In Response to Comments on the Exodus Report
Thanks everyone for the very positive comments! And, thank you Karen for asking good, fair challenging questions. As to your question Bon & Mal, the ultimate aim of the survey is to get more realistic figures out to the people and to AOL execs. Personally, it is mostly people like you, who think clearly, as to proper form and due motion, that effort is felt in true spirit of fair play.
Christina we are not so sure how to handle your question. Numerically, according to the initial Reports, there was a large group of “stayers” who are also long-standing members as are many who have moved. In fact, a moment ago, we split the "staying and moving" Journalists and reconsidered them as either well-invested in activity, or lesser invested in activity. As you may already now, the number of people surveyed actually staying and having written in the last two weeks of November was slightly less than 1/3 of the 995 Journalists surveyed. Arbitrarily, we use the momentous number for some Journalists of 10,000 site hits. It is a pretty big number to reach!
We found there were 77 well-vested Journalists who could be counted as staying. Of the folks who stayed and could be counted, it was found they represented 65% of the site visits in comparison to the low-vested people (246 Journalists) who represented only 35% of business movement for AOL’s advertisers. The high journalists averaged 20.48 months of business. On the other hand, at the time of the survey, (The last few days of November and first few of December) there were only listed 25 well-vested Journalists who could be counted in the survey, due to the qualification of being in Pam’s Directory and having counters. The high-vested movers activity represented 48% of all movers activity. Each of these journalists averaged 20.6 months of business to AOL brand services.
We shouldn’t compare apples and oranges, but I know the nature of what is going on out there. People just want to know their worth and value, They feel deceived. How many of us played Joe’s “what is your worth” game the week or so before the advertisements began. All of that was a calculation, not to be seen by us, but as a game in giving or taking away sense of value. It was an exaggerated, imaginary, and ego deflating/inflating trick. Perhaps AOL was testing our durability already?
Real problems do take place in a survey such as the Exodus Report due to extraneous variables, such as Karen pointed out. Journalists across the board choose not to use counters 20-22% of the time. Some journalists indicate counter errors or do-overs, umm ask Bill. Another complaint against the counters is that they count movement from the Journalist as well as the visitor. I think this is another advertising gimmick that might have some vantage for the advertiser in that it counts an element of time someone spends searching for something, sometimes anything. We as Americans are a very impulsive moving people. Such people are good potential purchasers. In this case, it really doesn’t matter who the counters count, and we cannot know what other “listening” devises the programs hold (see case above).
Karen also advances an argument of fence-sitting. She was correct to think she may have been counted pro for staying, because during the time period of the project, she hadn’t yet decided to move. In fact, this is how she was counted. She had not said the magic words, at the time of the survey, “I’m moving.” It is like being surveyed in the general population as being healthy. If you become ill the second week after the survey, you cannot go back and redo the survey. Surveys are like snapshots, our purpose was to capture just that moment in time when decisions were being made. It was not our intention to sway people during the survey to believing one thing or another, so it was not announced prior to the Journal visits.
The survey is also not a strong enough instrument to calculate the movement of people who quit Journaling, went private, or did not use counters. So, we did the best we could. We counted the changes in the community from active to non-active, or simply unknown, assuming of course, people having registered had once been enthusiastic about being included in the community through Pam's Directory.
Karen further takes into account that there might have been more fence sitters than just herself. I believe Karen is right again. While the survey only included 59 Journalist who had moved, within about 5-6 days from taking the survey there were found to be a total of 158 Journalists who had decided to move. This was witnessed perhaps more in the growing anger and frustration of not being heard by AOL over at Joe's and John's places. We had realized then with the amount of activity in entries, comments, and message boards, not to mention real letters, phone calls, and press reports against AOL, and in a collection of lists being made, there were more Journalists/people leaving than 59.
We combined the collective work of Judith, Patrick, and Gabreael, along with our work with Pam’s Directory and developed a new list of people who had moved. The list of names we found and links to new journals then could be distributed fairly easily, although this project is at an early stage. It was most important to the group not to lose a sense of community. We were more than the group AOL didn’t want. What did Bill say; we’ll miss your Spirit, but don’t let the door hit you on the way out. He was speaking as a management watching, unaffected by hundreds of customers leaving AOL each day. At this point, our business may be more trouble than it is worth to them, at least, they aren't pretending to fight for it. They seem to be grasping at straw dollars.
Numbers speak to people differently. We have put out numbers to be discussed. But, 600,000? Not even on the chart! And, as to pro or con AOL, I would qualify myself as being in good awareness having visited 995 journals to say, there is a tremendous amount of dissatisfaction out there, but as well, there were a lot of good folks discussing turkey dinner.
However, after all the numbers are said and done, it can still be claimed that an assertive, confident, leader-abled, and community-building segment of J-Landers has moved, and although many of these folks don't use counters, recent activities such as the VIVI Awards, and its 900 voters counted from the community, represent the strength of the community.
When the “Movers” list (J-Bloggers) was complete, we had solid knowledge that many more than expected had made a decision to move to a real Blog atmosphere, and the number was growing. Although, AOL has minimized the need for good will from its customers, in our hearts we know our value to each other. Most likely we will be the ones about the time of Christmas dinner suggesting to our 36 relatives reasons why they should refuse AOL brand services. When I told one of my sons I'd left the Journaling community after 27 months, he was shocked and fully heard me out. Although, the astonishment of that first couple of stinging weeks may or may not resound again amongst high pitch emotions of the holidays, many want to forget and move on. It’s nice at Blogspot. I believe they serve tea. More seriously, we can appreciate ourselves because we dared to care for our passions of lives expressed and acted upon.
posted by Ann Marie @ 12/04/2005 07:31:00 PM
Comments: 17
