I wanted to write a year end review for the website to reflect on what I accomplished for the year. Yes, I made a lot of mazes, but I did more than that, expanding what I did and how I did it. This post might just be for me, but I am happy to take you along on the journey. Enjoy. And since I did this exact post the year before…why not show 3 years !! I also added my outlook for 2022 as things will be changing !
Daily Mazes posted:
640 in 2021 vs. 366 in 2020 vs. 365 in 2019
I was up against a leap year from 2021 so I was destined to be at 365…until I decided on April 1st to create the Spanish Language section of the site (Laberintos) which added 275 additional mazes. Some of these had no changes but I am not going to count individual translations.
Blog Posts:
291 vs. 102 vs. 26
Some of my most popular content is still from 2020. In 2021 I tried some new things to improve my SEO and that included deleting large sections of the website and creating 100 blog posts, each featuring a best maze from 2018-2020. This did not work. But I did blog significantly more than LY and that did work, My goal was 3 times a week or 156 posts and even after dropping the 100 maze project I crushed that number.
Name Mazes Made
4 vs. 247 vs. 1,499
The SEO on this section of the site dropped off significantly this year. You can read about how I chose the names HERE. So 2021 meant only doing requests when they were submitted, and not many were, although this may become a project for 2022…maybe…
Books posted online:
12 vs. 8 vs. 19
In the 2 years prior to this one I created a lot of free downloadable content. By my count that was 27 books, some of which have been retired or improved. For 2021 while I started off with a few monthly books, I got away from this to focus on other content. Somehow I still managed to make 12 books !
Books Published on Amazon:
0 vs. 3 (13 versions) vs. 0
I published my first 3 books on Amazon. And with a bit of help I translated 2 of them into 3 additional languages. I also have one of the few Kindle maze books available since Arrow mazes are solved with your finger/eyes and not a writing utensil. My books did not sell very well so I have 3 additional books sitting on the shelf, ready for publication if I come up with a marketing plan.
Website Traffic growth:
242% vs LY, +1000%+ the PY
The website traffic grew year over year by 242% and it has the potential to grow by the same in the future as I learn more about image SEO. I am also looking at changing the future content of the site to attract different people.
Different countries visiting the site:
100 vs. 99 vs. 20
Well this was a weird category that I really wanted to grow in 2021…and I did technically grow it. But I lost 11 countries along the way (none with high traffic in 2020) while gaining 12 new countries. My largest new country was Barbados, followed by Guatemala. Thank you ! While I thought my largest growth would come from Spanish speaking countries (it did not), it was instead from Azerbaijan, Nigeria, Vietnam and Singapore.
Requests for Maze use:
About the same to slightly higher
YouTube Videos Created and watched:
Zero created, but views were up !
YouTube Subscribers:
Up.
RSS Subscribers to the blog:
Up +18. Has bounced around during the year…
Books Sold on Amazon:
Slightly down
So that is my year in review. I learned a lot. I hope to continue growing the site, making more books, and of course posting some interesting mazes !!
Now what can you expect on the site in 2022 ?
For the past 3+ years I have been posting daily mazes on this website. In 2018 and 2019 the theme was based on weird holidays. In 2020 and 2021 I featured a different type of maze each month and concluded most months with a free downloadable book. This gave me a guideline to design each daily maze and focus my work. In April of 2021 I started the Laberinto portion of the site for Spanish speakers.
For a typical 30 day month I need to do the following: 1 - Create a maze. 2 - Format and save the maze for display on the website. 3 - Create a downloadable file for the site. 4,5,6 - repeat steps 1,2, and 3 in Spanish by translating and updating each file. So each month I make 180 different files in order to populate the site. It takes a lot of time. Even for simple mazes. I work on other, more complicated mazes than the ones that I post daily. Those are the mazes I like making the most. The daily mazes are taking up a lot of time…but they do not produce a lot of enjoyment for me (typically). So they are stopping in 2022.
So what is going to happen in 2022 ? A weekly maze. 52 mazes for the year. Each maze will be more intricate. Each maze will be closer to what I call maze art. Each individual maze will have it’s own linkable section of the website for after the week is over. Each weekly maze will have a blog post telling you about the maze, possibly about how or why it was made and give more background. I also might include some additional coloring options for each maze. I like to think of it like a comic book, where each maze has an alternative cover !
I think you will see better mazes that are more shareable and more likely to be printed out and solved. Now, I will spend the same amount of time making mazes, but instead of producing 180 files for 30 days, I will make 12 files of 4 mazes for 28 days. And I will like a final product that has much higher quality (and I hope you will to!)
What type of mazes will I see on the site ?
Sign Mazes - for some reason I like making this type of maze
Building Mazes - a nice subject to create a maze with
Landscape Mazes - I have not perfected these yet, but with some practice I think these could become interesting
Landmark/Statue Mazes
When will mazes be posted ?
Every Monday except for the first maze which will post on January 1.
Each maze will also include a blog post to accompany it.
Many mazes will be posted during specific weeks to honor a specific holiday / anniversary, etc. Some of my favorite mazes are already slated for September/October !!!
Now would be a good time to give you an example. Let’s start with a maze I have featured before as an example of ‘maze art’. The Playhouse Square Sign in Cleveland Ohio. Obviously, the example is smaller than when it prints on regular size paper and is solvable (and easier to see the maze!).
From across the room this looks like a picture and not a maze (hopefully). Only when you get up close do you realize that what you are looking at is actually a maze. That is my goal.
I hope you enjoy the new format ! Let’s have a great 2022 !