Plans For DGB In 2016

Had enough of the indulgence yet? A bit too much beer? A few too many mince pies? Turkey and other meats making you feel bloated? You know what they say, New Year new you. Back to healthier living and a fresh start to 2016 and all that feel good stuff. Well, as I have done every year, I have plans to spruce DGB up a little bit. Here are a few things I have in mind…

DGB Forum

After reading the comments left on m DGB Forum post a few days ago, I have decided that in 2016 I will launch a forum section on this website.

It will be made up of two parts; one for the industry and another for home owners who wish to interact with the industry if they so wish. The for this is that a growing number of home owners are coming across this site and either leaving comments on posts or sending me private emails. I also ran a poll not so long ago in which the results told me that over a third of the traffic was now coming from home owners.

So there will be two areas within the forum. There will be some house rules, as expected, to keep people in line and keep the conversation on the right track. It will also require people to register and login in order to take part in the forums. This is to keep spam to an absolute minimum.

I also reserve the right to can it in the future if it isn’t used. This will be very much an experiment. If it work, great. If not, then I’ll take it down and try something else instead.

Social media

I’m amazed that the DGB Twitter account is now over 6500 followers strong. It’s a nice mix of window and door companies, other associated trades like plasterers, plumbers, electricians, builders etc. There’s some IT and tech companies in there, and no doubt a few bots and spam accounts. But I’d say most are relevant to the account.

For 2016, I would very much like to get to 10,000 followers by the end of the year. Not sure why, I just see it as a milestone worth reaching. I won’t go on many following sprees. I’m just going to rely on the content coming out of the account to do the job. I’ll then just follow back those accounts I like or I think bring value to my time line.

On the Google+ front, after spending much of 2015 trying to get it to work for me, I am very much of the understanding that it just doesn’t work. My analytics shows me where my traffic comes from, and Google+ isn’t on the map. I have had one or two clicks to the site from Google+, but it’s just nothing like LinkedIn, Twitter or even Facebook. I’ll keep going with it in 2016, but I won’t be holding my breath.

Speaking of Facebook, I am feeling much more positive about that one. The DGB page has got a few likes now, nothing major, but it’s steadily growing, and I am getting traffic from there which of course is the whole point. So I’m pretty pleased with it and I’ll be looking to grow that page strongly during 2016.

LinkedIn has been great this year for DGB as well. The connections count has grown significantly and most of those have been good, relevant fellow industry professionals worth accepting an invitation from. So no need to tweak things there, just keep doing what I’m doing.

1000 subscribers

Another little goal of mine for 2016 will be to grow the DGB subscribers list to around 1000 by the end of next year. It’s hovering around the 400 mark now, so I will be making a concerted effort to grow that steadily over the next 12 months to get that list into four figures.

DGB Stats

Overall, this website has had another year of strong growth. Both the visitor and unique visitor counts have been smashed compared to the year previous. However the site was a little down on page views compared to 2014. So I will be making it a priority to boost that again in 2016.

This post has been written before I left for my holiday, so I will be doing an accurate, in-depth breakdown of how DGB performed in 2015 when I get back. Needless to say though, after strong growth in 2015, I’ll be looking to keep it up in 2016 too!

Site changes

Don’t worry, there’s no major re-design in the works. Just some little tweaks here and there to keep the site looking fresh and easier to navigate. I’ll also be implementing a few new features to keep older but still relevant content easier to search for and available to read.

I want to wish you all a very happy New Year and hope that 2016 is a prosperous and exciting year for you all!