Paper 1

LaurenBateman.com Content & Traffic Analysis
BUSINESS ANALYSIS
Industry Overview (About 1 page)
The web-based guitar instruction industry has existed for a number of years now.
However, the recent history of this industry in correlation to the global pandemic has increased
the noticeability and overall expansion. The New York Times article by Alex Williams, Guitars
Are Back, Baby!, shows that this industry has existed for years with a stable amount of traffic
pracademic. “According to Jensen Trani, a guitar instructor in Los Angeles whose thousands of
instructional videos on YouTube, he estimated, have attracted some 75 million views over the
past 14 years,” said Williams.
Since the pandemic lock downs began in March 2020, there has been a surge in demand
for online anything. The web-based guitar instruction industry was not an exception. “Shortly
after stay-at-home orders were announced in the spring, Mr. Trani saw a surge of traffic for his
videos, he said, and quickly tripled his number of private students taking lessons remotely,” said
Williams.
The web-based guitar instruction industry was given its perfect opportunity to grow,
basically on a silver platter, by the pandemic lockdowns. Those who did not have time before the
pandemic to peruse hobbies were given copious amounts of time, being stuck at home.
The fact that there is a variety of teachers and services in the industry instead of a
singular entity, led the industry to be able to appeal to a more people. It wasn’t only one specific
teacher or service that saw a spike in interest. “Popular instructional sites like JustinGuitar.com
and GuitarTricks saw similar spikes during the spring,” said Williams.
In Guitars Are Back, Baby! Williams mentions a few different types of web-based guitar
lesson options. First being Trani, who offers his services via online videos, and while not web
based, Trani is a featured instructor in the Fender Play, a guitar instruction app. Being featured in
this app couldn’t hurt his views and visits to his videos. Another option is instructional sites like
the ones mentioned earlier, JustinGuitar.com and GuitarTricks. These instructional sites have a
variety of courses, instructional videos, and songs available to the user. The courses are a go at
your own pace type and range from beginner to advanced.
Online Guitar Instruction Audience (About .5 page)
The audience for online guitar lessons ranges from women and Gen Z to older white
males. According to Lauren Bateman during our class interview, her audience for paid lessons is
mainly older white males in their 50’s.
In Guitars Are Back, Baby! Williams states, “Young adults and teenagers, many of them
female, are helping to power this guitar revival putting their own generational stamp on the
instrument.”

Due to the new free time and resources the pandemic sadly gave us, the audience for
online guitar lessons has expanded. For example, Williams shares that a majority of Mr. Trani’s
new students were female-presenting people in their late 20s or early 30s.
The amount of effort needed to take online guitar instruction is very minimal. The New
York Times: Wirecutter article, Learn Guitar or Ukulele With These Free Resources, by Brent
Butterworth explains why in the context of the present situation.
“Many of us also own a guitar or ukulele that we bought on impulse, promising ourselves
we’d learn to play when we had the time. Well, now we do. Thanks to the Internet, we also have
the resources to learn to play at home—for free,” Butterworth said.
Due to the pandemic, we now have the time to do the things that were put off, along with
our access to limitless free information, makes it very easy for the audience to gain access to
internet guitar instruction.
Company Information (About 1 page)
LaurenBateman.com is an online guitar lessons website with the purpose to provide the
resources needed and wanted to build one’s guitar playing skills. The website was created in
2010, but Bateman truly started using it in 2017.
LaurenBateman.com offers the following services: free guitar crash course lessons; free
guitar lessons, which includes intro items, chord explanations, chord tips, and other beginner
tips; a YouTube Lessons playlist; songs with guitar chord charts, designated beginner and
intermate songs, and Christmas songs; paid guitar courses; and singing lessons.
LaurenBateman.com differs from other guitar lesson websites due to the chord’s placement in all
her lessons. In our class interview Bateman explains that most websites put the chords on the line
of a song but does not specify where the chord changes in the song. Bateman puts the chord
above the lyrics where in the song it changes. Bateman does this to make it easier for her
audience to learn the placement of chords and rhythm of each song.
Another aspect that makes LaurenBateman.com stand out against other guitar lesson
websites is the personal touch Bateman brings to her business, and her important value of being
customer focused. Bateman is very hands on with her customers and is very personable. In our
in-class interview Bateman explains that people will choose LaurenBateman.com over other
websites because she personally will email customers back. Bateman cares to make personal
connections to her audience and show that she cares. Bateman will answer questions on her
YouTube videos, respond to emails, and personally call those older individuals who needs help.
A final big aspect that makes LaurenBateman.com stand out is due to her lack of
classical, or university training and being a female. Bateman is self-taught, she is the guitar
teacher who is most like the student according to herself. She learned guitar purely because she
wanted to learn and play the guitar. In the web guitar instruction industry, it is male dominated.
In our class interview Bateman explains that there are no other female based guitar instructors,
she is the only one, and Bateman prides herself in that.

LaurenBateman.com makes money from more than just guitar lessons. From looking at
the website, basic sources of revenue include the paid beginner guitar course, paid memberships,
paid guitar course library, Laurens’s music, paid singing lessons, and merchandise. According to
Bateman herself, LaurenBateman.com has the biggest source of revenue from her paid courses.
Along with purchasing things from LaurenBateman.com, the website also makes money from
donations. The donations are a large aspect in keeping some courses and lessons free.
LaurenBateman.com ultimately makes money from the two brick-and-mortar music stores
Bateman owns, along with ad revenue from Batemans YouTube videos. A hidden way that
Bateman can make more money on the site is through her business advice. At the bottom of any
page there is a link to “Business Articles”. Once opened, users are able to see that Bateman also
offers business bootcamps for $147.
Bateman herself is the main contributor to LaurenBateman.com. Bateman creates all
content on the website herself, taking the time to chart out each song, create the chord charts
easily readable to her users, record and publish YouTube videos alongside the lesson. Bateman
has a small group of people working for her at the brick-and-mortar music stores, along with
those people helping with the website. Bateman strives to publish a chord chart a week,
sometimes along with links to corresponding YouTube videos. Bateman will personally create
each cord chart, which takes one to two hours per chord chart. On LaurenBateman.com there are
150-200 chord charts on her website as of our class interview.
Competing Site (About ½-1 page)
JustinGuitar.com is the competing site picked to be the benchmark for the analysis of
LaurenBateman.com. JustinGuitar.com is a competing site due to the purpose of the site being
the same as LaurenBateman.com, an online guitar instruction website. Both sites are built with
the goal to share and sell online guitar lessons to those who are looking to expand their skills and
learn something new.
Due to the sites both being online guitar lesson sites, their content is very similar. Both
sites offer different levels of guitar lessons to appeal to those of different skill levels, songs with
explanatory YouTube videos linked, different courses and content available to buy, along with
merchandise to buy. At first glace both sites are obviously very similar in content, but once
looking deeper into the content, differences are apparent. The first major difference is chord
charts. For LaurenBateman.com, when a user goes to a specific song, an explanation of the
difficulty is shown, along with a YouTube video with the chord charts directly underneath. The
chord charts for songs are included in all the free content available on her site, without login
required. For JustinGuitar.com on the other hand, when going to a specific song, the YouTube
video shows first and automatically starts playing. Next to the video there are prompts to login to
get a better experience, and when looking for the chord chart it is restricted to those who are not
logged in. To see the chord charts, look at the discussion tab or even make notes, the user is
required to login first. JustinGuitar.com appears to have a variety of free content like
LaurenBateman.com, but when a user goes to access it, they are required to jump through hoops

on JustinGuitar.com. Whereas on LaurenBateman.com, a user can see what they can and cannot
access right up front and does not attach the free YouTube videos to restricted member only
chord charts.
According to JustinGuitar.com, the site was made by Justin Sandercoe in 2003 to support
his private lessons. Then in 2006 Sandercoe moved to include free lessons via YouTube videos.
On JustinGuitar.com, there is a timeline to show the growth of the website. In 2020,
JustinGuitar.com moved from only Sandercoe working on the site, to a small team helping
manage and run the site. There are seven staff members listed on JustinGuitar.com under the
customer service tab.
Quality Content Assessment (About 2 pages)
Content Overview and Quantity:
When opening the home page for LaurenBateman.com, the content you are first show is
Batemans into video, along with a brief description of her mission. Continuing down the home
page, there are internal links to Batemans most recent lessons, popular lessons, her YouTube, an
introduction to Lauren page, and then finally a comparison of Batemans approach to lessons
versus others. LaurenBateman.com has six tabs in the navigation bar, three of which having drop
down menus.
They are organized as followed:
• Products: Beginner guitar course; Lauren's guitar course library; Guitar product
recommendations; T-shirts; Lauren's music; Singing lessons.
• Lessons: Free guitar crash course; More guitar lessons; YouTube lesson playlists.
• Songs: Guitar chord charts; Beginner guitar songs; Intermediate guitar songs; Christmas
songs for guitar.
• Testimonials.
• Meet Lauren.
• Member’s login.
The type of content that is used the most is text by far, with visuals, video and photo, being
the second most used. Text is used to explain lessons, what the purpose of the site is, to list
lyrics, chords, how something should be played, used as links to YouTube videos, etc.
Guitar lessons are the core of the site. Without creating an account, there are 173 different
songs listed under the guitar chord charts tab, 29 free guitar lessons, twelve Christmas songs and
six YouTube videos that are embedded into the site.
In the beginner guitar songs tab, there are 76 songs listed. On the intermediate guitar songs
tab, there are 32 songs listed. The songs, in both the beginner and intermediate lists, are also
listed in the general guitar chord chart tabs, mixed with songs of different difficulties. In total
that is 108 songs in between the two tabs, thus meaning 65 songs from the guitar chord charts tab
are not identified by difficulty level.
Comparatively, the beginner songs tab has much more content that the intermediates tab. The
chord charts available for free tend to be geared towards beginners, with a significantly lower

number of songs available at a higher level of difficulty. Overall, the content available seems to
be focused on those who are beginners and just starting their journey learning guitar.
The amount of content from each lesson provided has increased overtime. In 2011, Bateman
posted one of her first lessons on YouTube, which she then embedded into her site later on.
According to LaurenBateman.com, the lesson, Another One Bites The Dust Riff Lesson
by Queen, was recorded a year in Bateman’s teaching career. The page includes a brief
explanation about the age of the video, and then the video itself, but not much else. Going to the
home page and then clicking on the most recent lesson posted, there is a noticeable difference.
Firstly, there was a chord chart, with Bateman’s signature chords over the lyrics method. There is
an introduction to the song itself, giving a preview at what pace is needed, what chords are in the
song, the strumming pattern used, and a way to make the song easier for those struggling. While
this latest lesson is different than others due to the lack of a YouTube video, it is a much more
detailed and informative lesson content.
At first glance, LaurenBateman.com only has guitar instruction lessons. Once a user
scrolls to the bottom of any page, there is links to content not listed in the navigation bar. This
content consists of business articles, and links to Bateman’s business boot camp. Unless a user
specifically searches for this content, it is unlikely to be seen. The business content that is
available consists of seven detailed articles written by Bateman, answer common business
questions relating to online guitar instruction.
Quality and Value Content:
With anything made by humans, there are errors involved. LaurenBateman.com is not an
exception. When going to the page “Guitar product recommendation” from the navigation bar, a
list of products Bateman recommends for her students should appear, with the appropriate links
to Amazon. According to LaurenBateman.com, Bateman receives a small commission from sales
that use said links. The problem is that when the page opens, the paragraph explaining the
purpose of the page and a legal statement are the only things visible to users. There are no links
to products, no descriptions, or any evidence of the products that were picked by Bateman for the
page. The content meant for the page to promote Batemans recommended products and to create
a small revenue, are missing completely. The page does not serve any purpose, other than to
confuse users and make them question what happened to the promised content?
LaurenBateman.com is well-written and free of any glaring typos. LaurenBateman.com
also has unique content, content that can’t be found anywhere else. The business boot camp and
encouragement of entrepreneurship can be considered unique content for a guitar instruction
website. When looking for similar content on JustinGuitar.com, there isn’t any to be found.
JustinGuitar.com has no content pertaining to the business side of guitar instruction.
A more relevant example of unique content on LaurenBateman.com is her placement of
chord changes over the lyrics in all of her chord charts. In our class interview Bateman explained
that most online chord charts do not properly show where the chord change happens in relation

to the song lyrics. Bateman prides herself in having the chord placement in her unique style, thus
making learning songs easier for her audience to learn.
Brand Trust & Authority (About 2 pages)
News Coverage:
When doing a news search for Lauren Bateman or LaurenBateman.com, there are 10
results shown on each page of the Google news search. For both searches, both first ten results
shown were unrelated to Lauren Bateman or LaurenBateman.com. Purely searching using the
Google News search engine brings no results that pertain to the desired person or site. When
doing an advanced search, using quotations to get results with the exact spelling and arrangement
of words, “LaurenBateman.com” brings up no results. When searching “Lauren Bateman”, the
results that are shown are of different Lauren Batemans. The results from the news search
included Batemans who were two articles on a student being listed on the Presidents List at Tyler
Junior College in Jacksonville, Texas; a Reno, Nevada resident graduating from Harvard Law in
2015; and a UK District Inspector caught in a 2020 celebrity death scandal. The scandal being
she appealed to persecute Caroline Flask, then a day after it was announced a trail would go
forward, Flask killed herself. The importance of this scandal is that any news searches for simply
the name Lauren Bateman in any recent years bring results of only the UK District Inspector.
Through a Google news search for Lauren Bateman or LaurenBateman.com, there is no
way to find any content; even going past the first page of results and/or add key words like
guitar, lesson, YouTube, etc. To find articles mentioning Lauren Bateman or
LaurenBateman.com, a general Google search is required.
News sources that have written about Lauren Bateman and LaurenBateman.com include
mention in a New York Times Wirecutter article about learning guitar during the pandemic, a
feature article on The Red Bra Project, a feature article on BostonVoyager, and was the featured
guest for an episode of Music Studio Startup: Helping Music Teachers Thrive as Entrepreneurs,
to speak about her teaching career and dive into creating her own business. These sites,
specifically the New York Times Wirecutter, are trusted and relevant news sources and coverage
from these sites does not hurt the promotion of Lauren Bateman and Laurenbateman.com at all.
On the other hand, for the competing site JustinGuitar.com, doing a Google news search
brings relevant, trusted sources providing the desired content as the very first result. Articles
from the first page of results all cover the desired site. The first result is an article published
yesterday, Sept. 23, 2021, from GuitarWorld.com by Michael Astley-Brown. Astley-Brown
wrote about an acoustic guitar retreat with “online guitar tutor royalty Justin Sandercoe (aka
JustinGuitar) on the private Caribbean island of St. Vincent,” in July of 2021. In addition to this
article, two articles down there was a second article by GuitarWorld.com. Along with
GuitarWorld.com, notable sites that have covered JustinGuitar.com include Ultimate Guitar,
Mashable, ABC News, NPR, The Seattle Times, Wired, The West Australian, the New York
Times, the New York Times Wirecutter, Geek Wire, Guitar.com, Music Radar, and Acoustic
Guitar Magazine. All of these sites are reliable news sources, trusted due to their expertise in the

field or inclusion of experts, transparency, and (mostly) unbiased. By far JustinGuitar.com has
gained more trust and authority from news sources.
Social Presence:
Due to complications regarding getting locked out, I will be referring to Social Blades
numbers through the screenshots provided.
When looking at the social presence of LaurenBateman.com and JustinGuitar.com,
JustinGuitar.com has a large advantage when looking at the basic numbers. JustinGuitar.com has
been present in the community longer than LaurenBateman.com, and being a early creator
solidified JustinGuitar.com as an authority.
Regarding YouTube, JustinGuitar.com has a higher upload count, number of subscribers,
and overall video views. JustinGuitar.com created their YouTube in 2006 and has 1,022 uploads,
while LaurenBateman.com created theirs in 2010 and has only 345 uploads. This difference in
time and quantity of content explains the differences in subscribers and video views. Where
LaurenBateman.com has an advantage is in the last 30 days. For the number of subscribers in the
last 30 days, while LaurenBateman.com has only 8,000, a 11.1% decrease, JustinGuitar.com had
only 10,000, which is a 50% decrease. While both sites had a decrease in YouTube subscribers,
LaurenBateman.com had a 4.7% increase in video views for the last 30 days. JustinGuitar.com
on the other hand had a 27.3% decrease in views. The differences in overall numbers and
numbers from the last 30 days show that overall LaurenBateman.com is growing in their
YouTube presence even with decreases in some numbers.
In regards to their Instagram presence, JustinGuitar.com has a larger brand authority by
far. In comparison JustinGuitar.com has 52,120 more followers, 1.2% more engagement, an
average of 1,074 more likes, and an average of 25 more comments per post than
LaurenBateman.com. In addition to this, JustinGuitar.com has gained a reported 1,9848
followers in the past 30 days, a 37.3% increase. Versus LaurenBateman.com, who has lost 1,235
follows in the past 30 days. Even though LaurenBateman.com has lost followers, it is an overall
increase in percentage for the Social Blades numbers, a stunning 757.6% increase, due to not
losing as many follows as previous months. A reason for this difference in followers and
engagement can be due to the amount of content posted on each account in the last 30-day
period. JustinGuitar.com has posted 81 times, while LaurenBateman.com has only posted 18
times. According to the Later Blog, an analysis of over 917K unique accounts by Later showed
that users who post more each week tend to have more followers.

TRAFFIC ANALYSIS
Visit Analysis (1.5 - 2 pages)
GRAPH
LaurenBateman.com JustinGuitar.com
Visits (July) 47,600 2,600,000
Unique Visitors (July) 29,800 983,300
Visits Per Unique Visitor 1.59 2.6
Definitions:
Visits for a site are the number of times the site was visited or accessed in a month. A
unique visitor is an individual device accessing the website. A unique visitor can visit a site
multiple times in a time period. A user will go to a new site, become a unique visitor on that
device, look around then leave. If the same user comes back on that device again, it counts as
another visit, but does not create another unique visitor. This is what the visits per unique visitor
records. It is an average of how many times a unique visitor decides to go to the site. A user can
have two unique visits to a site by simply using two different devices, thus being seen as two
different visitors visiting once that day.
Comparison:
Comparing the two sites’ metrics over two months initially shows the obvious.
JustinGuitar.com has more visits, unique visitors and visits per unique visitor due to the sites
increased popularity and age. JustinGuitar.com keeps a steady pace of visits and unique visitors,
averaging 2.6 visits per unique visitor in both June and July. July did have a slightly lower
number of visitors, 2.6 million in July versus 2.9 million in June, and lower unique visitors,
983,300 versus 1.1 million in June. This resulted in a 12.38% decrease in visits and a 8.21%
decrease in unique visitors. This decrease in overall activity could be due to multiple things. One
reason for this decrease can easily be due to the increase in vaccinations worldwide. Now that
vaccines are becoming more available, those who were forced to work from home and given the
extra free time to use online guitar lessons, have moved on. The introduction of the vaccine has
increased social activity in day-to-day life, along with workplaces and schools’ transition back to
in person interactions. Another reason could be JustinGuitar.com having a mobile app. The
mobile app is largely pushed in JustinGuitar.com, the moment a user opens the home page. An
uptake in mobile app users could easily explain to decrease in website users. Those who did
transition to the mobile app will no longer have a reason to visit the website.
For LaurenBateman.com, the trend of their metrics over two months showed the
opposite. While the average visits per unique visitor decreased from 1.63 in June to 1.597 in
July, there was an overall increase in visits and in unique visitors. From June to July,
LaurenBateman.com had an increase of 17.13% in visitors. Going from 40,700 visitors in June to
47,600 visitors in July. Following that trend, in June there were 24,900 unique visitors, then
increased by 20.08% to a total of 29,800 unique visitors in July. A possible reason for this

increase could be due to users transitioning from JustinGuitar.com to LaurenBateman.com.
There is no way to specifically show if users did change sites, but it is possible due to the
decrease of activity on JustinGuitar.com being at the same time as an increase in activity on
LaurenBateman.com, a competing site.
Returning Visitors:
Returning visitors on LaurenBateman.com is not as high as JustinGuitar.com, and that is
perfectly fine. Visitors who are searching to learn a specific song will most likely come to the
site once to research and have the page open as they work through it and learn. But a second visit
is not required unless a visitor desires to learn another song, or to continue progressing on the
initial song visited.
A reason that a low visits per unique visitor metric could be a good thing is due to the
fact that LaurenBateman.com links to a separate site for lessons and the free crash course. When
a user goes to LaurenBateman.com, and decides to purchase a lesson, they are redirected to
LaurenBatemanGuitar.com, a completely different site. For this separate site, a high visits per
unique visitor metric is very desired. Due to the nature of guitar lessons, the goal is that visitors
will keep visiting the site to continue learning, and hopefully buying more lessons. Due to this
little detail that LaurenBateman.com is not where users go for repeat lessons, it makes sense that
the metrics for visits per unique visitor are lower than those of the competing site.

Engagement Analysis (About 4 pages)
GRAPH
LaurenBateman.com JustinGuitar.com
Web
Averages
Bounce Rate % 66.68% 54.56% 40.50%
Pages Per Visit 2.7 3.9 4.6
Avg. Visit Duration 11:32 min 15:48 min 3:1 min
Bounce Rate:
The bounce rate of a site is the percentage of users who exit after only viewing one page.
The web average bounce rate is at 40.50%, both LaurenBateman.com and
JustinGuitar.com are at a higher rate. LaurenBateman.com for July has a bounce rate of 66.68%,
and JustinGuitar.com for July has a bounce rate of 54.56%.
For LaurenBateman.com and JustinGuitar.com, the higher-than-average bounce rate of
their sites in not a bad thing necessarily. A visitor to either site could come from a search engine
to the specific song or lesson that was desired, and only view that page. If a visitor wanted to see
one specific song or lesson, there would be no need to visit a second page. For online guitar
instruction sites, a high bounce rate is to be expected.
While both LaurenBateman.com and JustinGuitar.com have an above average bounce
rate, LaurenBateman.com has a 12.12% higher bounce than JustinGuitar.com. There could be
many reasons for this higher rate, one that is most likely is due to popups. When opening
LaurenBateman.com, a popup will appear stating “Find this website helpful?”, then it will be
asking for donations. This immediate ask for money in the form of a popup can easily account
for the higher rate. Popups and donation requests can interrupt a user’s experience on the site,
leading to them “bouncing” before another page is seen.

Pages Per Visit:
The number of pages per visit is the number of pages a visitor travels to and views before
exiting the site. For July, LaurenBateman.com had an average of 2.7 pages per visit. In the same
month JustinGuitar.com had an average of 3.9. While both of those are below the web average of
4.6 pages per visit, LaurenBateman.com is noticeably lower than both. For most sites, seeing a
low pages per visit metric would be concerning, and a sign of users not being satisfied with the
content. For LaurenBateman.com, this is not a high concern. Traffic for LaurenBateman.com
comes from visitors using search engines to find lessons on specific songs or topics they want.
Much like the bounce rate, if a user does not travel to many pages, that does not mean
LaurenBateman.com is not meeting the users needs. Due to the search engines leading visitors
directly to the page desired, there is a lower chance visitors will click onto another page.
LaurenBateman.com is using search engines to their advantage, by creating a function and
simple way for visitors to find the content they desire.
Average Visit Duration:
The average visit duration time is the total amount of time a visitor spends on the website
during a single visit.
Average visit duration is where LaurenBateman.com would like to see higher numbers.
While bounce rate and pages per visit metrics being lower does not mean users are leaving
without their needs met, average visit duration does. The purpose of LaurenBateman.com is to
find songs and lessons for the guitar that are wanted, then to have the site open as you work
through it. A higher average visit duration here would mean that visitors are taking time to read
through the lessons, learn the chord charts, practice and begin to master skills.
The web average visit duration is 3.1 minutes, JustinGuitar.com is at an average of 15.48
minutes, with LaurenBateman.com slightly lower at 11.32 minutes. LaurenBateman.com and
JustinGuitar.com have very high visit durations, and that is what ultimately is desired. While
LaurenBateman.com has a lower average than JustinGuitar.com, it is fine for how Bateman has
designed her website to be as optimal and straightforward as possible with the simple chord
charts and brief explanation videos compared to those of JustinGuitar.com. Another reason the
visit duration for LaurenBateman.com is lower than that of JustinGuitar.com is due to the lack of
needing to log in or sign up to view content related to the lessons. For JustinGuitar.com, users
are only able to see the video without log in. LaurenBateman.com on the other hand will allow
users to view the video and chord charts without the extra set and time needed to log in or create
an account.

POPULARITY ANALYSIS (About 3 pages)
GRAPH As of August 2021
Total
Backlinks
No. of Referring
Domains
Avg. No. of Backlinks per
Domain
LaurenBateman.com 670 192 12.71
JustinGuitar.com 470,740 8,226 59.42
Definitions:
A backlink is simply a link to a website from completely a separate website. The total
number of how many websites have backlinks to one particular site is the number of referring
domains. The average number of backlinks per domain is the average number of back links that
are used on each individual site.
It is important to calculate the average number of backlinks per domain to insure that
there is a natural distribution of backlinks on each site, and is not skewed due to one domain
spamming backlinks purely to create larger numbers. Another reason to calculate the average
number of backlinks per domain is to gage the popularity of the site in regards to coverage and
notability.
Analysis of Link Quantity:
With each analysis of LaurenBateman.com and JustinGuitar.com it is plain as day that
JustinGuitar.com is a much more popular and recognized site. There is a dramatic difference in
number of backlinks and referring domains to support the conclusion that JustinGuitar.com is
more notable than LaurenBateman.com.
JustinGuitar.com has a whooping 470,070 more backlinks, 8,034 more referring domains
and a 55.03 higher average of backlinks per domain than LaurenBateman.com. These numbers
are revealing in the fact that LaurenBateman.com is a smaller name in the online guitar
instruction industry and still building their name, while JustinGuitar.com is a well know name in
the industry and a recognizable trusted site. JustinGuitar.com has been active for 18 years as an
online guitar instruction site and was one of the very first sites created for the industry. Due to
this, JustinGuitar.com had an upper hand in making sure they became a secured name in the
industry. LaurenBateman.com is continuing to grown and improve while there are sites like
JustinGuitar.com already established creating competition, while JustinGuitar.com was growing
and improving as the internet itself grew, leaving JustinGuitar.com to have little to no
competition as there was no one else starting that early.
Trend Analysis:
For LaurenBateman.com, the link quantity has improved dramatically since the
pandemics beginning. In Jan. of 2019 the number of backlinks for LaurenBateman.com was only
202 with 80 domains, versus the most recent numbers in August of 2021 with 670 backlinks and
192 domains. The rise in the number of backlinks for Bateman’s site correlates with the

beginning of COVID mandated lockdowns, forcing people to stay at home. In March of 2020
when lockdowns began, the number of backlinks jumped to 416, with domains increasing to a
total of 162. This surge of visitors brought more attention to LaurenBateman.com. That along
with news sources gather lists of online guitar instruction sites and including
LaurenBateman.com, improved the sites link quantity much faster than it would have pre-
pandemic.
Analysis of Link Quality:
The quality for backlinks to LaurenBateman.com, while few in numbers, do have high-
quality. One example is the NYT Wirecutter article that is the highest ranked authority
backlinked domain on Ubersuggest for LaurenBateman.com at a 95. The NYT is a high-profile
news source, that has asserted itself as an authority in the news industry. This backlink is very
relevant due to an uptake in online lessons with COVID, is a trusted site, a secured site, and is
associated with the NYT. The other backlinks to LaurenBateman.com are not as notable but are
consistent with being a news source that is on a secured site, and while smaller, still trusted and
publishing relevant content. Due to the lack of notable or well know backlinks to
LaurenBateman.com, the quality of Batemans links is far behind the quality of backlinks to
JustinGuitar.com. LaurenBateman.com has an overall lower number of backlinks, thus creating a
lower number of links to choose from unlike JustinGuitar.com.
JustinGuitar.com has a very large number of backlinks to their site, resulting in
JustinGuitar.com having a plethora of high quality backlinks to its site. JustinGuitar.com has an
article from the NYT, ranking at 95 along side Batemans NYT Wirecutter article. Where
JustinGuitar.com differs from LaurenBateman.com, is that JustinGuitar.com has seven
backlinked sites all rated at a 95 for domain authority on Ubersuggest. In the first 100 backlinks
rated for JustinGuitar.com, the lowest rank for domain authority was an 89 for
BodyBuilding.com. In comparison, the lowest rank for domain authority in the first 100 was a
mere 18 for CareHealthJobs.com.

Work Cited:
Williams, Alex. "Guitars Are Back, Baby!" The New York Times, Sept. 8, 2020,
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/08/style/guitar-sales-fender-gibson.html
Butterworth, Brent. "Use This Time During Coronavirus Isolation to Learn to Play Guitar or
Ukulele" The New York Times -- Wirecutter, March 25, 2020,
https://www.nytimes.com/wirecutter/blog/coronavirus-learn-guitar-ukulele/
Warren, Jillian. “This is How Often You Should Post on Instagram According to 81M Posts”
Later Blog, August 19, 2021, https://later.com/blog/how-often-post-to-instagram
The Red Bra Project: Episode 59, "Scientist Turned Musician -- How ONE Decision Can
Change Your Entire Life's Path with Lauren Bateman," Sept. 9, 2020,
https://www.theredbraproject.com/2020/09/09/scientist-turned-musician-how-one-decision-can-
change-your-entire-lifes-path-with-lauren-bateman/
JustinGuitar.com
LaurenBateman.com
LaurenBatemanGuitar.com
Social Blade, Social media metrics for JustinGuitar.com, YouTube:
https://socialblade.com/youtube/c/justinguitar
Social Blade, Social media metrics for LaurenBateman.com, YouTube:
https://socialblade.com/youtube/c/laurenbateman,
Social Blade, Social media metrics for JustinGuitar.com, Instagram:
https://socialblade.com/instagram/user/thelaurenbateman
Social Blade, Social media metrics for LaurenBateman.com, Instagram:
https://socialblade.com/instagram/user/justinguitar
SEMrush, Visit and Engagement Metrics for LaurenBateman.com and JustinGuitar.com:
https://www.semrush.com/analytics/traffic/overview/laurenbateman.com?competitor=justinguita
r.com:domain&searchType=domain
Bounce Rate By Industry Graphic: https://marketingtechblog.com/industry-bounce-rates/
Neil Patel’s backlink checker for LaurenBateman.com and JustinGuitar.com:
https://neilpatel.com/backlinks/

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