“Our Audience Is Engaged With The Blog”

by Belle Waring on January 27, 2006

I have to agree with Scott Lemieux about the validity of self-reported incomes in responses to an online questionnaire. Is the “mean average” [sic] income of LGF readers actually over $105,000? Do Roger Simon readers really pull down a (mean, natch) average of $116,000? Why do I have a sneaking suspicion that user death2dhimmicrats5 claimed to be making…one BILLION dollars a year. Click through to the linked Dennis the Peasant post for more hilarity. A bewildered commenter there wonders:

In a prior career, my title was “Media Buyer”. If this is accurate it’s highly pathetic. With all their money, couldn’t PJM come up with $15k to put together a bitchin’ printed media kit? Media buyers like to have something tangible in their hands. And don’t they have a WebEX account? What the heck is going on?

I feel horrible for laughing at this because I have been a fan of LGF and Glenn and Roger for 3+ years. These guys are savvy at so many things, but this is a fiasco. How can this happen?

How, indeed? And if the Pajamas Media readers love The Blog so much, why don’t they marry it? Oh, wait, looks like they’re working on it.

{ 15 comments }

1

Seth Finkelstein 01.27.06 at 6:48 am

Remember, Bill Gates + crowd of poverty-level yobs == high mean average income.

They probably claim a wingnut billionaire as a reader, on the basis that he looked at the blog one day (not Bill, but someone close to their funders).

2

Carlos 01.27.06 at 7:43 am

I dunno, six figures sounds about right for people living in their stepmother’s basement selling used library books on eBay.

It’s all about cutting unnecessary costs, you see.

3

DennisThePeasant 01.27.06 at 8:51 am

Actually, if Raj and Poodle Chaz are using the statistics culled from the surveys we did about a year ago, folks were offered various income ranges to choose from… which, in fact, would render it impossible to assign a meaningful ‘average’ income at all. Irrespective of that, a mean income of either $105,000 or $116,000 is hardly the stuff you’d expect to see in The Hamptons, especially if the household has two wage earners. We’re talking suburban middle class here. That isn’t the sort of statistic that is going to cause involuntary salivation amongst potential advertisers.

4

Ted 01.27.06 at 10:36 am

To be fair, I can’t imagine any other way to get income information; it’s not like LGF is going to demand tax filings. However, when you’re polling an audience of passionate fans, all of whom hope that your success will overthrow the dread MSM, you’re bound to get some people exaggerating.

Dennis, you’re right that $105 K is not silly rich for households with two earners, especially if both are college-educated earners. But what percentage of anyone’s audience looks like that? According to these guys,, about 30% of households are dual income, and they don’t know how many have college degrees. I can believe that higher-income people are more likely to spend their time dicking around on politicial websites (go college!), these results are harder to believe. (I know that you’re not defending them, I’m just talking here.)

5

Ray 01.27.06 at 10:51 am

Next you’ll be saying instead of putting laughable income figures in their PowerPoint presentation, they should have included, oh, figures on advertising click-throughs from their component blogs, or some other crazy talk…

6

Tim Worstall 01.27.06 at 12:20 pm

Never have I been more grateful about committing the sin of Onan.

7

Scott Lemieux 01.27.06 at 12:23 pm

“‘Tipping point type audience,’ ‘psychographic’; aren’t those just annoying buzzwords really dumb people use to sound intelligent?…I’m fired, aren’t I?”

8

Kieran Healy 01.27.06 at 12:29 pm

“We have crafted a vehicle that delivers this audience … “

Like a big Red London Bus, maybe? A plane? A train?

9

Bruce H 01.27.06 at 12:32 pm

And if the Pajamas Media readers love The Blog so much, why don’t they marry it? Oh, wait, looks like they’re working on it.

They can work on that all they like, but they will fail. Since marriage is, by definition, a divine contract between one man and one woman, their puppy dog crush on The Blog is destined to end in frustration and self-flagellation. (Expressed violently outward, natch.)

10

DennisThePeasant 01.27.06 at 1:15 pm

Ray-

Actually, it would have been best if they’d provided demographic information that advertisers consider important.

Hint: Household income isn’t close to the top of that list.

11

saurabh 01.27.06 at 1:47 pm

Err, while we’re at it, what about some CT reader demographics? What percent of us are college-educated, what’s our median income, etc.?

12

luci 01.27.06 at 3:23 pm

“Pajamas Media presents and connects high quality Blogs that fosters dialogue and attracts thought leading, tipping point type audiences”

Sentence doesn’t communicate what I think they want it to.

13

Kieran Healy 01.27.06 at 4:29 pm

while we’re at it, what about some CT reader demographics? What percent of us are college-educated, what’s our median income, etc.?

We’ll have to ask DHS for the data.

14

SamChevre 01.28.06 at 10:04 am

One reason that people with college degrees would be more likely to be represented in blog readerships is increased short-leisure time with internet access. In other words, many office jobs enable one to spend 5 minutes on the internet 5 times a day; most factory, trade, and retail jobs do not.

15

Ray 01.28.06 at 3:00 pm

Oh, accurate demographic information would have been best, no doubt about it, but that’s relatively expensive to collect. But if they’ve all been hosting advertising up to now, they should have that click-through information already.

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