Every month on the 10th I post some sort of “Top Ten” list. It’s very funny that two of these Top Ten posts made the Top Ten list for 2015! Of the top ten posts, only three were written in 2015, which I find very interesting, too.
My blog is not monetized.
I don’t promote advertising, and I have no affiliate links. So checking
out my stats is only an activity I do out of pure curiosity and fun. If there are patterns, I just ignore them
because I write for fun, for my family, and for the pure enjoyment of receiving
comments and feedback from readers.
Here are the top ten blog posts from Nutfield Genealogy -
in reverse order…
#10. "Plan ahead for genealogy research without Family Tree
Maker – Part 1 of an ongoing series"
The
retirement of Family Tree Maker software was big news late in 2015, and this
post barely made it to the top 10 list.
It barely made a little over 1,000 hits this past month according to my statistics. Not bad for a post from just a few weeks ago.
#9. "Hezekiah Wyman
and the Legend of the White Horseman"
This
blog post is from 2011 and gets a lot of hits around Patriot’s Day (April 19th-
the anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord- when this episode in
history took place). I’m not sure why so
many people are googling the story of Hezekiah Wyman, the guerilla sharp
shooter who picked off many of the British regulars as they retreated back
towards Boston. It’s a good story, but rarely found in any history books.
#8. "The Five Kernels
of Corn Myth at Thanksgiving"
This is
another perennial favorite, and gets hundreds of hits every Thanksgiving since
it was first published in 2013. I should try a re-write next Thanksgiving with
updated information.
#7. "Ten Things to
Know About Researching a Pilgrim in Your Family Tree"
This
post blew up my statistics for 2015, and made November one of my best months,
passing over 60,000 hits over all for that month. Pilgrim
stories are very popular on my blog (see #8 above).
#6. "A Funny Thing
Happened on Our Way to Pick up Photo Prints"
This is
another perennial favorite, and was picked up by Pinterest last year and still
gets most of its hits referred from Pinterest. This is interesting since I stopped using
Pinterest around the same time that this post was published. I guess the blog post sharing on Pinterest
has taken on a life of its own with me even promoting my blogs anymore.
#5. "Fruitlands
exhibit of “New England Portraits” "
Two
years ago this blog post was picked up by a knitting website (one of the
featured folk art portraits shows a woman knitting), and went on a mini viral
trip that still draws a lot of knitters to my blog from the "Ravelry" website. I hope they learn to love genealogy as much
as knitting!
#4. "Surname Saturday
~ FOWLE of Charlestown and Woburn, Massachusetts"
It is
very funny to me that this particular family FOWLE made the top ten list. They are not a very well known family. Didn’t come on the Mayflower. No
Revolutionary War generals. No presidential or royal connections. Its a true mystery why the FOWLE post has
thousands of hits.
#3. "10 Unexpected
Places to Find Family History Online"
This
blog post from earlier in 2015 has over 6,000 hits and still gets hundreds of
hits each month. It will be interesting
to see if it remains popular and stays on the top ten list next year, too.
#2. "Flora Stewart –
Black History Month in Londonderry"
The
photo of former house slave Flora Stewart that was published with this blog
post went viral on Pinterest two years ago.
It was picked up by several African American websites and chat groups,
and I still get many hits from some very
interesting Black history websites. I’m
glad this one was so popular, and that this obscure housemaid from Londonderry,
New Hampshire is becoming so famous online!
#1. "A Favorite Christmas
Gift! You might want one, too!"
OK,
this one is barely about genealogy, but it continues to be a favorite on my
blog. Right away, back in 2012 it was
picked up by Pinterest, Buzzfeed,, Tipsted and other crafty type websites and
blogs. It has over 200,000 hits and grows by leaps and bounds, especially every
Christmas and Mother’s Day. This past
month It gained another 18,000 hits. I hope that a few of the crafty readers
also pick up a love of family history and check out my other blog posts, too!
Top Ten Traffic Sources for 2015
1. Google
2. BuzzFeed
3. Pinterest
4. Facebook
5. Nutfield Genealogy
6. Bing
7. Yahoo
8. Google.UK
9. Tipsted
10. Clark Howard
First blog post - 27 July 2009
Total posts 2077
Published comments (minus spam) 4161
Page views all time history 1, 521,235 (as of January 1, 2016)
Top Five Search Keywords (phrases)
1. "White Horse"
2. "Nutfield Genealogy"
3. "Flora Stewart"
4. "Thanksgiving Proclamation"
5. "Tombstone"
Total Blog Posts by Year
2009 - 75 posts
2010 - 337 posts
2011 - 341 posts
2012 - 346 posts
2013 - 349 posts
2014 - 309 posts
2015 - 291 posts (In the last two years I moved and then had a grandbaby- good excuses?)
Total number of views of these pages:
"Surnames to 9 Generations" 16,640
"Descendants of Thomas Wilkinson" 11,665
"Descendants of Samuel Wilkinson" 7,649
"Awards" 6,180
"Honor Roll Project" 6,169 (this has moved to its own webpage)
"New England Genealogy Bloggers" 5,709
----------------------------------------------
Published under a Creative Commons License
Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Top Ten Blog Posts for 2015", Nutfield Genealogy, posted January 10, 2016, ( http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/01/top-ten-blog-posts-for-2015.html: accessed [access date]).
Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Top Ten Blog Posts for 2015", Nutfield Genealogy, posted January 10, 2016, ( http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2016/01/top-ten-blog-posts-for-2015.html: accessed [access date]).
No comments:
Post a Comment