Seven months in, and we have continued to grow. Implementing a new structure and set of rules seems to have been very effective (Requesting Comment: Proposed Structure and Rules). We have not yet even fully implemented these rules. This is a good lesson for us too. In order to sustain growth to require improvements to our structure. I’m keeping in mind how we can adapt as things continue to change.
Also, of note, both @jongarvey and I had our 1 year anniversaries on the forum a day or two ago. My how time flies.
Continuing to compare with BioLogos, which, for now, is a reasonable benchmark. BioLogos uses the same forum software as us, works in the same space, and is far more well known than us. We continue to see a steady increase in page views per month. It looks like we are now about 5x their forum traffic.
| BioLogos Forum | Peaceful Science Forum | |
|---|---|---|
| June | 37K | 20K |
| July | 24K | 35K |
| August | 28K | 69K |
| September | 18K | 76K |
| October | 20K | 84K |
| November | 16K | 110K |
Yes, that is right. We are now getting about 110K of page views per month. Lest you think this is all waisted page views of some of the regulars chasing their tails, a whopping 41% of traffic derives from web searches, and 26% is from referral or social traffic. That means most our traffic (67%) is new people visiting us. As you can imagine. Most of them are lurkers, or one time visitors. Be sure to invite them into the conversation. As we are hospitable, we will only grow. We will continue to implement systems to encourage kindness, and discourage unkindness.
An entertaining easter egg is that one of the top search queries for BioLogos is “peaceful science swamidass”, which directs people here: So what is BioLogos' problem with Dr. Swamidass? - Open Forum - The BioLogos Forum. This is currently their third highest keyword, but must only be about 1% of their traffic. With the years they have had to build up content, it makes sense that they have a long tail of landing pages, hitting much of their old content. This might only be a short term blip, but still an entertaining detail to share.
With all this, everyone should be proud. The conversation is growing. Let it continue. I’m curious where we will be 12 months. I wonder.