I've noticed that with the new month, folks are recounting how they have done as far as blogging for the last month. I had some goals at the beginning of the year and gave myself a "report card" after a few weeks. Now I'm going to take another look. My goal was to increase readership, and I think I've done that--but not necessarily by the means I planned. According to my stat counter, in the last 30 days I've averaged 52 readers a day, with 11 of them being return visitors. Back in February I was averaging 29 readers a day, with 7 of them being return visitors. I now have 30 followers and 46 Google subscribers (I think all followers are subscribers but not all subscribers are followers, but I'm not sure about that). My Technorati authority is 52 and my rank is 100,115 (I guess that means there are over 100,000 blogs more popular than mine).
What was I going to do to try to increase readership?
1.Post at least one book review per week. Done
2. Post at least one non-tour book review per month: I've done that lately.
3. Post at least two posts per month about my family. Nope, need to work on that.
4. Post at least two posts per month about my opinion about something. Didn't get there.
5. Try one more time with Taking it Deeper Tuesday--and if it doesn't work, then drop it. Gave it up. -- But I started Sunday Snippets--A Catholic Carnival, which seems to be working
6. Continue to participate in Faith N Fiction Saturday. Done
7. Post link collections of children's activities for Mardi Gras (maybe), Lent, Easter, Mary, Pentecost, the Rosary, and All Saints Day. (medium)Ooops, forgot Pentecost.
8. Update and re-post collections on Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. (easy)Not time yet.
9. Participate in at least one carnival per week. I've found the Catholic Carnival, the Christian Book Carnival and the Book Review carnival, so I ought to be able to find at least one post for one of them each week. (medium)Nope
10. Comment on at least two blogs per day (challenging) Nope
11. Comment on at least two blogs I haven't been reading regularly per week. (challenging--but can be combined with 10) Nope
12. Have some sort of graphic on over half my posts (challenging)Yes, but since they've all been book blogs, with Amazon links, that hasn't been hard.
13. Participate at least twice a month in a Meme, or some other type of "everybody is doing it" type of post. (challenging) Yes, I've started doing Mailbox Mondays and I think that has brought folks over.
So to what do I attribute my increased readership? Well, I think that once folks stop by, they want to come back--or at least I hope they do. My Mailbox Monday and Sunday Snippets posts are always well read. Thomas Nelson links to my reviews and I get hits from them all the time. I have picked up a lot of new readers by doing Hatchette giveaways, and I'm starting another one soon!
I have only been a follower of your blog for about a month, but it is one that I read each day.
ReplyDeleteI like the way that your blog is organized. It is easy to read and find what I want on it.
Your book reviews are excellent - some of the best that I have read. I appreciate your honesty when reviewing a book as I think that is important to readers.
I like the variety of books that you feature on your blog. They are the type of books that I enjoy reading.
I love your giveaways too! You make them simple to enter and the ones that I have seen in the past month on your blog have been great books.
In addition to your book reviews, I also enjoy reading about your family. As a mom myself, I enjoy reading other moms' blogs from the personal aspect. So, anytime you want to post about your kids or family life, please know that it is read!
Thanks for taking the time to do the book reviews and the giveaways.
To answer your question as to how am I doing, you are doing great! Keep up the good work!