October 2016 Data
(as reported by SimilarWeb.com)
Tapastic's growth resumed in October after stalling the month prior. Total visits increased 2.86% over September's 7,000,000 to 7,200,000. Global rank declined to #5,135 from #5,037. In the last five months, Tapastic has grown 23.07%. The average visit declined 22 seconds to 5 minutes and 28 seconds. Tapastic's rapid growth from earlier in the year is beginning to wane.
LINEWebtoons saw a second consecutive monthly loss of traffic. Total visits fell -4.86% to 19,400,000 and a -16.01% cumulative loss from from August's 23,100,000 visitor high. Global rank decreased from September's #1,865 to #1,947. In the last five months, LINE has grown 9.60%. The average visit increased by 1 minute and 9 seconds to 11 minutes and 53 seconds. LINE has given up a lot of its growth gains captured earlier in the year.
LINEWebtoons visitors are spending twice as much time on the site as Tapastic visitors. Why? Longer update lengths vs. single pages?
The GamerCat remains the 2nd highest referrer to Tapastic but saw the third straight month of falling referrals.
Traffic to Tapastic from the keyword search "ghostblade" increased 153.8%. Ghostblade and Silversong were featured in the September release of Make Mine Indie #2 and the successful series are driving traffic.
Facebook is holding steady as Tapastic's #1 platform for social media traffic referrals, at 60% of all referrals. Reddit and Twitter are within 1% of each other for 2nd and 3rd place. YouTube and DeviantArt finished 4th and 5th. This top five was unchanged from September.
Conclusions:
Webcomics saw a big hit in September with students returning to school. LINE continues to lose readership to the school year. Tapastic made gains against the current, likely from its ever more prolific book arm. As the gap in popularity continues to slowly narrow between LINE and Tapastic, one wonders, at what point will Tapastic surpass LINE and become #1 in webcomics worldwide? Can it? Tapastic has a lot of traffic yet to gain.