Blogger Appreciation: July 2011

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Each month my site is growing inch by inch and it makes me so very happy. For the month of July we had over 27,600 pageviews.

I am joining Kelli over at 3 Boys and a Dog and saying thank you to the top ten sites that sent traffic my way last month. If you compare my referrals from other months, these numbers are down a bit. July is a busy month for travel which directly affects our blogging traffic. (But I still managed to grow in pageviews, which is excellent.)

All of my top referring sites are blogs I link up to and sites that I share recipes, crafts, tips, etc on. Participating in events like these is an excellent way to get your blog out there and find new readers. Below is the total number of visitors each site sent me last month.

Top Ten Referring Sites

1. We Are THAT Family– 649
2. Tater Tots and Jello– 571
3. Tip Junkie– 459
4. I Heart Naptime– 411
5. Skip to my Lou– 390
6. Org Junkie– 267
7. Today’s Creative Blog– 204
8. The Girl Creative– 190
9. Tidy Mom– 174
10. No Time for Flashcards– 151

Getting Social

This is where my social networking referrals came from in July.

1. StumbleUpon– sent over 1352 visitors. This is an excellent site for sharing the wonderful sites you stumble upon when you’re online.
2. Pinterest– sent me 708 visitors. Pinterest is all the rage. Find something you like online? Create a Pinterest account and you pin the wonderful things you find online. People within your group can see your pins and get ideas as well. I am going to warn you, this is an addicting site.
3. Facebook– referred 518 visitors to my site. I love my Facebook readers and the community I am building there. If you are not following me over there, you should.
4. Twitter– sent me 95 visitors. While Twitter has never been my largest traffic driving social media site, it certainly is a site for connecting with bloggers in my niche as well as brands I am working with or hope to work with.

WordPress and Thesis Success

Back in the late winter/early spring, I made the switch to WordPress and also decided on using Thesis. I can not stress enough how impactful this decision has been on getting my site found. Because I am self hosted and own my site (benefit of WordPress) and have an SEO template installed  (Thesis) my Google referrals have skyrocketed! In July Google sent  4,764 visitors to my site.

Thinking about moving to WordPress? You can make the move yourself and save some money. Here is a step by step ebook that walks you through the process of moving from Blogger to WordPress in layman terms. This book is written by the gal who did all of my transfer to WordPress as well as my site design.

Most Viewed Post in July

This post is still getting tons of traffic 80+ Inexpensive or Free Summer Activities for Kids. Last month this post was viewed 3,107 times in July. Since this post went live in May, it has had over 12,000 views.

Want to dig into your analytics and thank your top referring sites? Hop over to 3 Boys and a Dog for details and to linkup.