In retrospect - 2007 in review

I’ve seen a lot of other blogs posting their year end retrospectives, and I don’t normally just do something because everyone else does it, but since this is my first year blogging, I thought it would be fun and useful to spend some time looking back and sharing my year with everyone who’s been involved with Chris Bloczynski dot Com since I threw open the doors (figuratively) in July.

Let’s start with the readers

My blog is written for you, and it depends on you to keep it going, so I thought that recognizing my regular readers would be the best place to start. First I’d like to thank my oldest blog friends in the world… Here they are in no particular order.

• Dan from DCR Blogs
• Ad Tracker
• Bloggrrl
• Joanne from Laidback Buddhist
• Dennis from Pro Money Blog (where’ve you been?)
• Coolio Jones from My New Hustle
• Rob Malon
• Reyna Elena from OFW Center
• Ankesh Kothari from Blog Clout (hey, let’s buy each other beers sometime?)
• Lewis from Lewis Empire

Along the way, I’ve also made some great new friends! Let’s thank them, too.

• Chanya from Blogstruk
• Vicky from Vicky’s Virtual Office
• Mark from New Success Online
• Chris Guthrie (Coming to the next blogger meeting?)
• Michelle and Jerry Gartner from Gartner Web Development
• Shaun Low
• Doug M from Easy Tech Talk (haven’t talked in a while… let’s catch up.)

Articles worth remembering

When you’re a writer, you tend to fall in love with what you write… but let me forego the ego for just a minute and show you the top ten most viewed items here on Chris Bloczynski dot Com, ordered from the most viewed to the least.

1. 99 headline techniques revealed (17,910 views)
2. You will read this article on hypnotic writing (5,868 views)
3. 10 Ways to use your autoresponder (2,443 views)
4. 30 days to growth (975 views)
5. Meet a blogger - Coolio Jones (861 views)
6. Why I didn’t install Blogrush (804 views)
7. My “About Me” page (gosh, I’m flattered!) (719 views)
8. Tips on writing (701 views)
9. Understanding communities (690 views)
10. Firefox extensions that I can’t live without (681 views)

Outside of page views, some articles should be measured by how much participation they inspired… here are the top ten articles that generated the most reader comments!

1. 99 headline techniques revealed (29 comments)
2. Grand Central (10 comments)
3. Netiquette - your opinion? (10 comments)
4. You will read this article on hypnotic writing (10 comments)
5. Meet a Blogger - Dan Rinnert (9 comments)
6. 7 things you need to be a Pro-Blogger (8 comments)
7. Reader opinion on Stumble and Digg (9 comments)
8. Contest time - Participate! (7 comments)
9. And the winner is… (7 comments)
10. Why I didn’t install BlogRush (7 comments)

Now, it’s ego time! Here are my personal top ten favorite articles here on Chris Bloczynski dot Com.

1. You will read this article on hypnotic writing
2. Understanding communities
3. Forest, Trees, Branches, Leaves
4. Branding on the web
5. 7 ways to reduce your overhead
6. Tools for the mobile entrepreneur
7. Anatomy of a semi-automated lifestyle
8. Aim for the “Perfect Day”
9. 99 headline techniques revealed
10. Setting a benchmark

Memorable moments

For only half a year, it seems like a whole lot was going on! Let’s look back together with fondness and think of some of the good times. Remember when:

• Bloggrrl won my very first contest?
• Ad Tracker brought me back to life? (actually, I did battle a major health challenge, so you were timely with the healing!)
• I hired an assistant to help me with blog chores?
• I met John Chow at the Seattle Blogger Meetup?
• My first article was submitted to StumbleUpon?
• The first time I got over 1,000 page views in a single day, I got 10,091 page views?
• I was linked to by John Chow, Yaro at Entrepreneurs Journey, and Maki at Dosh Dosh?

These are all events that stand out to me as the most memorable, at least here on my site. If you remember any good times you’ve had here, please feel free to share them in the comments section for myself and the other readers.

Stats and numbers

For those of you who are “numbers people”, here are some facts and figures you might find interesting!

• Since Chris Bloczynski dot Com opened in July, there have been 31,969 page views from 16,062 visitors. That equates to 1.99 page views per visitor.
• 245 comments were posted on 92 articles…. that’s 2.33 comments per article. Pretty good!
• 239 spam comments were blocked.
• My first newsletter went out to 14 subscribers on December 14th.
• 75% of total traffic has been referred by StumbleUpon… over 24,200 page views worth!
• 76% of total traffic has come in December 2007.

My goals for 2008

Since I’ve built up some heavy momentum in December, I plan to carry it through into the new year and really increase my critical metrics. Here’s what I’m shooting for:

• 1,000 RSS subscribers
• 400 newsletter subscribers
• 208 published articles (that’s an average of 4 per week)
• 150,000 page views for the year (that’s 12,500 a month… modest, after getting nearly 25,000 views this month, but achievable, I think.)
• I’d like to start podcasting in 2008. I’m considering producing 2 a month, which would give me a library of 24 podcasts for the year.
• I will produce 12 regular monthly newsletters for my newsletter subscribers, at a rate of one per month. I also possibly will produce up to 6 irregular mailings throughout the year, based on what’s happening on and around Chris Bloczynski dot Com.

Have a fantastic New Year!

This will be the last article I publish in 2007. I’ll be spending the next couple of days getting ready for ‘08, and my mother’s birthday is on New Years Eve.

This retrospective article has actually been a lot of fun to write! It was cool to re-read some of my older material, and I enjoyed looking back through old comments and seeing how many people I’ve connected with or influenced in some way since I started this personal blog. At the beginning of December, I really wanted to push the envelope and create some serious growth before the year ended so that I could springboard into 2008 with momentum and excitement, and based on my results this month, I’d say that the new year looks incredibly promising! Thanks to everyone who has stuck around, and I’ll “see you next year!” Be well, my friends.