A blog does not need “analytics” • Hacker News Board

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#111

Post by estimator7292 » Sun, Aug 31, 2025, 2:40 PM UTC

stevage wrote: post #3

The author lacks imagination or is not arguing entirely in good faith: > I realised that knowing about my website visitors had zero effect on anything in the real world. Perhaps that's true for them? But you don't have to try too hard to think of legitimate reasons why basic analytics are useful to any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience,…

So then you want to put analytics on your blog if you're actually putting analytics on a business and not a blog

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#112

Post by KingOfCoders » Mon, Sep 01, 2025, 3:55 AM UTC

righthand wrote: post #54

KingOfCoders wrote: post #36

1. Yes 2. I use SimpleAnalytics 3. I think Search Console is useful 4. But then, really? PS: Over the last year, my impression in search more than doubled, my clicks fell 75% #AgeOfAI

How do you find Search Console useful and how is that relative to collecting analytics? Just curious, I've only used Search Console in the manner of validating how pages are returned when searching and validating page metadata is correct. I realize that Google may require you to drain data into Search Console to use it or something, but I'm not sure how the data may be useful for the Search Console functionality.

Search console works without my data, I don't use GA. I Search Console to see what terms people are searching.

Re: A blog does not need “analytics”

#113

Post by rpgbr » Mon, Sep 01, 2025, 12:41 PM UTC

scoofy wrote: post #95

stevage wrote: post #3

The author lacks imagination or is not arguing entirely in good faith: > I realised that knowing about my website visitors had zero effect on anything in the real world. Perhaps that's true for them? But you don't have to try too hard to think of legitimate reasons why basic analytics are useful to any blog author who is trying to increase their reach, like knowing what topics are of most interest to their audience,…

The essay seems unhinged. Data is useful. What the hell is wrong with that?!?

A personal blog doesn't need to be “useful”. I guess that's the point.