It’s crazy to think I’ve been blogging since 2009. That’s 13 years!
Being an old person in social media does mean I have a frankly terrifying amount of content on this blog. I’ve published more than 1,000 posts since I started Who’s the Mummy.
My Blog Stats
Over time, it’s interesting to see which content I create becomes most popular. Especially when content becomes truly ‘evergreen’. This means content that is found and read months or even years after it was originally written. My page views in recent years have crept up from around 10,000 page views per month to more like 60,000 page views per month, with peaks around summer and Christmas.
I think having a large bank of content with 100+ posts that attract 10-100 views per day is the reason for this. I perhaps have 10 posts that get REALLY big traffic hits at certain times of year, but there’s a strong baseline of traffic from all that archive content.
According to my Jetpack plug-in my blog stats for the year are as follows:
- Total page views: 815,541
- Best month: June (112,000 page views)
- Worst month: February (54,000 page views)
- Average visits per day: 2,234
- Mobile v Desktop: 89% v 11%
I find it interesting how the vast majority of traffic now comes from mobile devices. I tend to think this means content has to be really easy to read (lots of subheadings, not too many big images) and it has to load quickly and look good on mobile display.
Today, I’m sharing the top 10 most popular posts on Who’s the Mummy in 2022.
I’m pleased that a few of these posts are new to the blog (I’ve still got it!) but it’s also nice to see some posts that are a decade old, and still finding readers. I have a few tips about creating content that is popular AND will have a long shelf life.
Tips for Creating Evergreen Content
- Try to write posts that answer questions people have. Sites like Google Trends and Answer the Public or even just Google’s own auto-complete feature are free ways to find out what people want to know.
- As a rule of thumb, if I’ve spent a lot of time finding something out, or researching something – I write a post. Because if it took me weeks to find a wetsuit or choose a summer school or understand a government policy – other people will probably be struggling, and my content could help them!
- Do the basic SEO so your content ranks on Google. That means having relevant keywords and using them in your title and body copy. Link to your post from other posts on your site. Share it on social media. Try to get other people to link to that post from related posts.
- Don’t worry about answering niche questions. On the Internet even a very specific question will be relevant to thousands of people. It’s often easier to be found writing great content on a niche topic than writing the same old general guides to popular topics and places.
Top Ten Blog Posts for 2023
Helping Girls Prepare for their First Period
This post from 2016 pulls together some of the books, products and advice I found most helpful with a daughter approaching her first period. With around 2,000 page views on my blog every single day, it’s by far the most popular post on the blog.
I think this post ranks well because it’s a topic that isn’t especially well covered outside of magazine websites that offer general, bland advice.
Is Private School Worth It? Here are 10 Things they won’t tell you
This post was written in 2020, and is generally ranked 2 in my top 10 blog posts, year round. It’s an honest post from someone who sent their child to private school from the age of three until the age of 16. Want to know the pros and cons and whether it’s value for money? This is the post for you.
The Best Plus Sized Wetsuits for Women
I update this post each year and it’s well worth doing because it brings in around 1,000 page views a day during the spring and summer months. It was first published in 2020.
It’s a post I wrote out of frustration trying to find wetsuits for myself and friends, and finding that incredibly difficult. I always work on the basis that if I find something hard work, other people will, too!
What to do if your child finds their Christmas presents
This is definitely one of my more seasonal posts and was written back in 2012, making it 10 years old. The story of the post happened when Flea was still in primary school. One year she found a bag in the spare bedroom containing everything I’d carefully bought for her stocking. Whoops!
The traffic to this post is around 600 people a day in December, which reassures me that I am definitely not the only idiot this has happened to.
10 Places to SUP in the North West
During lockdown, like many people, we bought paddleboards and this post shares some of our favourite spots to get out and about on our boards.
How to Get the Hallmark TV Channel in the UK
I love Hallmark movies and I am in good company with around 1,300 people a day landing on this post in October, November and December, as the world indulges in cheesy Christmas movies.
This post from 2019 performs well year round but I also have a specific post about Christmas movies that picks up additional traffic during that seasonal peak.
Stocking Fillers for Teenage Girls
This is a new post from 2022 but one that’s hit a nerve with people, with around 900 page views a day in December. It’s the newest post in my top 10, so I’m hoping that it will continue to perform well next year.
I’ll tell you a true story about this one: my daughter was opening her Christmas stocking from her grandparents and it contained one of the items from my list. Turned out my Mum had Googled ‘stocking fillers for teen girls’ and ended up buying several items recommended in my post without realising I’d written it!
Our Ultimate California Road Trip Itinerary with Kids
This post from 2018 is based on all the information we’ve shared during three California road trips over the last eight years and links to specific resort and city guides on the blog. California is hands down one of my favourite places in the world and I love sharing our experiences and highlights with other families. It’s now number 7 in my top 10 blog posts.
University Summer Schools for Year 12 Students
Another quite recent post that makes my top ten, this guide to uni summer schools was published in 2022. It’s one of those examples of something where I’d done a lot of web surfing and research and figured I could save other people some time by putting it all on one page.
This post shares some of the best UK summer schools for teenagers, including paid for, free, and virtual options. Read it here. This post gets around 200 page views every day, and more in the spring months. It’s definitely one that I will update for 2023.
When does child maintenance stop?
Weirdly, the government website does a very bad job of explaining when co-parents stop paying child maintenance and how this works if your child goes to college, or sixth form, or university.
I checked out all the relevant websites and spent an hour on hold to the Child Maintenance Service so that – God willing – other parents don’t have to do the same thing, to get an answer to what should be a very simple question. Hence this post being one of my top 10 blog posts.
So there you have it! Our top 10 blog posts for 2022. I wonder if they’ll look the same in another ten years?
