Stats: May 2014

May was a quiet blogging month as I concentrated on getting tasks done and many of these were offline tasks like tidying and filing. After many years of looking, I think I’ve finally found a task management tool and system that is working for me and I’ll write about it in the future. I hope as I reduce the tasks on my list and get quicker at the others I will have more time for the things I want to do such as writing, scrapbooking and sewing.

I wrote the same number of posts as April and none of them were popular enough to make it in to my top 5 most popular posts. I’m actually disappointed about this a I’d hoped my one about internal windows would make it; because come on guys it has a video showing our lift. I often mention our lift and I think most people think I mean a stair lift and here is the opportunity to see the lift in its full glory.

It was a mixed month in terms of metrics. As my Klout scored had increased by over 10 I’d expected my chart places to increase significantly. I moved up 59 places in the Tots 100 chart to my highest score, but disaster – I was suspended from Hibs 100. I was number 58 in April so I’d hoped to make it into the top 50. It took a while, but I found out I was suspended because I was not suitable as I did not have enough house or interior content. After going through several emotions (disappointment, anger, belligerence) I looked at my posts and agree there has not been a high percentage of house related posts recently because I haven’t been writing as much recently and due to time constraints I’ve concentrated on quicker posts, plus I need to wait for our house project to progress further, although I have some topics waiting to write such as working with an architect and how to develop a house renovation plan.

I have to admit I’m disappointed about no longer being part of Hibs 100 as I think the topic is more appropriate to this blog than Tots 100 so I was expecting to do better, plus I am now no longer part of their PR programme and although I’m fussy about what opportunities I take I suspect there could have been some great opportunities as we progress our house, just like using RoomSketcher to visualise our hall without the lift.

It has made me question the value of charts. I like being able to measure progress and I’ve found these charts have motivated me to engage more, however are they are diverting my attention away from what I want to do? Plus is it really possible to move into the top 100 or as those people get the most attention does it become self perpetuating? I honestly don’t know. I blogged for 6 years without them, but since joining up to Tots100 twelve months ago I have notice I’m more interested in my blog and how to improve it, so that is a good benefit.

Something else I noticed was my reliance on my Goodread posts to have a new post each week. I started these to highlight the posts I’d shared during the previous week as I know people don’t follow me on all platforms, and also to share a bit of link love. However, do you find them interesting? Do you enjoy reading them? Can you think of an alternative method to highlight the posts?

So a mixed month, although all the numbers have increased again (thank you). I’m looking forward to going to BritMums Live in June and hope to meet lots of people and be inspired and motivated. Are you going? What are you thoughts on blog charts? Do you read link posts?