Trump started a blog, but hardly anyone is reading it

• Trump's new blog is apparently not very popular.
• The blog has only seen a little over 212,000 engagements in its first week.
• When he still had Twitter, Trump used to see more engagement via single tweets.

When he still had a Twitter account, Donald Trump shared tweets featuring the word "ratings" almost 400 times. It's no secret he's obsessed with numbers and how many eyes he has on him at all times.

Along those lines, the former president might not be too happy to learn that his new blog has fairly low readership.

The blog, titled From the Desk of Donald J. Trump, has only seen a little over 212,000 engagements in its first week, according to data compiled by the social media analytics company BuzzSumo, which was first reported by NBC News. Comparatively, Trump's tweet announcing he contracted COVID-19 last October - his most liked and retweeted post to date - was retweeted hundreds of thousands of times and liked over 1.5 million times. In other words, Trump saw more engagement from single tweets than he has on his new blog so far.

The blog, which was launched last week, allows Trump to communicate directly with his followers. He can post statements, videos, and images. So far, the website operates a lot like Trump's old Twitter timeline, in the sense that he's primarily been using it to post statements attacking his critics.

Trump was banned from Twitter and other major social media platforms after the Capitol attack on January 6. He was impeached over his role in provoking the riot via incendiary and false statements about the 2020 election. The former president frequently used social media to spread lies about the election, including falsely claiming that it was stolen from him.

Polling continues to show that many Republicans have bought into the erroneous notion that President Joe Biden was elected illegitimately, underscoring the impact of Trump's disinformation campaign.

The fact that Trump's website is not getting much engagement so far suggests that removing his social media megaphone has had a major impact on his ability to communicate with the public.