New HitTail Live Widget being Tested

Hey baby, wanna see my HitTail?

Would you share the first page of your HitTail Search Hits data with the world?

Well, it used to be that you had to log into your own site (or as Connors) to see how cool and addicting our real-time Search Hit tab in HitTail is. But we wanted to start giving everyone a feel for the “black river of keywords” that exists in any site without logging in.

So, we’re testing this new “HitTail Live” widget on our own site for now—but based on whether people like this feature, we might make it available to the public. First, I’m interested in what you think. So, comment!

This widget it somewhat in the spirit of the “search voyeur” features that used to be built into sites like Excite and AOL Search in years past, where you can have insight to the “search stream”. Lately, this has been supplanted by Google Zeitgeist. But somehow, we still think that viewing the real-time flow in a voyeuristic fashion is still hugely appealing. It’s the same issue as day-after Google Analytics, vs. the viewing the real-time click-stream that makes folks like this blogger continue to use HitTail over other choices. Both have their uses, but as this writer states, there’s just something about watching those hits come in.

So, if you’re interested in using this widget on your website, let us know with comments. It’s not a sure thing. For example, would you actually be OK with SHOWING OTHERS the flow of traffic leading into your site? Is it giving too much away?

Personally, I feel it will help reveal the trends on the Internet that the online marketing community doesn’t want to acknowledge: natural search is king. Paid search (which is indistinguishable from natural search from a referrer perspective), which you can identify by the “lack” of a natural listing, is just way less common than people think. Sure, it can drive traffic, but can it even begin to compete with natural search niche domination?

By showing you this widget, we’re now also showing you a slice of the traffic coming to the HitTail site itself. It’s also a wonderful example of how awesome our filters are. Doing this should by all reason pollute our data with people surfing or referrer links. But it won’t. Think about that. If you click one of those links in the Widget, and surf BACK INTO the HitTail site using a reproduced Google search, shouldn’t you see that you just did that in our widget? Shouldn’t that sort of self-referential referrer loop ruin the data?

In any other tracking system, it would.

And THAT sort of subtlety is why folks like Tatraplan detect something special about HitTail’s particular brand of showing referrers.

And with this new public-facing widget, we think there’s a much easier way to check out HitTail’s coolness, without “logging in as Connors”.

If you agree, and might like one of these for yourself, let us know.

HitTail, MyBlogLog, Snap Previews and TypePad Explode in a Cacophony of Coolness

April has been a busy month for HitTail. We launched our premium service, built a TypePad Widget and a Blogger Widget, got into the SixApart's TypePad Widget gallery and newsletter, kept pace with exploding popularity, and recorded over 70 quotes and testimonials on your spanking new TypePad blog...

...all in this single month of April!

So, my challenge to you, the HitTailer, is to give us a quote. And you can do that merely by blogging about us.

We'll know.

It's a fairly sure bet that we're going to link back to you on that site. And while you're at it, check out how eerily cool HitTail, MyBlogLog and the Snap Website Previews work on a TypePad blog.

As it turns out, almost every HitTail quoter I'm linking to who published a positive HitTail comment online are themselves running HitTail. Therefore, whenever I construct a link to them, I am by definition alerting those HitTail-addicted folks of the fact that I linked to them.

Yes, as it turns out, you can view every single link or hit that comes into your site as an important event (as there are much fewer than almost everybody thinks).

And so, its mere moments between me linking to them, and them coming to see who just made a link to them.

This gives them a link, and an opportunity to review and comment upon their quote. Now, for the cool pictures.

People visiting the HitTail quote site get previews of the quoters' sites by merely mousing-over the links, thanks to Snap's cool website preview feature. And if they're a member of the cool MyBlogLog service, their picture appears on the website too as a recent visitor. Then I get to see their picture.

If this isn't an example of the cool undercurrents of the "online discussion" then I don't know what is.

TypePad Widget for HitTail

For all you TypePad junkies who have been cramming the HitTail code into a line list, we've just made it easier for you. We have just created a TypePad widget, and been accepted into the TypePad Gallery. Make it popular, so we get accepted onto the TypePad Recommended Widgets list. Thanks to Dave Berkowitz of 360i and Search Insider for originally suggesting it.

HitTail reveals in real-time the least utilized, most promising keywords hidden in the Long Tail of your natural search results. We present these terms to you as suggestions that when acted on can boost the natural search results of your site. It's that simple.