2012 CFLdb Zeitgeist

Published on January 20, 2013 4:00 PM by dbo.

At the start of a new year, indulge me as I reflect on 2012 at the CFLdb family of sites.

Overall

Traffic continues to grow across all our sites, continuing a trend of tripling on a monthly basis year-over-year. Adding additional content/pages, mainly with CFLdb Statistics has certainly been the primary driver of this growth.

In April, game data was added for games from 1950 to 1979 and corrections to the existing data from 1980 forward were made. Soon after this, Steve Daniel and the CFL were kind enough to provide their game records back to 1907. This complete data was published in September. The new data corrected the errors in our researched publications while we also contributed some additional data around pre-season (exhibition) games and some Second World War Service Club games. More work is needed in this area.

The new data also required some rework of our data to fit the evolution of the leagues and teams prior to 1950. When game times were known, weather data was added courtesy of Environment Canada records. Work will continue in this area as well.

The razzledazzle sister site was added in 2012 and late in the year a volunteer stepped forward to do some graphic work for the family of sites and our infographics. Expect improvements in this area in 2013.

Besides minor content updates and continued posting of articles and links on the main CFLdb site, it received little attention this year. The rulebook was not updated to the 2012 version due to a lack of source material. I am working on rectifying that before the 2013 rulebook changes come out. There could be more improvements to the main site and additional sister sites in 2013 time permitting (see below).

Traffic Metrics

Site Share

  1. CFLdb (62%)
  2. CFLdb Statistics (36%)
  3. CFLdb Razzle Dazzle (2%)

Geography

  1. Canada (71%)
    1. Ontario (31%)
    2. Alberta (20%)
    3. British Columbia (14%)
    4. Manitoba (12%)
    5. Saskatchewan (10%)
    6. Quebec (5%)
    7. Maritimes (4%)
    8. Unknown (4%)
    9. Territories (<1%)
  2. United States (18%)
  3. Remainder of World/Unknown (11%)

Browsers

  1. IE (50%)
  2. Firefox (16%)
  3. Safari (15%)
  4. Chrome (11%)
  5. MobileSafari (7%)

Platform

  1. Windows (74%)
  2. Macintosh (20%)
  3. Linux (4%)

CFLdb Searches

The most popular destinations for visitors arriving at CFLdb:

  1. Compensation FAQ
  2. Schedules
  3. 2012 Grey Cup Quarter Scores post
  4. FAQ (all other FAQs combined)
  5. Glossary
  6. Stadium Status
  7. How to Make a Grey Cup Pool Board post
  8. CBA
  9. Books
  10. Rulebook

CFLdb Statistics Searches

The most popular search terms for visitors arriving at CFLdb Statistics:

  1. CFL Attendance 2012
  2. BC Lions Attendance 2012
  3. CFL stats (database)
  4. CFL TV Ratings 2012
  5. Toronto Argonauts Attendance 2012
  6. CFL Commissioners

CFLdb Razzle Dazzle Searches

The most popular search terms for visitors arriving at CFLdb Razzle Dazzle:

  1. Grey Cup Pool Board
  2. Grey Cup Facts
  3. CFL Schedule
  4. CFL Season Ticket Prices
  5. CFL Playoff Bracket

Spirit of the Times

So what does it all mean? What follows is my interpretations of the visitor patterns at the CFLdb family of sites and not fact.

  • We receive a large amount of traffic from the US and the percentage of US/Canada traffic during the off-season is closer by about 10% until the season starts. The increase is mostly due to graduating college students checking out their options (starting immediately after college season end through the bowl games and peaking again after the NFL draft). After compensation, the rules and differences between leagues are popular topics.
  • Compensation is still the most popular topic. Hopefully we are slowly correcting the many misconceptions about CFL compensation that exist amongst Canadians while providing a factual resource for interested American players.
  • The content presented on the sites (from the FAQ, to Books, through Stadium Status) remains popular and used so it will be continued to be added to and improved.
  • The sites continue to fill a need considering the wide range of search terms that direct visitors here.

The Future

While 2012 saw much growth and content additions, I am disappointed in the year overall as the site did not receive much focus from myself and the year ended without a lot of the goals set at the beginning of 2012 unachieved. The motivation has waned over the site and unless I find more time or it becomes a full time job, I don’t know if the site will improve as fast as I wish in 2013 either.

I have a priority list of items to work on in 2013. I want to narrow the focus to deal with the necessary and high impact items.

User Interface

  1. Incorporate the new logos designed by our volunteer graphic artist
  2. Redo the site layout/design, responsive layout for improved mobile access
  3. Improved interactive elements

Content

  1. Reworked FAQ, add rulebook years
  2. Player rosters
  3. Add aggregated stats
  4. More sister sites (ideas to remain a secret until they are more than ideas)

I will post more on changes, ideas and progress as they occur. Drop me a line if you have an idea of what you would like to see or want to help.

Conversation

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2012 CFLdb Zeitgeist was published on January 20, 2013 4:00 PM by dbo.

892 words.

This article is categorized under cfldb.ca and tagged with zeitgeist.

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