Over 2018, For the Sake of Good Taste really started to hit its stride in terms of where it’s going in the future. As I nailed this down, my ideas for 2019 blogging goals really became crystal clear! We might not have accomplished all of our (admittedly ambitious) 2018 goals, but I’m confident this year can be bigger and better.
Like last year, I’m sharing my yearly blogging goals (and, later, my personal goals as well!) with all of you. I hope to be a bit better at updating my progress throughout the year, too, so stay tuned!
Quadruple our traffic
Once again, I’m setting “quadruple our traffic” as a blogging goal for the year. We didn’t quite reach our target in 2018, but we’ve continued to grow in leaps and bounds and I have no doubt that this year can be even better! I’m rounding the quadrupled number for simplicity’s sake.
For record-keeping, here are our 2018 stats and, from there, our 2019 goal stats:
Page views:
2018: 9,530
Goal: 38,000
Sessions:
2018: 4,118
Goal: 15,000
Users:
2018: 5,250
Goal: 21,000
And, while these aren’t being tripled exactly, I’d like to improve the average time spent on the site (spend some time delving into the archives!) as well as our bounce rate.
Average Time Spent:
2018: 1:55
Goal: 5:00
Bounce Rate:
2018: 57.94%
Goal: 25%
Increase our retention
Again, this is an important goal for the year. I love gaining new readers, but I want our already-loyal followers to keep coming back, too! My goal for this one is 40% returning traffic, 60% new; last year, we ended up at just 4.1% vs. 95.9%.
Social Media
Facebook was a bit of a pain in the neck throughout 2018, but we otherwise did remarkably well on our 2018 social media goals! With that in mind, I’m hoping to once again blow it out of the water when it comes to our primary social media channels this year.
I’m including LinkedIn and Quora here, too, though they don’t quite fit the standard “social media” profile. Quora has proved to be a really great source of traffic (the key is to give really helpful answers to relevant questions!). And while I haven’t really utilised LinkedIn much in terms of blogging growth, I’m hoping to develop it throughout the year.
For LinkedIn, I plan to track how many times I share blog updates, rather than the likes/followers I’m tracking for other networks.
So, our 2019 social media goals:
Facebook: 150 likes
Twitter: 2,000 followers
Instagram: 1,000 followers
Pinterest: 750 followers
BlogLovin’: 100 followers
LinkedIn: 100 updates
Quora: 50 followers
Feature four guest posts
This breaks down to at least one a quarter and doubles our 2018 goal. Since we were able to share three guest posts in 2018, I’m confident we can have at least four amazing bloggers visit this year!
We’ve already got one guest post lined up for later this month, so so far, so good!
Are you a blogger who’d like to learn more? Check out our media kit and shoot us an email!
Share two guests posts
I didn’t set a goal to guest post on other blogs in 2018, but I’d really like to do so this year. I actually did share three last year despite the lack of a formal goal, so I’m hoping to keep up that momentum!
Are you a blogger looking for guest posters? Check out our media kit and shoot us an email!
Work with five brands
As our stats continue to improve, I’m confident that we can get even more brands excited to work with For the Sake of Good Taste!
I’m also planning to pitch a few brands directly, something that I have yet to do successfully (I tried once with my last blog, to no avail!). It’s moderately terrifying, but I’m going to do it!
Are you a brand who’d like to learn more? Check out our media kit and shoot us an email!
Create three original products
With our upcoming ebook and a course already in the works, this one should be relatively painless. A successful launch on the other hand? Well, fingers crossed!
Swap It! should be coming your way later this quarter, with the course later in the year. I’m still brainstorming some ideas for a third product, so let me know if you’ve got any suggestions!
Fellow bloggers, what are your 2019 blogging goals?
