Starting off the new year just a week ago means that I am still in a place of self-reflection about the last year of my life.
As an avid reader, my Goodreads goal is very important to me. Throughout 2018 I did not put pressure on myself to reach a certain number. As the year was coming to a close I realized I was scarily close to 200 books. A feat I have not accomplished since 2015. So with about a week left in 2018, I buckled down and picked the shortest ten books on my TBR. I crossed the finish line the afternoon of new year’s eve.
I did not know how to how to quantify my blog the same way I did my Goodreads goal. One might suggest opening up my google analytics and looking at the raw numbers, but they do not tell the whole story. So instead of focusing on how many people clicked on my blog, I instead want to focus on all the opportunities I had this year because of my blog.
This year I reviewed for many authors including pioneers of the NA genre and authors that I have been reading for years. I have reviewed for Jamie McGuire, Alessandra Torre, Jennifer L. Armentrout, Emma Scott, Lauren Blakely, Emma Hart, Emma Chase, Melanie Harlow, Jay Crownover, and Karina Halle. Three of these authors (Jennifer L. Armentrout, Jay Crownover, and Karina Halle) are three of my top five favourite authors. The amount of times I cried over emails telling me that I was accepted for ARCs, I could not even tell you how many happy tears I have shed.
Going into 2019 the main goal for my blog is not to grow an audience, but to create True Fans. This week’s reading, Kevin Kelly’s essay 1,000 True Fans, drove home ideas surrounding creating and honing a dedicated audience is more important than creating a large audience. My background pertaining to when my reading met my online social presence was on Youtube. A platform like Youtube is always going to be about the numbers, and those who have a million subscribers are going to have more success than those with a thousand fans. But YouTube is where YA books have a home, not NA. New Adult books live in Facebook Groups and on blogs, spaces that are inhabited by what Kevin Kelly calls “true fans.”
I function as a true fan online myself. I go full in, head first with everything that I love in any way I can support. Those are the type of people I want in my audience and who I want to be communicating and connecting with.
As 2019 is upon us I have already finished my first ARC and I achieved within this first week a huge reviewer milestone. I was accepted onto an author’s official review team (Nicole Williams’ team). This means I will receive and reviewer all of an author’s books early without the hassle of applying over and over again each time a new book comes out. It is these achievements that demonstrate what I am accomplishing with my blog.
Most importantly going into this next year, more reviews, more posts, more connections. This blog is here to stay and here to flourish.
