Audience of one

We are now over halfway through 2013, and that means I have written precisely 19 blogs for this site, not including number 20, which you are currently reading but I have yet to finish at the time of writing because I’m still writing it. Interestingly, even though a reasonable number of people read each new entry, I’ve yet to receive a single comment on this page, although in truth, I consider that to be a blessing. The last thing I really want is Disgusted of Bogside ranting about the multiple use of commas (which I pre-emptively apologised for in my very first blog back in January), or some spammer posting a link to www.randyvicargerbils.com, which I’m then unable to remove from the page, thus condemning my pristine blog to display a spunk stain of spam for evermore. If you want to slag me off, Twitter will do fine @G75Media #shamelessselfpublicist #igotretweetedbythewifeofbonjoviskeyboardplayerlastnight

Honourably excepting a couple of out-and-proud followers (hi, Stuart), I wonder who the people reading this blog might be. Ex-girlfriends? Clients? Talent-spotters (doubtful)? It’s strange to think that these words might be read in six months’ time by someone I’ve never met, in a place I’ve never been, who may form a very elliptical impression of me based on my previous posts about neds and tower blocks. When I started this blog, I saw it as a natty way to unleash pent-up creative frustration, and I didn’t really care who read it. However, because my creativity is now being expended upon my increasingly busy day-job as an award-winning freelance copywriter (at your service, sir, madam), the need to vent my spleen has subsided, and anyway, this blog has hardly gone viral, has it? Fenton in Richmond Park it is not.

In fact, there’s another way of considering the readership statistics for each new blog I post. Maybe the world is so bleak and dull, and some people are so lonely and desperate, they will actually resort to reading my linguistic excreta because it’s better than the alternative. What that alternative might be, I shudder to think, but it must involve either Jeremy Kyle or the Daily Record – two of the most odious creations on this side of the Atlantic.

Even more startling was the statistic that on Christmas Day 2008, four people logged onto the G75 Media copywriting website, and only one of those people was me. What were the other three people doing that day? Were their presents so bad that they were forced to distract themselves by visiting the nascent website of a freshly-hatched copywriter in East Kilbride? Almost as tragically, I actually know that four people visited the site, because my website analytics software identifies (among other things) where people come from, what web browser they’re using and even what screen resolution their monitors are configured to.

When it comes to The Write Intentions, I’m considerably less informed about the who/what/where/when, but I do know that the most popular blog I’ve posted to date was a diatribe I penned in March about Jehovah’s witnesses and timewasting. It’s ironic that more people read my opinions on timewasting than any other blog. Or maybe it was the religious angle that got bums on pews and eyes on the prize? Perhaps I should adopt a more reverential tone in all my future blogs?

Okay. Here goes. [Clears throat] Jehovah, Jehovah, Jehovah. All I said was that blog was good enough for Jehovah.

Now to test the theory. If 750 people read this entry, I’ve cracked it, and a blog column in GQ or Loaded surely awaits. Alternatively, if the disappointing audience figures persist, at least I’ve managed to give those mysterious, anonymous readers another little clue about my personality – I love watching Monty Python films. And in that respect, at least, I know I’m not in an audience of one.