100 Posts Later. What You Liked. What I Learned.

Welcome back to My Early Retirement Journey! All three of my loyal readers, I'm so glad you're here! I have reached 100 posts (actually a week or so ago). Praise the Lord! Yeah, I took it there.  Anyway, for the two that I didn't just offend, keep reading for a recap of the 10 most viewed posts and a few lessons learned along the way. Stay tuned for my next blog update publishing soon. (In case you missed the last one, check it out here!)

Let's get into it. Per Google Analytics...

Here are my Top 10 posts:

Maybe you read some. But in case you missed any, here they are for your browsing pleasure...

1. Why Yes, This Is My $300,000 Student Loan Repayment Plan: REPAYE 2018


2. How Being A Victim of Identity Theft Helped Me Take Control of My Finances and Pay Off $30,000 of Debt in 2 Years


3. Review | 3 Free Spreadsheets You Might Want To Try


4. Why I Love My Roku So Much! (Cable-whathat?)


5. A Bajillion Tiny Little Indisputable Facts About Life In Your 30s


6. 7 Easy Meals When You Need A Break: A Listicle


7. What No One Tells You About Managing Your Aging Parents' Finances


8. Enron and Madoff and Ponzi! Oh My!: How to Background Check Your Financial Professional


9. Financial Update | June 2018 Income and Expenses


10. My Week Ending May 18, 2018: Royal Wedding, Sick Again, Misery

Notes. The top ten are certainly a surprise. I see no ostensible pattern.  Do you?

• The top two don't surprise me much. That seems to be the reason a lot of people start a personal finance blog.


• Three of ten have some sort of personal finance number in the actual title.


• Four of ten have some variation of the word finance.


• The Roku post is certainly a surprise.


• A couple of my more personal stories made it on the list, so that's at least hopeful because I enjoy writing those a bit more.

Lessons learned:

• Do not be consumed by readership, comments, and page views. It will kill your joy.


• It's pretty easy to start a blog. It's pretty hard to get anyone to read it.


• It's exciting to see your words in print no matter which way you look at it. While new comments are pretty motivating, write for you. Write what you wish was already written for you to read.


• It's pretty easy to be seduced by the success of others. It can be pretty uneasy getting over the low of not quite realizing that level of success just yet.


• Join the community of your blog's niche. It's a great way to make connections, get tips, and get help!

What I learned about myself:

• I still enjoy creating content, writing, publishing etc.


• I am still looking for new ways to establish myself online while staying true to my voice. This means there are still some things I censor until I see a more established blogger doing it first.


• I am still trying a variety of things to figure out what works. This means I'm still browsing at least five or so blogs a week and commenting and sometimes digging deeper into their archives to see what I can take away from their success journey.


• I am still not aggressively pursuing making my blog profitable. By this I mean not writing content that is clickable or shareable or marketable or affiliate-linkable. For now, I'm still writing content I want to write that documents my early retirement journey from the perspective of a single girl. That was my objective after all. I'll talk more about blog strategies and changes in my next blog update. Subscribe now so you don't miss it! :)


• Lastly, blogging is easily my cheapest hobby. Prior to this my favorite two things to do were eat takeout and watch TV. They still are, but TV costs me $80/mon with a cable subscription. Takeout can run me around $200/mon. Blogging is $4/mon or if you click through my link $3/mon. That's about 10 cents a day. 10 cents! Even when I play the lottery with my office pool, it's $2/week. Blogging is the best. It really is, and not just because of the affiliate link I'm promoting. I was obviously blogging way before I was an affiliate! I strongly encourage you to start your own blog. Even if you only publish six posts - that's six pieces of your life you're sharing with the world!
  
  
  
  • Read more about my blogging journey:
    
    
    
    • 101 Things You Will Encounter Your 1st Week Blogging….about FIRE or Personal Finance
    
    
    • How To Stay Motivated Your 1st Month Blogging