The
vagaries of the calendar created an alignment of Thanksgiving Day with a slightly less important event, the one year anniversary of
http://www.ultimatesportsinsider.com/. One year ago, I wrote my first blog entry "
College rankings and the athletic solution". I'm sure it stands as one of my least read postings. Each day after it was written, I would check my Google Analytics to see if I had achieved ESPN-like readership. I was part of the global conversation and of course Google would have thousands of people reading my postings in short order. Reality check - it took nearly 45 days, and another 9 postings to reach double digit readership for a single day. Needless to say, growth was slow.
In the last 365 days, an additional 113 postings have focused on a variety of topics with the
economic environment and athletic budgets serving as the primary issue by a wide margin. My favorite topic is the
RPI. And the posting that I most enjoyed writing also received the most attention -
Sports Leadership by the Stadium Lights. The result has been steady growth.
Today, USI (some friends like to refer to the blog this way, but the domain name is already owned by a phone company) has achieved a level of readership that I would have laughed at had someone suggested it during the paltry numbers of USI's early days. The most recent statistics include:
- 27,232 visitors (includes individuals who return to the site more than once);
- 14,984 unique visitors (counts each individual person once, regardless of how many times they visit);
- 820 visitors in a single day (October 7, 2009); and
- Readers in 84 countries (United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Japan, Australia, India, Belgium, Brazil, Netherlands, and Philippines are the top ten countries).
So on this Thanksgiving evening, after the turkey is gone and everyone has gone to bed, I thank you for your readership, critical comments, article suggestions, and notes of support. While ESPN.com still surpasses my readership by a wide margin, I believe USI is filling a niche. I thank you for the opportunity to learn so much about college athletics through the countless connections that we have developed in the last 12 months through
http://www.ultimatesportsinsider.com/. I hope you've received some value along the way and I look forward to the next 12 months.
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