Jilly Pop’s Year in Review (Obligatory Blogger Post)

Greetings lovely readers and bloggers!

This is that time of year when blogggers love to write their year in review posts. For us it’s so exciting, a virtual Christmas letter. You may already be bored! But, wait, I’ve got some cool things to talk about Jilly Pop’s future and the direction the blog will take in 2017 as well as a highlight and update on some of my most popular posts. I’ve also got some important personal news to share. So let’s get started!

Let’s start with some really exciting news for 2017. I have been writing this blog by myself since 2015 and I’m proud to announce that I will have a recurring contributor to Jilly Pop. He’s Sam (JourneyThroughTheHorizons) and he’s got mad writing skills, loves music, and is a busy student I’m thrilled wants to a part of my blog. If you’d like to read Sam’s guest post, which was my top media tweet in December (295 impressions! Sweet!) Sam’s next feature about Bitter’s Kiss and The Blue Stones new video for “These Bells Will Ring” will be up this weekend.

The next news I have is professional, which I rarely mention on Jilly Pop. I’m currently in 3 weeks of training for a postion at a huge corporation in Brooklyn. I’m super excited and I will be starting working 3 days a week in January 2017 which means I’ll have time for Jilly Pop and my new obsession: Zipcar.

So now that we’ve got some stuff to look forward to, let’s take a look back at a pretty great year at Jilly Pop.

First, did you notice I’m calling my blog Jilly Pop? Well, Jilly Pop Music is kind of long, so Jilly Pop is my blog’s nickname.

The overwhelmingly most popular post on my blog in 2016 was actually a post from November 2015. Thanks to Google search results, a huge amount of increased eyeballs came from my feature on Flights Over Phoenix and their video for “Runaway California.” If you “Google” the band and song, my post is the second search result. I have no idea how that happened!

So let’s rewind to the end of 2015 when my top post was my year in review. WordPress Stats tells me 2015 was my best year of blogging at about 4,000 views. I haven’t posted as much in 2016, but I believe in quality over quantity and have reached about 2,000 views.

These were my 10 most popular posts for 2016 according to my WordPress stats:
1. Flights Over Phoenix – Runaway California

 

2. Weslynn – Strange Feelings (Exclusive Single Premiere) -*note* Exclusive premieres are really cool for blogs so I hope to have the opportunity to post more premieres in 2017.

3. Holly Elle – How a Heart Breaks

4. Wonky Tonk – Stuff We Leave Behind

5. Bassett – Ghost Hwy (EP)

6. Victor Perry – 4 A.M. Nostalgia

7. Madi Ringe – Summertime

8. Kylie Odetta – High Dreamer (EP)

9. Saint Adeline – Status Quo

10. Victor Perry – Missing (Everything But The Girl – Cover)

I’m actually more interested in the results of my Twitter Analytics than WordPress stats. I am amazed by the data analyzed in Twitter Analytics. I have been on Twitter since 2009 and have 775 followers. But Twitter is much more that followers. It’s all about cards, media tweets and mentions.

In 2016, these Jilly Pop featured artists garnered the most impressions:
January – The Fireflys (a UK band who I have written about since 2014 – super nice band who released a new album)

February – A tie! Dan Lipton and Kylie Odetta

March – Smoke Season (They have a 4 video series called Ouroboros. This post was about Veteran Suicide Awareness and called “When The Smoke Clears.”)

April – J.R. Richards (J.R.’s song Come To Tears was about his son’s early onset mental illness.)

May – blog hiatus
June – blog hiatus
July – Weslynn (The exclusive single premiere earned 841 impressions!)

August – Victor Perry (his new EP 4 A.M. Nostalgia was released – he is also a super nice artist who I keep in touch with!)
September – Kylie Odetta (She rocked 426 impressions with Dangerous Woman / This Is What You Came For / Give Me Love (MASH UP)

October – A busy month with 3 top posts: The Grand Undoing, Saint Adeline, and Amy Guess.

November – Victor Perry (hits with a cover of Missing – Everything But The Girl – cover. Several other blogs posted it as well. )

December – Sam’s post about Just Seconds Apart. (Sam is Jilly Pop’s new contributor!)

Thank you if you read this far. Thank you if you subscribe to and read, like and comment on my blog.

Jilly Pop is a small, indie pop blog promoting indie artists and I’ve had the pleasure this year of beginning to work with publicists. I believe that quality of my posts is due to these relationships. Shout out to the teams at Working Brilliantly, Lafamos and Effective Immediately PR.

So, how was your year and what do you hope for in 2017?