An Absolutely Phenomenal Week; Thank you!

Phenomenal Week!

When I started this blog over a year ago, I had several goals in mind:

• Sharing my passion of travel with others – both friends, family and strangers.
• Helping to educate others in miles, points and the ways of traveling.
• Posting news, tips, tricks and deals that help make traveling easier and more affordable.
• Writing trip reports of the hotels, airlines and other destinations I go to, not only so you can live vicariously through my craziness, but also so you can use those guides as references when you create your own adventures.

The first few months saw low, but steadily increasing membership. Over the Fall of 2014, I achieved a great milestone – having over 1,000 readers (sessions) per day for a span of 7 days. Not only was this the first “benchmark” in the BoardingArea blogs, but also a personal milestone for me, as it had signaled a tremendous growth in this blog. Fast forwarding to winter of this year, I had a chance to chat with Randy Petersen, the “Godfather” of everything miles, points and BoardingArea, to begin work on my next goal – 5,000 readers per day, for a 7 day consecutive span. It’s not easy, to be honest, and while there’s lots of eyes looking at the pages during the Monday through Thursday time period, readership naturally drops fairly significantly during the Friday through Sunday weekend.

Last week, I hit a very significant milestone, that I am personally proud of, but forever thankful for because of you. Last week, Monday through Sunday, over 5,000 readers per day visited this blog, allowing me to cross into the next threshold, or as BA bloggers know it, “the 5K Club.”

There are several things I’m especially proud of:

• Comments on posts have increased significantly, and there are discussions on the latest tips, trips and suggestions. I love how readers are interacting with the posts, and also interacting with other readers. I also really appreciate those of you who find the occasional error, too. Thank you for letting me know so I can have these corrected!
• Social media presence has sky-rocketed. Not only have there been more followers, but also more interaction with posts via re-tweets, favorites, sharing and the like. Thank you for sharing posts and other information with your friends!
• There’s re-curring readership. Over 5,000 of you have spoken and you’re continually using this blog as a place to share your thoughts, read my musings, and help create new resources.

I can’t thank you, my readers, enough for your generosity, and you sharing the passion I have for this ever changing industry. I think traveling is a life-skill that every person needs to experience, and I like to think of this blog as a “classroom” of sorts where we can all collaborate together.

New Things You Can Look Forward To:

• An improved site design with separation between features, and a more modern look. For example, we’ll be removing the Twitter widget on the right and replacing it with a better looking display.
• A visual trip reporting sorting feature. You’ll be able to sort through trip reports by name, date and other criteria, instead of shifting through a stagnant list.
• New rating criteria for hotels, airlines and meals. So you can better understanding my thoughts on the experiences I review, I’ve designed a rating system unlike any other. You’ll see this soon featured on the bottom of trip reports that way you can quickly see my thoughts on some of the most important aspects, helping you travel better for yourself.
• …and much, much more!

Let me know of the questions I can help answer for you, the topics you want covered, or anything that can help your user experience better. This is your classroom, and your experience.

I hope you’ll share my passion in one of my favorite quotes:

“To move, to breathe, to fly, to float; To gain all while you give; To roam the roads of lands remote; To travel is to live.” ― Hans Christian Andersen, The Fairy Tale of My Life: An Autobiography

THANK YOU! 🙂