Officially, it was to make way for a new, improved website -- but that was three months ago.
Now here's the interesting thing. According to Alexa.com, which measures web traffic, WJMA's ranking has actually risen 563,445 positions (as of today). The volume of traffic has increased 42%. Of course, page views have dropped -- but then there's only one page to view.
(click on the image to enlarge)
So why is traffic up? Well, a number of sites link to WJMA, including this one. In fact, I've been including a link to WJMA in every post for the past three months.
And all of that increased traffic found.... nothing. There's not even an email address on the placeholder! It's like a steady stream of potential customers make their way to your store, only to find the doors chained and locked. Is that any way to run a business?
As Ken Dardis of Audiographics (and others) continually point out, it's past time for radio stations to move from just being over-the-air broadcasters and become media content providers.
For a business not to have a website these days is like a brick-and-mortar store that only takes cash. It severely limits the business' ability to function.
If nothing else, the past three months have shown the importance of interconnectivity. I don't know how many people went to WJMA because of this blog, how many from the WJMA radio history site, or how many from the various other sites. But every link helped drive traffic to WJMA's site.
Now imagine if Piedmont Communications had launched their updated website three months ago and been able to take advantage of all that traffic.
Then, I think, we'd have a different post.
- Ralph
Day 94 of the WJMA Web Watch. Yes, I'll keep linking. Why not? We'll check the stats again in another three months.
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