In an effort to keep myself accountable, I’m sharing monthly progress updates for my 2019 goals.

Reach 70,000 monthly blog page views.

Here are my 2019 benchmarks and progress to reach my monthly blog page views goal.

January – target: 37,343, actual: 42,806
February – 40,312, actual: 43,398
March -43,281, actual: 51,102
April – 46,250, actual: 65,303
May – 49,219, actual: 33,309
June – 52,188, actual: 47,864
July – 55,157, actual: 13,027
August – 58,126, actual: 6,726
September – 61,095
October – 64,064
November – 67,033
December – 70,000

I knew that unless my traffic turned around significantly, August would be a lower traffic month than July. In July, I still had decent numbers through the first third of the month. August started low and remained low. The good news is that except for a little dip toward the end of the month, things haven’t gotten worse. The bad news is that despite a lot of hard work, things haven’t gotten better either.

It’s extremely discouraging, to say the least. But I’m trying to stay optimistic. I’ve been working behind the scenes on a lot of back-end tasks, optimizing older fall content, and preparing new fall content. July and August have never been my best traffic months. So I’m hopeful things will still start to improve soon, even if my numbers are way below what I’d like.

Page view tactics

There are two primary methods I’m using to achieve my page views goal, which are as follows.

Publish posts weekly with two evergreen posts per month. Check. In August, I published 2-3 posts weekly with the following evergreen posts: 50 Gift Ideas for Mom on Amazon, Wisconsin Dells Vacation with Toddlers, Free Adoption Quote Printables, Common Adoption Mistakes to Avoid, 50 Quick Healthy Cold Lunch Ideas for Work, Raising Toddlers and Cats Together, and 50 Free Vintage Dictionary Page Printables.
Maintain consistent social sharing, particularly for high traffic and seasonal posts. Check. I’ve kept up with social shares for all new posts, working to create a minimum 2-3 pins for all new posts. I have optimized a ton of old posts, including the vast majority of my fall posts and a few holiday posts as well.

Reach 7,000 Pinterest followers with three million monthly viewers.

Here are my 2019 benchmarks and progress to reach my Pinterest followers and viewers goal.

January – target: 4,177, 1.3, actual: 4,296, 1.58
February – 4,434, 1.44, actual: 4,630, 1.66
March – 4,691, 1.5, actual: 4,980, 1.82
April – 4,948, 1.77, actual: 5,356, 2.38
May – 5,205, 1.96, actual: 5,598, 1.43
June – 5,462, 2, actual: 5,936, 1.98
July – 5,719, 2.14, actual: 6,134, 950K
August – 5,976, 2.28, actual: 6,322, 704K
September – 6,233, 2.42
October – 6,490, 2.56
November – 6,747, 2.7
December – 7,000, 3

I ended August 2019 with 6,322 Pinterest followers. I’m still ahead of my projected target because I had so much growth during the first half of the year. It’s likely that I’ll continue to meet my projected targets. However, none of it seems to matter right now as my Pinterest engagement is still so ridiculously low.

Pinterest tactics

Until May, my 2019 Pinterest strategies had been as follows:

Schedule content from other bloggers via Tailwind.
Schedule my own content via Tailwind.
Manage my photography group board.

I am still using all of these strategies. Since May, I’ve been experimenting with a few new techniques. The following outlines what I’ve been doing the past month.

Create at least 2-3 Pinterest graphics for all new evergreen posts. Currently, I’m sharing one graphic through all of my boards before I start the next one.
Create at least one new Pinterest graphic for all older evergreen posts and use it for new social shares.
Pin blog content shares on older posts right from the blog as opposed to re-pinning from Pinterest. (Pinterest claims that it’s really important, as the pins appear new in the system this way. As far as blog views go, it hasn’t seem to make a difference thus far.)
Manual pinning daily. I still schedule the vast majority of my Pinterest content. I used to pin manually daily, and it did help. But I got away from it and am making it a regular routine again.
I started a second group board in July. It’s very early in the process, and I have no idea if it will help at all. I’ll share more about the new board as it develops.
Participate in Tailwind Tribes. I’m grandfathered into the base Tailwind Tribes plan because I tested the feature when they first released it. I used it a bit the first year or so it was out and then got away from it. I’ve joined a handful of new tribes and am participating regularly. I am getting re-pins from it, mostly on fall content, so we’ll see if it makes any difference over the coming months.

Finish and publish ebook #2.

Blog Photography Hacks went live on April 1! Please pick up your copy if you haven’t already. I really appreciate your support for this new project.

Ebook #3 remained completely on hold in August. We’ll see how things go as we move into fall.

Publish one article per week on Constant Content.

In August, I published the following articles on Constant Content.

Ways to Cozy Up Your Home for Fall
Shopping Together for an Engagement Ring
How to Treat Your Bridesmaids Right
How to Make a Small Bathroom Look Larger

I had two sales in August: Benefits of a Kitchen Island, which I published back in September 2016, and Ways to Enjoy More Outdoor Living This Fall, which I published back in September 2018, for a total of $76.70.

Finish out all 2018 and earlier vacation photos and keep up with current photo editing.

Vacation photos

Currently, I have the following sets of vacation photos not yet finished that I’d like to wrap up in 2019. The notes in parenthesis are my progress at the end of 2018. The notes following the parenthesis in bold text are my progress thus far in 2019.

November 2015 – Hawaii (haven’t finished editing) Finished editing.
August 2016 – Montana (haven’t finished editing) Finished out completely. Created and ordered a photo book, backed up edited photos, cleared out all RAW files.
October 2016 – New Orleans (finished editing, need to make a photo book) Finished out completely. Created and ordered a photo book, backed up edited photos, cleared out all RAW files.
May/June 2017 – Mediterranean cruise (finished editing, need to make a photo book and order prints) Finished out completely. Created and ordered a photo book, ordered prints, backed up edited photos, cleared out all RAW files.
September 2018 – Montana (haven’t finished editing) Finished editing.
October 2018 – Washington D.C. (haven’t finished editing) Finished editing.

I still need to finish out the remaining vacation photos this fall. As is usually the case at the end of the summer, I am way behind on current photo editing right now. I did make some progress in August and anticipate being in a slightly better position again by the end of September.

Read 40 books.

In August, I read the following books:

My 2019 reading total is 43 books, which means that I hit this goal in August. I’m not planning to slow down my reading pace any time soon and will continue to share what I’ve been reading in my goal updates through the end of the year.