I don't know about you, but seeing **FOLLOWS BACK** just makes me wince.
If you're a faithful oldie around
Maxabella loves... (and by that I mean you've been visiting me long enough to have become bored with my sidebar long ago) you probably didn't notice that a little while ago I took the 'Google Friend' count off the side of my blog. I didn't remove the actual button because I love being able to 'follow' a blog myself, but I didn't want to have to worry about the numbers anymore.
I'm so tired of the numbers.
When I first started blogging,
Flog Yo Blog Friday (at the time hosted by
Mummytime and then by
RRSAH and now by her
Glowness) was a godsend. It's a lovely linky that really helps a newbie (and an oldie) to get to know other blogs they might like. There is none of that *FOLLOWS BACK* nonsense, although I did just notice that there is a pretty long list of participation rules going on lately, most of which involve needing to follow one person or another. But, regardless, it's just a really nice linky.
A lot of American blogs (and apologies if I'm generalising here but they do seem to mostly be American) seem to
only do giveaways and 'linky party' posts. Both the giveaways and 'linky parties' have lots and lots of rules about following the blog and then following this person and then skipping two extra people and following the third and then the sixth and then... Sheesh, what are those 'linky parties' all about anyway? It's like there are blogs out there that exist just to link up to other blogs.
I kinda got into trouble with a blogger recently because I didn't bow down when she added my Grateful linky to her 'list of linky parties' page on her blog. I was kind of annoyed, actually, because there were all these **FOLLOWS BACK** bloggers coming over from her page and I had to keep removing them. They didn't bother to write an actual 'grateful' post, they just linked up their latest psalm post and I was supposed to be happy about that. So not happy.
It's hard to get your blog out there, I know that.* But do they really just want people to 'follow' them for the sake of saying they have more followers? What's the bloody point? Is it because of all the sponsorship business? Can't PR / Advertising companies see straight through all that marlarky anyway? I'd much rather have a magazine blog than a billboard blog. And by that I mean 'readers' rather than 'traffic'.
I dunno. I just know I'm so tired of the freaking numbers.
Do you worry about your 'stats'?
Is it because of a PR angle or is it something else?
How many blogs do you follow? Do you 'follow back'?
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* But if after all of that if you're still interested in the numbers, here's a little tip for bumping your name up the list that I only just realised. I used to have an ♥ symbol next to my blog name Maxabella loves... which was fiddly so I removed it about a month ago. Then I realised that I couldn't tell the difference between my newly installed Instagram page (also Maxabella loves) and my blog page in my browser, so I put a non-fiddly asterix before my blog name. Guess whose blog is number one in most people's lists of blogs they follow... that's right, it's * me!
