Blog in Review – 2019

I normally don’t do this, but a number of my blogging buddies are doing a look back at their blog and seeing how things went for them in 2019.

While I haven’t done this in the past, it is an interesting academic exercise as it is nice to see progression as the years pass. I’m not putting all of the effort I could be into the blog (I haven’t bought a domain name and WordPress plan, for example), but I do like that some people seem to find this blog entertaining and I’m always happy to see that.

I also love all the friends I’ve made from it (ok, “all” may only be a few, but still…).

So, unlike previous years, I’m going  to do a little post talking about the year in review regarding Dude Take Your Turn.

First, for those of you who may not be aware, the blog name “Dude Take Your Turn” came from a friend of mine. I was looking for a blog name and she suggested it because we have a guy we play games with that is always slow to take his turn. She constantly has to say “dude, take your turn!” to him.

I’m writing this on New Year’s Eve night (yes, I am a party animal), so there could be another 10-20 views/visitors still to come, but I think it’s safe to look back and see how things went over 2019.

In 2019, I had 20,088 views with 12,878 visitors to the blog. That is actually pretty good. (2018 was 10,825 and 6906 respectively, but I took a lot of hiatuses from the blog last year).

I managed to do 117 posts (not bad for 365 days, considering I took some time off). I wrote 151,605 words for an average of 1296 words per post. I’m sure a lot of that has to do with the “New to Me” posts and the like, which usually get over 2000 words depending on how many games there are on the list.

That’s what I’m most proud of. I’ve been doing this blog since March 2017 and I have not missed a “New to Me” games post for a month. The worst one was posted about the middle of the next month. Most of them get posted in the first week (including the December 2019 one which is posting on Friday).

Even during my worst times when I just don’t feel like blogging is worth it any more (believe me, it happens more than I would like), I manage to get that post out.

My most viewed post in 2019 was the app review of Terraforming Mars (back when it was only on Steam, though I have updated it for the current app). That’s also my most-viewed post in general, being the only one that’s broken 1000 views (it’s now at 1164).

For those of you who are regular readers of my blog, I thank you very much for that.

Obviously the country from which I have the most views is the United States with 8524. Second is Canada (me being Canadian, that makes sense!) with 2025. Surprisingly, Germany is my fourth-most country views with 913 (half of those are probably Clio). The UK is third with 1719.

I do have regular visitors from elsewhere in the world where I don’t know anybody (even from Twitter), and I really do wish they’d chime in and let me know how I’m doing, how they found me, whether there’s anything else they would like. I have a regular visitor from Greece, another one from Markham, Ontario.

Let me know how I’m doing!

Anyway, here’s to hoping that 2020 has even more progress. I’m actually averaging close to 100 views a day over the last month or so, which is way higher than it used to be. It used to be, when I went a few days without posting anything, I’d be lucky to crack 50 views.

One goal for 2020 is to not take so much time away from it. Sometimes, as I said above, it feels like it’s not worth it. I get down on myself and I have to pull myself up by my bootstraps and get posting again.

With encouragement from people like Grant from the Players’ Aid blog, (I’ll never forget that stern look he gave me on Twitter when I tweeted about wanting to give it up) it will be easier to keep things going.

Thanks very much for your readership over the last 3 years, and I hope to see you around in 2020!

I wish you the very best of new years and hopefully it will be good for you.