Welcome to the One Month Anniversary of www.CookiesbyDave.com!  First of all, I wanted to thank each and every one of you that puts up with my daily rants and randomness on the website.  Your support is greatly appreciated and I hope you have enjoyed the posts and recipes.

To have a little fun this morning, I decided to do some data mining on the site and see if anyone is actually reading the posts. So put on your mining helmets and breathing apparatus and join me in the facts and figures mine of www.CookiesbyDave.com.  I know, I know, your initial guess is that three people visit my site (wife, mother, and sister) mainly to see what I am writing about them, well you are right, but there are also lots of other folks.  Let’s take a look at the numbers (considering that you guys are sort of like my shareholders, think of this as our annual, in this case one month, meeting).

VISITS

In its first month, www.CookiesbyDave.com has had 1,720 views.  While far from viral, it is a number about 1,720 more than I would have guessed.  Since the website costs $7.95 per month, the expense works out to ½ cent per page view.  A better value than anticipated.  Perhaps, www.CookiesbyDave.com finally got us out of the lingering recession.  Perhaps.

GATEWAYS

Most people visit the site via Facebook (94.5%), Google and Twitter both account for about 2.5%, and Microsoft should be proud in that 3 visitors used Bing.

TOP POSTS

Not surprising, due to the grand opening build up and constant ads, the Top Three posts were all related to the website’s launch.

The Top Three Non-Grand Opening Posts were all pretty memorable…

“Wings. Beer. Awkward Moment.” (37 visits) – Featuring my inability to order chicken wings and the origination of the term, “Wet Rub.”

“Narcissism – Library Card Style” (37 visits) – My attempt to win a contest at the Willmar Public Library and the perfect outlet for my narcissistic tendencies.

“That’s cold(play)” (33 visits) – My sad realization that Charlene has a crush on Chris Martin of Coldplay and Jennifer Lawrence of “The Hunger Games” would never date me.

Also, I am proud to report that my free cookie cookbook download, “Today is a Great Day for a Cookie… Soliloquies, Scrumptiousness, & sorta Psalms” had 54 downloads.  Imagine all of those cookies baking around the world.  Yummy.

WHO ACTUALLY READS MY STUFF

63% of the site’s viewers are women

38% of the overall viewers are women between ages 35-44

No one under the age of 18 likes my site

WHEN

The most popular time to visit www.CookiesbyDave.com is 8PM.  Noon and 5PM are also pretty popular.  Most of the viewers begin their daily Internet pleasures at 7AM and log off at 10PM.  That leaves a whole 9 hours at night without www.CookiesbyDave.com.  Oh well, everyone needs a break sometime.

WHERE

The most frequent location for the site’s viewers… Willmar, Minnesota (where I live) and Battle Creek, Michigan (my hometown)…  Number 3?  Wichita, Kansas (where I used to live).  The key to building a website?  Move around.  A lot.

Overall, the site has reached folks in 24 states and 16 countries on 6 continents (all except Antarctica… what is wrong with those penguins and snowball researchers?).  Special shout out to visitors from Zambia, Romania, and Honduras.  It has also reached the native speakers of 10 different languages, including my Swedish fan (that blonde woman from ABBA?).

AND MOST IMPRESSIVE…

Of the 152 Likes for “Cookies by Dave” on Facebook, we have not had a single drop. Not one.  Thank you for forgiving me, when I have offended you, and always giving me another (or two or three) chance.

ONE FINAL THANK YOU (and apology)

So I would like to end with a special thank you to all of you for putting up with my daily non-sense. By allowing me to vent, I am able to interact in public in a semi-normal fashion.

And a note from the Prize Fulfillment Department of www.CookiesbyDave.com…  to our eleven prize winners (you know who you are), we are horribly slow in our prize delivery, but we are working out our glitches and promise to provide all of your prizes by our website’s first (year) anniversary.

Oh and remember, today is a great day for a cookie.