Transparency in soup stats

Wow.

Thanks, DailyCandy.

Last week I got an email from a factchecker. “DailyCandy is writing about Soup and Bread Cookbook in our Chicago Health and Wellness edition,” she wrote.  “It is scheduled to run on January 4th. Can you kindly confirm the information below ASAP today, including spellings? Thank you so much!”

And I wrote her back and confirmed the spelling of my name and a few other things. I also added the proper spellings of Sheila and Paul’s names, and noted that Soup and Bread, the event, starts back up for the season on January 6. (That’s tomorrow, people.)

More (unsolicited) press, I thought. Neat.

And it was neat — although when I saw the item yesterday I confess to being (again) flummoxed by DailyCandy’s editorial model. Coming at the end of a list of spa services and hot yoga classes, the blurb is staggeringly …. brief. And, “lovely local?” That’s nice, but it wasn’t on the list of fact-checking questions!

Anyway. My point is not to complain about the site’s editorial voice, which skews to the cutesy and consumerish. That’s their schtick and it seems to be working for them. But I did want to point out that this one little sentence resulted in the biggest spike in S&B blog hits EVER.

I’m new to all this stats-tracking/search-engine-optimization/blogging voodoo. I don’t really understand it and most of the time I don’t particularly mind. Soup & Bread works pretty well finding its audience through analog, old-fashioned word-of-mouth. Recent promotional efforts notwithstanding, “growing the brand” isn’t a huge priority.

But it was fascinating, and a little thrilling, to be able to see such a clear, graphic represtentation of cause and effect.

Even more interesting: Those 830 hits translated to ten PayPal sales. Which is either a lot or a little depending on how much you know about “click-through-revenue” or whatever it’s called, but it’s definitely more than the mention we got in the Kitchn’s gift guide generated, which was zero sales for 470 hits, and with which statistical comparison someone in a marketing department would, I’m sure, be able to make monetizable hay.

What do I do with this data? I’m not sure. But I do know that those ten PayPal sales mean I’m $220 closer to paying off the last of our bills. $220 closer to paying Sheila a paltry stipend for her time and talent. $220 closer to getting some money into the hands of the Food Depository. $220 closer to turning that money into decent food for someone who really needs it.

Who knew one little blurb had such power? DailyCandy, I have underestimated you.