Partners in Fire posted monthly updates sharing their growth strategies for the first fifty months as web publishers. We decided to keep these old articles for posterity and to give new bloggers a realistic view of what to expect.
Here is our 39th update, edited for grammar, clarity, and to add a little extra context with the benefit of hindsight.
39th Month Update
Although we didn’t reach 10K pageviews this period, it was a short month, and we were on track to hit that over the 30-day period.
In the 28 days of February, we had over 9,500 pageviews, only 500 shy of the target. I consider this a win. We generally have over 300 pageviews daily, and we would have hit the mark if the month had a full thirty days.
Readership
In this period, we saw only one day with fewer than 200 users and two days right at that 200 mark.
Saturdays are typically the worst traffic days because people are out engaging with life rather than reading articles online.
We understand.
Traffic Drivers
Organic Search
Organic search continues to be our top traffic driver, with over 60% of our users finding us via search engine.
Although we still had fewer than 5000 visitors via organic search this month, we would have been very close to that target if the month had 30 days.
Top Pages
Our top page remains “How to be a Twitch Affiliate,” which brought in just under a third of our organic traffic.
The percentage dropped slightly from last month, but that’s because I’ve been working hard to spread the love. We don’t want all our eggs in one basket.
The article eventually lost its ranking, highlighting the need for multiple articles to rank in order to maintain organic traffic.
Our articles “How to Get 500 Twitter Followers” and “FU Money” came in second and third, with 8% and 7% of the organic traffic, respectively.
I’m thrilled to see “FU money” rank and drive traffic, as it was one of the first posts I wrote using all the SEO tips and tools I’ve learned over the last few months.
It took about six months for it to get to page one of Google, but it’s exciting that it’s finally there.
Hopefully, many of the posts I wrote after that will be following it.
With the most recent Google updates, the article on FU Money finally fell from the top ten. It’s now on page 2. With the transformation from Twitter to X, our article on getting Twitter followers is no longer relevant. We tried to update it for the new platform, but it no longer ranks.
Referrals
Referrals were our second-biggest driver of traffic during this period. Over a thousand users found us via other websites.
Most of those were from our link on Money Saved is Money Earned’s MSN feature last month. The power of having a blogging network is real!
Money Saved Money Earned is no longer an active website.
Our second-biggest source of referral traffic is still Github. It’s a platform that people use to build software. I have no idea why so many of my posts have been featured there, but hey, the internet does what it does, right?
I’ll take it!
Direct Hits
During our 39th month, about 700 users found us directly. I’m still unsure if this is just traffic that Google doesn’t know how to record, folks reading our newsletter, or folks directly typing “Partners in Fire” into the URL box to find us.
Whatever it is, I’m happy with it, and I’ll take it!
Speaking of newsletters, if you aren’t signed up yet, what are you waiting for? We have so much content that I’m sure there’s something for everyone.
Sign up today!
Social Media
Partners in Fire is still floundering on social media. This month, we had a little less than five hundred total users from social platforms combined, which is pretty similar to previous months.
Pinterest was our highest-performing social platform. A little under three hundred users found us on the platform.
Overall, I don’t count this as a bad thing. I hardly did anything on Pinterest this month. I pinned about one pin for each article (if that!), and that’s it.
This month has been exhausting for me, and unfortunately, this is one of the things that fell by the wayside.
However, the fact that my Pinterest traffic didn’t drop despite my lack of involvement is a testament to the course I took on Pinterest SEO. After all, Pinterest is a search engine.
The SEO strategies are different from those with Google, but the same concepts apply. I applied them in previous months (not entirely, but something is better than nothing), and my traffic didn’t drop when I didn’t have time for the platform.
I’ll call that a win.
About 75 users visited us from Twitter this month, similar to previous months. The interesting thing about Twitter is that it’s one of the best vehicles for driving traffic when you are just starting, but after that, it kind of stagnates if you don’t put a ton of effort into crafting the perfect tweet to drive engagement (hint: I don’t).
But it’s the best platform for networking.
My goal on Twitter is to have over 10K followers by the end of the year (which is about double what I have now). It’s a challenging goal, but I think I can achieve it.
We never achieved that goal. After the buy-out, investing in the platform didn’t seem worthwhile.
We hardly got any traffic from Facebook during this period, which isn’t surprising as I’m not focused on the platform. Still, 38 users for configuring a plug-in a few months ago isn’t bad.
Content
Partners in Fire is publishing fantastic content. I’m always going to say that, but it’s true. Our eclectic mix of interesting articles spanning multiple niches ensures something for everyone.
We started the month with a post that’s the antithesis of all finance content everywhere.
Yes, we urged people to spend money! Finance isn’t about scrimping and saving and being miserly for your entire life. It’s about being intentional with your spending so you enjoy your life.
We returned to our financial roots with two money articles. The first is a massive guide to achieving financial freedom that cuts down on the “you must do this” and helps you build your own path with just a few building blocks. The second is an extensive post on financial goals that will help you set SMART financial goals and give you some great tips on how to achieve them.
Of course, we all published various Passion Fire content as well. We started with a complete beginner’s guide to Discord Bots as part of our series on navigating Discord (one of the best apps for engaging with your audience, by the way).
Next, we published an epic post celebrating the Legend of Zelda series’ 35th anniversary. We even got some of our gamer friends to write about their favorite games in the franchise! It was a magnificent article.
We rounded out the month with an art post on the different types of watercolor paper (if you’re considering dabbling in watercolors, you need to read this – all paper is NOT created equally!) and a lifestyle article on the benefits of living in a small town. Those of you thinking about geoarbitrage should read this before taking that leap!
We’re proud of the content we published this month.
How Are We Going to Improve Our Readership?
Our readership is improving slowly but surely. The main goal is the same as it has been for a while—to improve our readership via SEO.
It’s a slow and painful buildup, but I think focusing our efforts here will prove to be the best move in the long run.
I’m also still working on increasing my reach via YouTube. I almost have enough subscribers there to get a branded domain name, so if any of you readers want to help me out and subscribe to the channel, I’d greatly appreciate it!
We did get a branded domain on YouTube but haven’t had time to focus on the platform. With all the changes in Google in recent years, we aren’t sure SEO growth is still the future. Instead, we’re focusing on fixing our content and creating a trusted brand.
Monetization
Partners in Fire made money this month. It’s not enough to recoup the losses from last month, but it’s still sufficient to cover the expenses for this month, and that’s a start!
Income
Affiliates – $493.03
We made a little under five hundred dollars this month in affiliates. Most of it was through the SEO Hustle, the fantastic blogging mastermind group that gives me access to MOZ and some other SEO tools. They offer an affiliate program for members who get new folks in. But, we only get paid if a new person completes the three-month (nearly free!) trial and decides to stick with the group. The trial is only a buck; you get access to many tools and resources to help you build your blog and increase traffic.
The Insiders are still active, but they no longer offer affiliate commissions.
Ads – $59.68
We should make more than sixty bucks in ads at 10K pageviews. This is why one of my top goals is to get into a better ad network. But fifty bucks is better than nothing, so I’m chugging along with this one until we get enough views to get into something better.
Total – $552.71
Expenses
Money Mix: $170
ConvertKit: $30
Blog Tools: $65
Total: $265
It takes money to make money, right?
I spent $265 on my blog this month, which includes my mastermind group, a better email list, and some miscellaneous blogging tools, like a VA, to help post things on forums for me (I have to try stuff, right?)
Net Income: $287.71
Continued Growth
I’m investing so much money into the blog because I believe I can grow it into a successful business. We will continue to invest in SEO and building our email list, and I think that by the middle of the year, we will be regularly making money!
Just found your blog. Great content and the transparency on this post was amazing (I need to try Pinterest more actively)! Keep up the good work and you’ll soon be getting 10k views a day.