Side by side stat lists? What’s the value? Hopefully, it will highlight sites both large and small and get people to just think a simple question, why does nonprofit so and so have more visitors than I do. Think of it as open-source research. They then have to make a decision, either stay niche or go big. Most people will stay niche but some people will want to understand what it takes to go big.

As for comparing my blog to yours in terms of site visitors, I don’t think people are that childish. This is where the real open source people divide from people who merely use it as a tool to pry open Microsoft’s grip from the masses. Real open source people understand open source as a philosophy of openness that extends far beyond software. It stretches into your thinking about how you run your business and how you feel about sharing your findings. That’s the deep philosophical concept that is rooted with the FOSS movement. It’s one that I support with very few reservations. In other words, to use street lingo, there “ain’t no shame in my game”. I’m not worried about the fact that you have 3 times more visitors than I do. There are both historical and operational reasons for that. It breaks down the other way as well. Should you worry that several hundred of my readers are complete addicts to this site, visiting it more than 30 times a month (who ARE you people anyway?) Am I supposed to freak out and worry that people will start visiting your blog exclusively? Or wait, should we worry if Techcrunch is a bigger blog than the both of us?

Hey readers, stop reading this blog — Beth has three times more readers than I do. Go there. There, I’ve said it. Will people do that? I’m pretty sure they won’t — our audiences overlap but they don’t commingle. However, I know that by looking at your stats and your operational methods, I’d have to definitely change the way I operate if I want to get to 10,000 readers a month. I’m not sure if I want to given my current time constraints but perhaps some more enterprising blogger can.

In a world of involuntary metrics, it’s better to simply embrace the nature of that information and do what nonprofits have always done best: give it away and share it. This whole notion that metrics are akin to performance reviews is so laughably ignorant of current trends (as if you could hide from the fact that people couldn’t do a site metrics comparison on you) that it shows there’s a deep-rooted misunderstanding of how technology works, what it can do and how you’re supposed to use it. Here’s a chance for people to understand the commitment of making blogs, running a technical nonprofit and even doing for-profit (in the case of Chipin and PicNET) work but instead people seem to prefer a closed-source approach that restricts learning chances for everyone who is still new to the game. I don’t think that’s how nonprofits should operate but apparently people still rely on the older business model of hiding their stats in a special private shoebox. Shrug. They’re wrong but I think they’ll turn around eventually.

http://www.quantcast.com/coalitionforthehomeless.org

Here’s a website by my old employer. Did the walls come tumbling down for the Coalition for the Homeless? Was there ever a downside to publishing stats? No, there was not. No animals (or people) were harmed in the logging of these statistics on the web.

I think most nonprofit people are just uneasy with metrics for their efforts. It’s understandable but what I’m showing people here is that even a modest amount of transparency is useful and in this case, takes a minimal amount of work. Instead, I hear a lot of what I call, frankly, whining. Yes, it’s detractors whining about how these stats don’t match their mission but then refusing to divulge any further data. It seems to me that most people who whine about site statistics are also unwilling to share any other statistics that might highlight their organization’s mission. So let’s take some small steps everyone… first thing, post your site stats. Next, start posting some of your outcomes data. I’ve show you mine, you can show me yours

I can only speak about my organization, but our online presence is insignificant compared with our offline presence, but that does not mean we don’t deserve a blog entry.

I also don’t think it’s a big deal if a non-profit claims to serve poor People of Color but its’ web traffic does not show this (what about its’ foot traffic?). The vast majority of our target population probably (I say probably because we don’t even check our stats on a regular basis – blasphemy, I know – and because most of the inquiries we get are due to flyers we put up, postcards mailed out, etc.) does not use our website, but again does this mean we are not the real deal?

If anything it shows we could use a little help in this area because we are the real deal, but have not been able to use the full potential of a web presence.

– Justice Brandeis

We use this quote above to complain about the private sector and our government. However, I think we should also apply it to our sector. I want the real uniques so that we can stop complaining in our sector. I’m tired of people saying “those aren’t the real numbers but there are these secret numbers I’m not telling you about”. We need metrics. People working in our sector need to report those metrics. That is transparency. How do we know if an organization is the real deal? What can we say about an organization that doesn’t seem to have adequate racial, gender, or economic diversity in its online audience?

Why is it that I know more about Blackbaud’s business model but not about most nonprofits? Why should I hold a nonprofit to a lesser standard than we do for publicly held companies? Doesn’t this seem odd?

Transparency isn’t only in the service of nonprofits who are using it as a way to further market themselves. It’s not just about answering questions regarding good governance but also an opening up of the conversation to different topics that may not necessarily be under the control of the original organization. I would like to see all the major players put their numbers up. This will allow people like me to see whether or not these organizations are worth writing about, worth paying attention to and even better, whether or not they are paying attention to racial, economic and gender diversity on their site. Wouldn’t it be odd if a nonprofit directed towards serving poor people of color didn’t actually have poor people of color going to their site?

This is not just an exercise in getting metrics but frankly, if nonprofits are not even willing to part with even these numbers, I’m willing to suspect that nonprofits have something to hide even if they’re not. And sure, Ben, I’d love to have people send me their unique visitor numbers, but really, I’d end up posting them on the blog anyway. So why bother doing that, when anyone can simply put the Quantcast Javascript up on their site? This really is the flip side of Web 2.0.

BTW, I’m working with Quantcast (for free) to put up a Nonprofit Top 50 list that can be used by donors and nonprofit workers alike to see which sites they should go to. I still have slots open for the Top 50 but preference will be given to those who are using Quantcast javascript.

According to Google Analytics, our monthly uniques over the past 30 days were 41,067.

I also suspect that Kiva’s numbers are much higher than shown.

I’m not sure there’s good reason for us to publish all our stats online, but I’d consider sending you a screenshot of our analytics page if you promise me one of the martinis that Holly was asking for

Ben

p.s. if this is just a way to get organizations to send you their real uniques, it’s Machiavellian brilliance

I want to echo the sentiment that the numbers in your table are just plain wrong. Our uniques are closer to 10k per month.

But what I really want to know is why its so important that nonprofits publish their site visitors? What does that tell the public about how good they are at achieving their mission? Or how capable they are to administer the organization? Isn’t that what transparency is for?

H