Earlier this year, I conducted a short survey of Consumerism Commentary readers. I do this once in a while to try to develop a picture of who you are. A few people have expressed interest in seeing the results of this survey, so here are some of the statistics.

58% of Consumerism Commentary readers are male. A different 58% of Consumerism Commentary readers are married (or equivalent). Three quarters of readers who answered the survey are between the ages of 23 and 40. Here is a detailed breakdown of ages:

• 1% are 18 years old or younger
• 6.4% are between 19 and 22 years old, roughly college aged
• 41.8% are between 23 and 30 years old
• 32.3% are between 31 and 40 years old
• 9.4% are between 41 and 50 years old
• 6.3% are between 51 and 60 years old
• 2.8% are 61 years old or older

About 80% of Consumerism Commentary readers who responded to the survey report they have at least a bachelor’s degree. Furthermore, about one third of readers have at least a master’s degree.

How does your annual active income stack up against other Consumerism Commentary readers? The definition of “active income” was left to interpretation by each respondent. Click on the thumbnail to view a larger chart.

Likewise, here is how Consumerism Commentary readers responded to a question about net worth. The definition of net worth wasn’t defined in the survey, so readers were free to calculate their net worth in whatever method made sense to them.

In the survey, I asked readers to leave comments about what they like and didn’t like about Consumerism Commentary. Here are the things readers liked:

I like Flexo’s approach to things. He isn’t preoccupied with debt, and takes a long-range view. He’s organized and pragmatic. I wish I had his kind of head and I try to emulate it.

Even though I don’t think pleasing design and navigability are that important to a successful finance blog, I do think it is a very clean and visually pleasing site. I think it tries be very professional and intelligent and is a real resource for advanced personal finance geeks like me.

I enjoy that it’s easy to read, easy to follow. Long enough to be interesting & educational without making my eyes glaze over.

Consumerism Commentary isn’t free from criticism, of course. Here are some of the comments that refer to improvements that readers would like to see. There are a number of great suggestions here.

I would like to see more media such as videos, podcasts, etc.

Make it more about the people who run it. Ditch the guest bloggers, unless their articles pertain to topics being discussed by the site owners, OR you can’t find those articles anywhere else. Get rid of the headline/subhead template that I see all over personal finance blogs. Most bloggers don’t use that style, and it makes your articles look like they were “premanufactured”, instead of being unique.

Explain stuff to the average guy in simple ways. I may be broke now, but I won’t always be.

Remember that some of us read via email and therefore are more behind realtime readers – in terms of requested responses from readers, contests, waiting lists, etc. I’d also like to see more frequent postings, just because I DO enjoy this blog and would like to see more of it.

A number of comments referred to the design of the website, mainly pertaining to the idea that the website looks cluttered. I do have some plans to revamp the layout of the website, and I plan on timing this with the release of several new features. Look for a new, less cluttered design in the coming months.

Thank you to everyone who responded to the survey! I’ll be contacting the winner of the $50 gift card shortly.

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About the Author

Flexo, the owner and creator of Consumerism Commentary, has been blogging and writing for the internet since 1995 and has been building online communities since 1991. Find out more about him and follow him on Twitter.

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