After reviewing October web logs for all of mine WordPress powered websites, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that approximately 5% of the traffic was due to Technorati. I was disappointed to see though that most of my traffic ended up landing on an error (404) page. After taking a closer look I realized that it was to my own fault and I would like to share it with you if, so if you are operating a WordPress site or any other blog that pings Technorati on a regular basis, you will not end up showing your visitors 404 error pages.
As you know whenever your website pings Technorati, short after thier boot comes visiting your website and providing the fresh content from your site to everyone at Technorati. This of course can result in some extra traffic to your website.
Why did my visitors ended up looking at 404 pages?
Well it was completely my own fault. Few times, or should I say many times, after a writing and publishing a new an article, I would become dissatisfied with either content or titles of my articles and by the end of the day may have change them. Since I am using Smart Update Pinger Plugin, my website does note ping any services unless new content is published. You can set that option in order to avoid of being seen as a spammer. Of course if you are a die heat blogger it probably will not matter. But for me it does, I do not publish very often.
Whenever I would change for example a title of one of my article, I would right away adjust the url to include keywords. But since after editing articles my sites send no pings, Technorati and maybe other service as well, do not update the change until days later. So whenever a Technorati user finds my site, it inevitable leads him or her to a 404 page.
What have I learned from this?
First of all, I underestimated the amount of traffic Technorati can provide to my sites. I was truly surprised by the numbers I saw. Most of all this traffic cost you nothing, its almost like a gift!
Secondly, I have learn good lesson about editing my posts. I know from my own experience that if I lend on “404” page, the site has less than half a second to grab my attention. I would be much better for my visitors to see an updated page. So he lesson learn here is to take more time when writing the articles. This will assure less “404” pages for may visitors and hopefully more than half a second to grab their attention.
Conclusion.
After this episode I know that Technorati got my attention for real this time, and I would highly recommend to any blogger to make sure your website pings Technorati along with other “blog search engines”. Also, whenever writing an article, if your are not satisfied 100% with what you have written, take more time before publishing it, otherwise you may end up just like me, showing your visitors error pages.