Looking Back On The Past Two And Half Years.

On a cold October day in 2007 I sat down in front of my computer and said to myself..” Self, you need to learn about all this social media stuff you are spouting as the future” So… I picked a topic, a passion… the restoration of Sylvia to try it out. I thought, I will do a posting a week and that will be that. If there are readers, fine, if not, fine. It’s about learning a new way to communicate. As things started to develop I realized that the hobby had no such outlet yet and the only real communication was a couple magazines, two forums  and  boat shows. Nothing spontaneous and news related. I also felt that if you were new to the hobby, your only source of general beginer information was through boat brokers, ebay or clubs. And if you were at a club web site or on the forums it could be intimidating to jump in and look like a complete novis. And since I am comfortable in my ignorance regarding these boats and in a new communication format.. What the hell. I got nothing to loose and everything to gain. I recall folks from the ACBS asking, what was my motivation? There had to be a secret reason that I was doing this. Why would someone spend each day doing a story on Classic boats? Where is the money, Where is the pay back.. The answer was, and is very simple. The reason is because its fun, and in a strange way, it’s helpful to my sanity. I get to each morning of my life, go boating. And if I can share that with the world.. All the better, I get to go boating with a mess of fellow Woody Boaters, and that’s a thousand times more fun than doing it alone. So.. little did I know the ramifications of such motivation…

I just looked over our reader stats… To date.. There have been close to 500,000 pageveiws, with close to 90,000 unique readers, who, half of come back for more to the tune of close to 300,000 visits. Remember this is not a web site with boats for sale or other content. It’s really one page with a new story each day.. These are amazing numbers for the format we have, and based on the size of the hobby, exciting to say the least. It means we are reaching new boaters, we are reaching around the world as well. Woody Boaters in Russia, New Zealand, Netherlands, Finland, Germany, France, Australia, Serbia,Yes even Africa.. The only place that we never seem to crack… Wyoming… What in the heck is wrong with Wyoming.. Ha…  We are now humming along at over 30,000 pageviews a month with about 13,000 visitors and 7,000 unique readers a month… If I am not wrong here, and I might be. That now makes Woody Boater the most read publication of sorts in the hobby. Bigger than, the Rudder, and Classic Boating. I realize it may be like comparing apples and oranges. But 7,000 unique readers is a good number, We are also in some cases the #1 lead for our sponsors. Last year for example we drove over 14,000 readers to one of our top sponsors. With a click rate of over 8% OK that’s geek talk.. BUT, in the world of banner click through rates.. 0.10% click through rate is trophy worthy.. 8% is almost unbelievable.. in fact I don’t believe it, but my web geek people and there calculators tell me its so. So, that’s it. You have just wasted a good 5 minutes according to my stats on reading this, and you have nothing to show for it. Other than we have bored you with me isms.. We here at Woody Boater consider each reader as part of the family. I suppose it’s nice to know from time to time, that everything is good in Woodyboaterville. So from all of us here..Pat your self on the back… And thanks.. You all make this fun…If you are in Clayton this year.. Stop by and say HI! we will all be there for the first time since Mt Dora. Texx, Krunch and I… We will be the ones with the hats on!