Another Bloggiesta come and gone. Wow! That was one whirlwind of a weekend, but thankfully I was able to get quite a bit done.

Here’s a list of the things I was able to get done:

• Update my reviews on my “Reviews A-Z” page. (Again, shouldn’t take too long, but it needs to be done.) – Thanks to my lovely partner in crime over at Chick Lit Reviews…this is all done! Wahoo! Thank you Leah!
• Tag my reviews with age ranges and gender preferences for a future project. Done! Yay!
• Return the emails in my inbox. Yes, I know, kind of lame, but since Christmas I’ve fallen behind and I hate that. So this is a priority. Done! Yay!
• Write up reviews for the 5 or 6 books I’ve recently finished and schedule them for later postings.
• Finish up and send out the 5 or 6 author interviews I have lined up for the next couple of months. Done! Yay! Even emailed them all as well!
  
• How do you organize your books? A book lovers dream! Courtesy of Jenn from Jenn’s Bookshelf (I need some serious help in this area and in fact asked Natasha if it might be possible to have a challenge like this for that very reason. I can’t wait!) Done! Yay!
• Email out of control? Not staying on top of it? Email best practices and solutions. – Trish at Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin’? (Ummm…yeah, well as you read above my email is kind of crazy. Not insane, but it needs to be handled. So I’m sure this will help.) Done! Yay!

The few things I was really hoping to get accomplished, but wasn’t able to:

• Post my reviews to the following sites: Goodreads, LibraryThing, Indiebound, Amazon, Kidlitosphere, Book Army, B&N, etc. (I have a few to catch up on with this and I’d like to be all caught up.)
• The new year is a perfect time to reevaluate your blog. On blogging goals- Amy from My Friend Amy (Any chance you can take to reevaluate where you’re going with your blog can be a great one. I’m definitely interested in making it the best it can be, so I’ll be attempting this one!)

More than anything I’m excited for the few things I picked up along the way. A few ideas I gathered from other participants. I’m planning a few different pages: A To-Be Read/PIE List that I saw over at Aths’ site Rainy Day Reading, an “Upcoming Releases” page for each Children’s and Young Adult books, an author/illustrator page and a couple of other things.

All in all, I spent close to 15 hours this weekend working on things and I’m quite pleased with how things turned out. How about you?

It’s so weird. I can now call myself an official Bloggiesta veteran. This will be my third time participating, exactly a year after the first time I did. Wow!

So, what do I have planned this time around you might wonder? Well, a lot! I have so many hopes for this year coming up with my site, but a few housekeeping details stand in the way of progress. Not a lot, but a few things I’d like to tidy up. Then, I’d like to have some fun with the mini-challenges Natasha has planned!

Here’s my “official” list of to-do’s:

• Post my reviews to the following sites: Goodreads, LibraryThing, Indiebound, Amazon, Kidlitosphere, Book Army, B&N, etc. (I have a few to catch up on with this and I’d like to be all caught up.
• Update my reviews on my “Reviews A-Z” page. (Again, shouldn’t take too long, but it needs to be done.) – Thanks to my lovely partner in crime over at Chick Lit Reviews…this is all done! Wahoo! Thank you Leah!
• Tag my reviews with age ranges and gender preferences for a future project. Done! Yay!
• Return the emails in my inbox. Yes, I know, kind of lame, but since Christmas I’ve fallen behind and I hate that. So this is a priority. Done! Yay!
• Write up reviews for the 5 or 6 books I’ve recently finished and schedule them for later postings.
• Finish up and send out the 5 or 6 author interviews I have lined up for the next couple of months. Done! Yay! Even emailed them all as well!
  

That’s it! I know, it may look like a fair amount, but really it’s not too bad. Most can be completed with a couple of hours of “quiet time”, which I’ve already scheduled. Yay! Then it will be onto the mini-challenges!

A couple of the “new” Mini-Challenges I’m looking forward to…

• How do you organize your books? A book lovers dream! Courtesy of Jenn from Jenn’s Bookshelf (I need some serious help in this area and in fact asked Natasha if it might be possible to have a challenge like this for that very reason. I can’t wait!) Done! Yay!
• The new year is a perfect time to reevaluate your blog. On blogging goals- Amy from My Friend Amy (Any chance you can take to reevaluate where you’re going with your blog can be a great one. I’m definitely interested in making it the best it can be, so I’ll be attempting this one!)
• Email out of control? Not staying on top of it? Email best practices and solutions. – Trish at Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin’? (Ummm…yeah, well as you read above my email is kind of crazy. Not insane, but it needs to be handled. So I’m sure this will help.) Done! Yay!

And I think that’s it! Hopefully I’ll be able to accomplish a lot, but really enjoy chatting with everyone else.

The last two Bloggiesta’s I participated in I was also able to host a mini-challenge myself. So make sure to check them out and do some sprucing up of your own. Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge: It’s Not Cheating, for those of you in need of a “back-up” list, it’s perfect! And for those of you in need of Blog Stats make sure to check this one out first, It’s All About the Numbers.

So, what are your plans? Anything you’ve been planning just for this occasion? I’d love more suggestions!

Good luck to everyone involved! Above all, make sure to enjoy some fantastic food, cross off some goals, and enjoy the great company! I’ll see you around!
(And I apologize to my regular readers not interested in bloggiesta! Regular programming will resume very soon!)

Bloggiesta finished up this morning and I’m finally able to put together my wrap-up post. This time around Bloggiesta was a little different for me. With the Mini-Challenge that I hosted about Stats, I was able to help answer some questions via email and Twitter. It was really really fun! Sorry for any of you that were on the receiving end of my long winded emails, but when I get going with that type stuff I can go on for a long time. So, most of my time with Bloggiesta was spent doing that, BUT I did get a lot of other great tasks accomplished and I’m feeling pretty good.

So, this is what I started with when I began Bloggiesta:

• Schedule at least 14 Posts.
• Post my reviews to the following sites: Goodreads, LibraryThing, Indiebound, Amazon, Kidlitosphere, Book Army, B&N, etc.
• Set up a Calendar on Google.
  
• Organize my Author Interviews & Websites into a separate page.
• Gather a List of Bloggers I love and post a separate page.
• Create a Book News Page.
• Create an Awards Page.

Here’s the skinny on what I really accomplished:

• Set up a Calendar on Google. I was able to put this together, plus coordinate it with my Google Docs & Reminder Fox scheduling data so that I’m all planned out! YAY!
• Add more “Guests” to my “When I Was Young” Feature. I sent out a total of 15 requests and just looked again, I have 3 more to send out. Wohoo! This is a huge thing, because this is one of my favorite parts of the site and I want to see it keep going. So yay!
• Scheduled a total of 2 Reviews, but set up about 16 posts/reviews so they’re ready to go when I am finished with the books.
• Post all of my reviews to the following sites: Goodreads, LibraryThing, Indiebound, Amazon, Kidlitosphere, Book Army, B&N, etc. I’m just about done with all of this (although, I did give up on Book Army, every time I entered a review it went away to nowhere, boo!), but I still need to add them to the Kidlitosphere. All-in-all pretty good I think.
• Gather a List of Bloggers I love and post a separate page. This is the page titled “Links” and so far it’s not looking so hot. So, this is definitely still a work in progress.

Things I’m still planning on doing this coming week:

• Schedule out a few more posts.
• Organize my Author Interviews & Websites into a separate page.
• Create a Book News Page.
• Create an Awards Page.

All in all, pretty good. I’m so glad I was able to help so much this time around and I can’t wait to join in Bloggiesta again next time around. Although, next time I may just be a cheerleader, I seriously need a nap now. )

On to Day 3 of the 3rd Bloggiesta! Today was kind of rough. My hubby was able to go help someone move this morning and The Turkeybird decided it wanted to be up at 4:30 AM, which didn’t exactly bode well for my concentration. I was still able to press on and got a few things I wanted done accomplished. How about everyone else? Any fabulous new progress to report?

• Set up a Calendar on Google. Done!
• Add more “Guests” to my “When I Was Young” Feature – So far, I’m up to 14 (and I’ve emailed them all!), but would still love to schedule more!
• Schedule at least 14 Posts. – So far, I’ve done 14 reviews and some templates. Not bad. Still need a few more
• Post my reviews to the following sites: Goodreads, LibraryThing, Indiebound, Amazon, Kidlitosphere, Book Army, B&N, etc. (I’ve done about 20 and I’m still plugging away!)
• Organize my Author Interviews & Websites into a separate page.
• Gather a List of Bloggers I love and post a separate page.
• Create a Book News Page.
• Create an Awards Page.

Wish me luck and I’ll be stopping by a few of my fellow participants to see how they’re doing during my rest stops!

Make sure to check out my two Mini-Challenges! Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge: It’s All About the Numbers (learn all about how to utilize your stats to make your blog even better) and Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge: It’s Not Cheating (learn all about backing up that data you desperately don’t want to lose).

So, it’s day two of the 3rd Bloggiesta, you’re starting to lose a bit of speed and need a bit of a push. Pick up your favorite Mexican snack food and your must-have sweet and dig in! Saturdays are always great for getting tons done and I can’t wait! I’ve only accomplish a few things, but still been able to cross some difficult tasks off the list. Hopefully today will be a banner day and I’ll be able to cross of most of it. What do you think? You think I can? Let’s see how it goes!

• Schedule at least 14 Posts. – So far, I’ve done 2, with templates set up for about 7, just need to add reviews. Not bad.
• Post my reviews to the following sites: Goodreads, LibraryThing, Indiebound, Amazon, Kidlitosphere, Book Army, B&N, etc.
• Set up a Calendar on Google. Done!
  
• Organize my Author Interviews & Websites into a separate page.
• Gather a List of Bloggers I love and post a separate page.
• Create a Book News Page.
• Create an Awards Page.
• Add more “Guests” to my “When I Was Young” Feature – So far, I’m up to 10, but would still love to schedule more!

Wish me luck and I’ll be stopping by a few of my fellow participants to see how they’re doing during my rest stops!

Make sure to check out my two Mini-Challenges! Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge: It’s All About the Numbers (learn all about how to utilize your stats to make your blog even better) and Bloggiesta Mini-Challenge: It’s Not Cheating (learn all about backing up that data you desparately don’t want to lose).

I’m very excited to have the opportunity to host a Mini-Challenge for the 3rd Edition Bloggiesta put together by Natasha of Maw Books. The last Bloggiesta was my very first and I accomplished so much that I knew I wanted to participate again. So, without further babbling on my part…

As a book reviewer or someone just looking to improve their overall site, stats can be a very useful tool. This can also be a source of great stress and confusion for most bloggers, even those of us who have been doing it for some time now. So in an effort to help sort through the numbers and get to the information you really need to know we’re offering up this mini-challenge. The overall goal here though is to have fun, learn something new and hopefully improve on your already fabulous site!

Your assignment: Set up one account with a Stats Site and have some fun with it!

• Google Analytics (Personally, this is the one I use and I really like how easy it is to use.)
  *Added* WordPress users may want to install this plug-in to make it really easy to access your GA stats: Google Analytics for WordPress
• Woopra (Similar to Google Analytics just a different style.)
• Site Meter (I also use this as a backup, easy to grab stats. They also email you once a week.)
• StatCounter (Simple to use counter showing number of hits and location daily. Also, one of the few that work with WordPress.com websites.)
• IceRocket by Blog Tracker (Suggested by Stacy from A Novel Source)

Let’s Play Around with That Great Data Now: There are a few “Big” things that can get you started off in your journey with stats. Below is a list of suggestions to start with as well as some tips on where to find the information you’re looking for. Remember that the data you are looking at will only be from the date you started your Stats account, most don’t go back to your blog start date.

• Average Daily Hits. The number of people visiting your site everyday.
  Using Google Analytics click on the “Visitor Trending” Tab and then “Visits”. This will tell you the average number of visits per day based on the dates you put in the top right box.
• Average Monthly Page Views. The number of “pages” viewed each month. Pages can be tabs, menus, archives, anything that takes them away from the home page.
  Using Google Analytics click on the “Visitor Trending” Tab and then “Pageviews”. This will tell you the number of pageviews for your site based on the dates you put in the top right box. If you want to calculate your monthly number, just pull out your calculator and divide the number by of months during this time.
• Average Monthly Unique Visitors. The number of “brand new” visitors to your site.
  Using Google Analytics click on the “Visitor Trending” Tab and then “Absolute Unique Visitors”. This will tell you the number of unique visitors for your site based on the dates you put in the top right box. If you want to calculate your monthly number, just pull out your calculator and divide the number by of months during this time.
• Current RSS Subscribers.
  Make sure to head over to Puss Reboots Mini-Challenge to set up your RSS feed. Once this is done you can install a button that tells you how many subscribers you have or just check it from time to time.

Additional Tools:

• Problogger: If you haven’t subscribed to Problogger’s site, I would highly recommend it. He always has a ton of great tips for improving your site. His article 17 Statistics to Monitor on Your Blog is perfect for anyone at any level and will give you some extra fun things to look at with your blog stats over time.
• Google Analytics Blog: This is perfect because if you have a question, they’re sure to have an answer. If you are a beginner, they even have a category to use to get started called Beginner Topics.
• YouTube also has a great video by Google called, Beginning Analytics: Interpreting and Acting on Your Data, just don’t pay attention to the bit about e-commerce unless you’re really interested in it. There are also some other great Analytics videos on there you can check out.
• Smashing Voice also has a fantastic Guide to Using Google Analytics and Tools.
• Woopra has a great set of posts all about Using Woopra, as well as a video review that has me thinking about trying it out.

Remember, this should be fun! Play around with the stats and use them to make your site better. If you notice a particular month has low visits, take a look at what you blogged about and compare it to a more visited month. You may find that your visitors like a certain post more than another. Use these tools to keep improving and enjoying your blogging experience.

I’m by no means an expert, but if you have questions, again, feel free to contact me either on Twitter, via email (the1stdaughter {at} gmail {dot} com) or on my contact page.

Natasha has some wonderful prizes for those of you who participate in these challenges so once completed this challenge come back and let me know how it went in the comments below. You have until the end of Bloggiesta to complete this mini-challenge and report.

Enjoy the Bloggiesta festivities and ‘Ole’!