 6, 2017, 7:09 am

        Greetings from Vancouver Canada.
        Curious did you start with this format for the blog or did it evolve over time?
        I have started a little blog, I am not a techie wizard so slowly learning the format over time. Any suggestions for baby bloggers? I am loving the blog reading slowly from the start. My friend suggested it once she hear that I was learning about personal finance.

        Reply
    • Mark June 24, 2012, 5:27 am

      There is another reason for searching instead of typing the full URL: security. While regular readers probably already have bookmarks or RSS subscriptions, someone who knows he is looking for Mr Money Mustache but hasn’t bookmarked it, might mis-type the URL (perhaps spelling it “Moustache”). URL typos are one of the most common ways to find oneself at a malware-propagation site. By using Google, you: (a) don’t have to remember and type the full URL perfectly, betting your hard drive that you will; and (b) get a chance to see the results and validate that you’re going where you want to go, before you bet your hard drive on it.

      Reply
  • Sam June 24, 2011, 10:50 am

    Keep it up and don’t burn out. Pace yourself and in 1-2 years, you’ll notice that virtuous cycle of search engine traffic.

    Reply
  • Dom January 7, 2013, 10:07 am

    MMM, if you are wondering why some people still search “Mr. Money Mustache” in a search engine rather than just type it in the address bar, it could be because they could potentially get rewards for using a certain search engine like Swagbucks. I still type it into the search often even though I have your blog as a favorite on my toolbar!

    Reply
  • That Guy April 13, 2013, 12:00 am

    the American spelling kicks ass. MUST STASH. Not a weird drippy cow with a MOO-STASH……………….

    wow. Not that I have been staring at your blog that long but….. HOLY CRAP. It is funny how you can look at something for a long time and then somebody points something out to you and *DING.DING.DING* it all makes cents…

    It makes much more cents than the picture…. :)

    Digging this blog so far…. After I found it I am going in chronological order so I am avoiding asking my most likely basic (drunken) questions so far hoping I find the answers in future posts.

    THANKS! So far I dig it. Only wish I had been guided this way a number of years ago…..

    Reply
  • Tom October 4, 2013, 5:35 pm

    Any updates for 2013 readership?

    Reply
  • Steve Adcock December 12, 2014, 4:10 pm

    You outta give us another update now that you’re established and traveling the world based off of this blog. How many hits now? :)

    Reply
    • GregW October 23, 2015, 4:25 am

      Steve, MMM now has a Google Analytics stats button at the bottom of the page. Look just under the “Featured In…” Graphic in the page footer. Traffic is several orders of magnitude larger than it was in this post.

      Reply
  • Bill September 29, 2015, 6:23 am

    2015 readers represent.

    Reply
  • German March 2, 2016, 2:11 pm

    2016 reader from Argentina.
    I got here by a The New Yorker article* that my wife forwarded to me and I’m trying to read my way up from the first post.
    So far pretty amusing and interesting, although some points do not apply for a country like Argentina where you can’t just invest your savings at a 7% compound for 10 years.
    Right now inflation rates are near 30% annually and savings account interest rates around 25%.

    But despite this tiny detail there are very good ideas we can use here in the south!

    *Link to article: http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/02/29/mr-money-mustache-the-frugal-guru

    Reply
    • Maxx November 26, 2016, 6:47 am

      Hi I’m from Argentina. First of all thank you for this great blog/site!

      In here gov’t bonds have IRR of 8.3% in dollars. For long term plans are very attractive.

      With hard work, good saving rates and finance planning is really possible to be finance independant.

      In general salaries tend to be lower than in the US for skilled people but expenses are lower and rates are higher.

      Again, MMM thank you!!

      Reply
  • banyanbat January 19, 2017, 9:14 am

    I had earlier read this post but did not notice something that I did in my second read. Thanks for the subtle direction on how I can promote my blog through different channels. :) I think this will definitely help me spread the word.

    Thanks a lot, Mr Money Must Stash :)!!

    Reply
    • Pepe Peseta Patilla February 7, 2017, 2:03 pm

      Like in the last comment, I read this post more than one year ago and have read it again, gaining some ideas about how to promote my mustache´s spanish blog and also… I didn´t notice the relation with Must Stash!!

      Thanks for this blog!

      Reply
  • Ryan February 20, 2017, 8:52 am

    Been reading backwards for a few months. You’ve turned my ex-bike racer self into a bike commute twice a week kinda guy.
    Also, love that you use the Mike Mulligan and his Steamshovel reference, one of my favorites growing up and still to this day.

    Reply
  • Jim July 9, 2017, 3:34 pm

    Just figured out the Must Stash thing a few days ago. All by myself…. so proud!! 🤗🤗🤗. Ps. So love ❤️ that you mentioned Mike Mulligan and MaryAnne! Been a favorite for decades.

    Reply
  • Nitin October 23, 2017, 9:31 am

    Just like those Youtube comments – Who’s reading this in 2017? :)

    Here’s another take on your beloved name – Although it ‘MUST ACHE’ for a while when you start out on your journey to FI, you ‘MUST STASH’ your way to your freedom.

    A long, long time reader and loyal fan of Mr. Money Mustache. You’ve changed my life, Pete. At 32, I think I’m well on my way to FI before I’m 40 or earlier. Been reading your blog and other FI bloggers like Brandon and Jim Collins in no particular order for a couple years and now am currently on a project to properly read each of these blogs end-to-end.

    Reply
  • Nora April 16, 2019, 7:26 pm

    Love the Mike Mulligan reference! I have always been a big fan of “The Little House,” also by Virginia Lee Burton. Worth a read.

    Reply
  • Vanshaj Bindlish August 4, 2021, 7:59 am

    Hey MMM!

    I’ve read your every single post till here and will be going to read all of them. I’m so that I found this blog and how I land on this blog is also a coincidence and I really want to share this. I’m also a finance enthusiast and genuinely against wasteful expenditure. Though, I was addicted to some kind of wasteful expenditure, lockdown has changed me completely. Actually, I started writing my blog this July and this is the reason I come across this blog and while searching how to grow a blog only and I’m posting regularly but there is not that much growth that I’ve expected.

    Its only been 21 days and I’ve a total of 2800+ views and 980+ visitors and I was kind of disappointed a bit because this is the era of internet and such a response is kind of under my expectations. But coming to this blog gave me inspiration to go a mile ahead and do until you don’t achieve what you want to. I’ll be thankful for the insights you’ve shared.

    Honestly telling, when I click on this post, I was expecting numbers in 100K+ or even in millions and I was about to skip it. Because I thought I knew what’s the numbers going to be. But you really surprised me and you always do. A lot of people think the way you do, including me, but aren’t able to accept it on the ground level. Because things are actually quite easy in theory, but when it comes to practicality you are the inspiration. Keep the good work up (I forgot, you have already done that).

    You have added one loyal fan to your list!

    Link to my blog- https://coffeeandfinance.in

    Reply

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