Blog Statistics Update August – September 2013
This month I am wavering between wanting to quit EPF and wanting to commit to it even deeper. I am not really going to stop in the near future, but I noticed that I have been commenting much less on other blogs. At this moment posts just don’t seem as interesting to me as they normally do and I think I should be focusing more on improving my own content and searchability. It’s also a pretty busy/stressful month for us with our move so that is certainly contributing to my bad attitude! Allllso I kind of miss my old regular commenters and IRL friends who don’t seem to be popping in on the conversations so frequently now – you know who you are! (Not that I don’t appreciate my new commenters – thanks, guys!) But on the plus side, I have been inspired by listening to The Money Pillow podcast to expand to a couple more websites. Now I just need to find the time to work on that content!
Guest Posts
This month I participated in a blog swap on the topic of lessons learned from my first side hustle. My post at FI Journey was about my short career as a medical guinea pig and FI Pilgrim’s post on EPF was on building a website for his first client.
I also wrote a guest post for Crystal at Budgeting in the Fun Stuff on how becoming basketball fans has improved our finances.
Analytics Data from August 16 to September 15, 2013
People who listen to us, as of September 15, 2013:
RSS subscribers: 72 (-85) (I think this is part of the fluctuations that always seem to be going on! the next day it was up to 188.)
Twitter followers: 566 (+52)
Facebook fans: 39 (+1)
Rankings:
Alexa: 94,152 (-15,967)
Google PR: 3 (no change)
MozRanks: 5.10 and 4.94 (no change)
Some Google Analytics statistics:
We had a little decrease this month over last because we didn’t have as many links from high-profile blogs, but I’m comfortable with our numbers for this month. I want to push them higher and am formulating a plan to do so – actually setting goals *gasp*!
Popular Posts
Most viewed posts:
1) Inexpensive House, Expensive Car
2) DECREASE IN PAY ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
3) What Do You Consider a Good Salary?
4) How We Watch All the TV We Want for Free (Including Sports)
Most Commented Posts:
Don’t Use Gifts to Avoid Joint Finances
DECREASE IN PAY ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
Have You Even Been without Health Insurance?
Financially Surviving Your First Month as a PhD Student
Who Has Seen You Financially Nude?
Putting Rent on a Credit Card: An Opportunity to Churn
Earnings
I know I’ve been saying this for a while, but we have finally crossed $100 in (estimate) Adsense earnings. So I fully expect that after the earnings are posted at the end of September we will be able to take our first payment. We’re on the way to breaking even for the year, woohoo! We also had another affiliate company we work with, Viglink, send the $1.16 we’ve earned so far to our Paypal account. We wouldn’t have initiated a payout of such a low amount, but there it is!
Search Terms from Real People
“elegant salad bar ideas for a wedding reception” – I’ve never seen a salad bar at a wedding reception before, but I would be into it!
“tightwad, unconflicted” – these two weird, seemingly unconnected words are actually technical terms from The Literature
“lean in 50/50” – looks like someone else saw the similarities between these two books
“do i need a brick & mortar bank” – only in a few rare situations. in my experience, no.
How do you work through feeling burned out with blogging without reducing your posting schedule? What is your plan for increasing traffic?
Filed under: blogging, month in review · Tags: burnout, inspiration, rankings, statistics
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It seems like there are a number of people, myself included, kind of thinking about how they really want to go forward with their blog. It seems to me like there’s kind of a prescribed path to getting started, but if you want to get over that hump you have to branch out in some different directions. So you either have to spend more time or change some of your regular activities. Those aren’t always easy choices.
Matt Becker recently posted..What Makes You Happy Without Making Progress?
I think the information is out there for what I need to do – the issue is taking the time to learn and apply the strategies. But I agree it isn’t easy. I don’t want to spend more time on blogging overall so right now my networking is suffering.
I just wanted to say that I’d personally be sad if you stopped writing!
Aw, thank you! No plans to stop soon, just thinking about finding something more sustainable that lets me take on new projects. The comments I get on my posts and especially the discussions we get into are really the reason I’m doing this.
I know less about blogging than your average landscaper so I have no advice on how best to proceed. Maybe outsource to your significant other? I’ve been trying to trick the Mrs. into writing for me, so I can watch more football, but no dice so far.
Done by Forty recently posted..Where My Property Taxes Go
Kyle already does some behind-the-scenes stuff but I would like him to do more. 🙂 He has written a couple posts and I want him to have more of a visible presence on the blog. But he’s trying to graduate right now and I don’t want to put anything more on his plate.
DB40 suggested what I was thinking. When I start to need time away, I usually tell Mr PoP and he writes a post or two for the queue. And Mama PoP’s posts have been helping ease the writing requirement as well. It’s nice to have help! =)
Mrs. Pop @ Planting Our Pennies recently posted..Happy Friday – The Laughter of Children
I like that Mr. Pop inserts his voice into your blog from time to time! I think he has more of a presence there than Kyle does here.
I hear you too! I’m in the same space. It’s largely due to a more busy work schedule, combined with recently moving house. I also think when you’re ‘new’ to blogging you’re often overflowing with topic ideas, but when you’re not as passively thinking about blog topics during stressy times, it can get hard.
Sadly I don’t have a partner to outsource to (I have a partner, but he’s not likely to take the reigns!). I’ve just done what I can when I can. I’d find it harder if I was you, as you have a theme to your blog, whereas I’m more all over the place, making what I feel is sporadic at the moment, perhaps not so much for the reader!
Lastly, growth. It’s insidious, and the key to capitalism, but I like to try and be balanced and think highly of a good core group of readers (like friends, and acquaintances). I also can’t expect every post to be awesome/sharable/linked up. I suppose I’m not (yet) making money, so there’s not that incentive either, on traffic. Though I do track it.
SarahN recently posted..Decluttering – using it up, giving it away and selling
Thanks for your comment. I’m glad to know someone else feels similarly. Like you said, with moving and work being busy and such ideas aren’t coming to me quite as often, although I am more limited in time for writing than I am in ideas – I have a huge backlog! It might be easier if I wrote about whatever, but the great thing about PF is that it connects to pretty well anything in life!
I’m definitely feeling the same way. I don’t want to quit writing, but it is certainly getting tougher to find the time to do it as my schedule fills up.
Your Alexa ranking seems to keep shooting down, and it’s cool to see you build a blog that will potentially bring in some real revenue. I know that’s not necessarily the main goal. But it’s cool that you recieved the $100 from Adsense.
The mid-game seems to be the hardest part. I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the people that make it past a month but eventually quit quit in that window of 1-3 years in when they are established, but still not a major name. It seems that at this stage, we are expected to be monetizing heavily and bringing in enough money to offload the work of having a blog on others. While I could see that happening with my food blog, I have trouble imagining staff writers on a site called “Edward Antrobus”
Edward Antrobus recently posted..Do Pedestrians Have to Obey Traffic Laws?
Sometimes I wonder if I can keep posting indefinitely. I guess the next step would be to transition to an authority site format with staff writers. Being the only voice can be tiring in the long run
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I feel too protective of this blog to let staff writers eclipse my contributions! And I don’t think EPF will ever become like an authority site – it has too many diary components. I’ll leave that for my next couple sites!