Daily Note: 12.20.2022
. . .
I’ve taken a long break from writing on Medium, but left quite a few Tarot stories on the platform. All of them have also been posted here on EP (in some version)—and most have had little readership on Medium.
There’s one big exception, though.
Every Friday I get a report on which of my stories have been viewed the most that week. And it always looks almost exactly like this:
The total numbers at the top may change—but the most-viewed item is always “Kabbalah and Tarot: The Tree of Life.” And for the past few months, the number of weekly views has typically been between 140 and 160.
Here’s what that looks like:
That peak you see occurred on July 11, 2022—almost exactly a year after the story was first published on Medium.
I have no idea what stimulated a spike in Tarot/Kabbalah interest on that particular day. Nor could I say why there’s a general daily increase for the weeks after that. Medium doesn’t provide much information for analyzing traffic—but I can tell you that the increase was not associated with anything that happened on the Medium platform. Nothing to do with with Medium distribution algorithms, or members following me.
In fact, since the day it was published, just 380 people have found the story on Medium, while more than 4,000 have gotten to it via Google search.
Very few stories about anything get read on Medium, and even fewer find an audience for more than a few days. So the 380 part is not surprising.
I’ve been vaguely mystified, though, by the steady traffic for this particular story. So I finally decided to find the reason—and if you’ve already guessed it, you’re probably right. Type “kabbalah and tarot” or even “kabbalah tarot” in the Google search bar, and my story is the first one that comes up.
On the other hand, if you type in “qabalah and tarot,” you’ll see three pages of Robert Wang results. (Try “cabbala” and you’ll get something interesting, but that’s another topic.)
So at least in part, it’s the spelling of one word that has brought folks to this particular story. And the extra SEO value of being on Medium puts it at the top of Google search returns.
Mind you, 4K is not that many people—but it’s also not that few!
Since they all come from outside Medium, I don’t have any more information about them. Therefore, no clues (yet) for investigating the larger part of my mystery: who is searching for Kabbalah + Tarot, and why?
I’ll continue this line of thought in subsequent notes. But of course there’s a bit of serendipity to leave off with today. Search for “hanukkah and tarot,” browse the first page of results, and you’ll eventually discover interviews with two people who have very different but equally interesting ideas about Tarot and Jewish tradition. Since I’ve already taken that trip, I’ll share my findings!
“Kabbalah, Tarot, and Delving into Mystical Judaism” is an interview with Heather Mendel, creator of the Szygy Oracle.
And here’s an interview with Stav Appel, creator of The Torah in Tarot:
See you tomorrow! C