Two years!
It’s been two years today, that I decided to hop on the blogging train!!!
At the time, this was yet another item on my side projects list. At the slight difference that this one was particularly inspiring me!
You know how it goes. You’ve found a new topic that you spend hours reading about and you want to be part of the community. So you start a blog!
I’ve had done that in the past but for the bad reasons: to prove something to myself and others.
But mustachianpost.com was feeling different at the time. I really felt it like a topic that truly inspired me and that I could write about even if I wouldn’t ever make any money out of it.
And for once I’m glad to realize I wasn’t wrong as I’m still here blogging about personal finance in Switzerland, while I still don’t make a living with this passion!
So if you think you’ve found a passion, here would be my recommendation to you in case you want to start a blog about the topic: just do it!!! Hop on the train. Work hard. Give it a one year trial.
Working out? Still a passion after 365 days? Still liking it?
If yes, go for it you’ve found your way, congratulations!
If not, discard it and go to your next side project.
And most importantly, see what you leave as a life experience, and not at something failed or missed.
Be proud of yourself to have taken action. And to not have stayed locked in the dreaming pattern “If only I had done that, I could be so happier or so rich nowadays”.
What about you guys/gals?
I always find it interesting when bloggers open up their blog numbers to us, other blogger voyeurs!
So here you go, as my 2yo blogger’s present, below are some of the key 2015 figures that represent you - the readers.
Posts and comments
On the 37 posts I’ve written, you guys were engaging with 280 comments!!!
It must sound not so much for other bloggers for a 1 year period. But for me it means so much when someone takes the time to interact and/or ask questions.
I hope I get even more of them in 2016!
Analytics
It’s quite amazing to step back after one year of blogging to realize that I reached quite a great amount of visitors:
- 10'643 sessions (you imagine if you would put 10k people in a big room? That would be impressive!!!)
- 23'639 pageviews
- 2 min 10 sec average time on page (this sounds like people who are coming are actually reading! Oh yeah!)
- 55.81% of new sessions
- 62.97% of bounce rate
N.B. for readers who have a blog: make sure to exclude all these spammy bots’ views from your analytics data, else you’ll think you’re doing extra great while you’re only doing good!
From where are you?!?
- Switzerland - 38.81%
- United States - 23.27%
- United Kingdom - 5.31%
- Netherlands - 4.23%
- Germany - 3.38%
- Canada - 2.86%
- Belgium - 2.52%
- France - 2.10%
- Brazil - 1.48%
- Italy - 1.17%
The total list contains 120-130 countries in total, including “fancy” and far away ones like Saudi Arabia, Mozambique and New Zealand.
Age and gender
The cool thing is that 50% of visitors are in their 25-34, and 30% are in 35-44.
I find it cool as the impact of the blog should logically be more important as the readership still have 2-3/4 of their life left to apply personal finance tips and tricks so they reach financial independence one day.
Even more awesome would have been a 50% of readers in their 15-25yo so half of you would all reach FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) at 30-35yo!
On the gender side, it seems that my blog clearly bring more guys with 72% of male vs. gals with their 28%.
Let’s see how this evolve in the next years.
What device do you use?
This one amazes me quite a lot!
As we all seem to be more mobile than ever, you readers seem to like to be in an comfy setup to browse through the blog.
Home desk or laptop on the couch - that is the question?
If Google don’t lie, here are the figures:
- 63% desktop
- 21% mobile
- 14% tablet
How the hell did you get there???
Who recommended you to visit mustachianpost.com?
- 35% referral
- Special thanks to 1500days who hosted me for a Q/A session back in January 2015 where we got quite a few interesting comments
- Many thanks also goes to J. Money and its pfdirectory.org website for featuring both the #BSRI and the European FI/ER Bloggers List
- 27% organic search
- 22% direct
- 13% social
Which searches did you enter in Google?
Below are one of the Google search people have used to find the blog:
- “swisscom hack” - which funnily enough brings you on a Orange/Salt related blogpost!
- “etf portfolio 2015” - after checking on Google, I was surprised that my 2015 portfolio post ranked on the 2nd results page, with such “generic” terms! Cool!
- “ynab made me rich” - this one is so true that I’m glad I rank #1 on Google with my detailed post on how I went from almost no savings to buying my first home. Oh yeah!!!
- “early retirement switzerland” - I think these visitors landed on the right place!
- “swissquote experience” - despite a horrible user experience, I still recommend Swissquote to invest from Switzerland because of its cheap fees
What changed for me?
The main thing this blog project taught me is rigor.
Rigor about maintaining a pace of publishing.
Rigor about my daily writing habit with 15 to 30 minutes dedicated to this practice every single workday during my morning commute.
Rigor about stashing money until we’re able to reach our first financial goal which will get delivered in some weeks!!!
The blog has also helped to frame the vision of my/our life and to find support through like-minded people. Thank you guys/gals!
What will change in the future?
After a discussion with one of my fellow Swiss blogger Benoît from Novo Monde, I decided to focus my blog even more on my geographical niche that is Switzerland.
I already talk a lot about my country tip and tricks to reach Financial Independence, but one of the drawbacks is that I blog in English…which isn’t one of the 4 official Swiss languages.
So my 2016 plan is to serve better Swiss people by going bilingual and have all MP posts available in both English and French.
By doing this, I hope to help even more local readers and reach a wider audience.
This way you will now be able to share awesome content with your friends/mothers/wives/husbands!
Last words for you, dear readers
THANK YOU! Without you, all this wouldn’t make any sense!
Also, special thanks for you that, on top of reading my posts, take time to let comments and interact with other readers and myself.
I’m really glad to spend this second year anniversary with you - like-minded friends.
Hopefully we’ll celebrate some more birthdays together!
Cheers!
