Happy anniversary Rahway Rising

Nov. 1 really snuck up on me this year. I don’t think I expected to still be doing this when I started three years ago, but here we are with Post #373.

I started out looking to post once a week — at least according to the very first blog post. I’ve gotten into the habit of aiming for two to three times a week if there’s something to tell, but it really ebbs and flows: some weeks I can’t find the time to get to the computer, other weeks I’ve got blog posts piling up (at least in my head).

I usually aim to provide some readership data in my anniversary posts but I haven’t had much time to compile anything about the most popular individual posts over the last year. Perhaps you’d like to share some your observations of the changes you’ve seen around town since we started?

We do get about 1,000 visits in a good week, and more than 200 visits during an average weekday. Since we started tracking data on Google Analytics in January 2008, in all, we’ve had 36,000+ visitors, 125,000+ visits and 205,000 page views. Some other current stats:

– 289 e-mail subscribers
– 190 friends on Facebook
– 183 fans on Facebook
– 95 followers on Twitter

All that has translated to maybe a penny a week through Google Ads since we gave that a shot starting in summer 2008. That’s not why I do it (thank goodness!). We’re always open to trying new stuff, even doing the Facebook and Twitter thing, as well as two happy hour events in the past year (and yes, we should do that again soon…). The mission of the blog remains the same: to provide information about what’s going on with redevelopment efforts throughout town, given the dearth of coverage.

I think the most fun for me are the random emails from readers, either inquiring about a certain project or something they saw, offering suggestions, or just a pleasant note to tell me how much they enjoy the blog. Whether you take an active or passive role in this little effort of mine, thanks for reading.

2nd anniversary blog post
1st anniversary blog post