Decoding Lensrank Decay
Aug.25, 2009 in
Captains Picks, Squidoo Tips
mac33 has an excellent post on lensrank decay on one of his lenses and the impact of traffic on his lensrank.
It is an excellent example of how a few ticks of traffic to your lens don’t necessarily mean you will instantly climb to the top of the lensrank ladder. If your visitors arent engaging with your lens, your rank can quickly return on it’s previous path of decay.
This topic is worth further discussion and I’ll dig through some of my stats to see if I can provide some other examples that help make mac33’s point and expand it into some other potential factors of the lensrank algorithm.
Great Post mac!
August 25th, 2009 at 8:47 pm
Thanks for the mention, Captain, glad someone else thought it interesting too! I like your term ‘lensrank decay’…that describes it well.
August 28th, 2009 at 9:30 am
As a seasoned lensmaster of nearly 3.5 years, I can attest to the ‘lensrank decay.’ There are a number of factors involved that contribute to the sinking lensrank. I’ve read Mac33’s post and find it compelling. The algorithm has been a ‘mystery’ to the general public as we know algorithms are intended to be. It’s obvious that traffic matters as does clickouts, purchases, audience participation, ratings, and favoriting. Then, of course, you must take into consideration the big of a boost for giant squids, purple stars, lens of the day, and angel blessings — angel dings can also strategically impact that lensrank. Sometimes there are disparities noted in the top lenses throughout the topic categories — it’s a bit of an artificial lensrank that defies the dashboard stats. When a number of angels decide to bless a particular lens, it can raise it up from obscurity to an elevated lensrank. But, we all know, this is temporary — right?
August 28th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
“…how a few ticks of traffic to your lens don’t necessarily mean you will instantly climb to the top of the lensrank ladder…”
Amen! I have a lens that has hovered around 400-1000 hits a week, however, the lensrank is stuck at around 10,000. Go figure!
August 28th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
Yeah and I have one that was created last January and only had about 150 hits total. However, people like to comment on it. It’s ranking 7,059. Guess I ought to promote it a little. :0)
August 28th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
In other words, the effect that traffic has on lensrank expires over time, yes? I’ve known this to be the case for ratings, Angel blessings and such, and now we see it’s the same rule for traffic.
The fact that the lens in question receives very little visitors makes the effect much more obvious and easier to see. I also have a number of such lenses and every visitor makes the lensrank soar compared to what it was before for a while.
August 29th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
So if you want your traffic to affect ongoing lensrank,you have to keep promoting it so that the traffic keeps increasing? That has to be only part of the equation because traffic that is interacting, commenting, adding links, etc. as opposed to those who come and as quickly go, must be a factor as well.
September 15th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
Captain, Haven’t seen any posts from you in August and none so far in Sept? You busy on other ideas?
October 17th, 2009 at 4:07 am
[...] reading the Captain’s latest post, I was then directed to this post by [...]