The end of the year is approaching quickly–only six weeks away!  Because of this, I wanted to take some time and reflect on our site goals.  I also need your help to attain some of them, so please read on to see how you can help!

2009 Goal 1.  The site will be self-sustaining.

There are two aspects of this goal.  The first is that WritAnon was to be financially self-sustaining by the end of the year.  This goal has already been reached, and it looks like next year we will turn a profit.   From what I’ve seen, I expect that WritAnon will continue to grow for a very long time.

Thanks to everyone who has visited the site, purchased items from the WritAnon store, and utilized our services!  This has helped us to become self-sufficient in our first six months of existence, and could not have been done without you.  Please also remember to refer us to your friends if you’ve been pleased with the service you’ve received.

The second aspect of this goal was for the forums to become self-sufficient, with members carrying on the community by posting each day.  It has been interesting to watch the ebbs and flows in the forums–we see cycles in how several people have stories to post, then take a bit of a break from the forum as they work on pieces on their own.

We’ve had over 2600 posts as of this writing, which means that we’ve had (on average) about 17 posts a day.  Right now, we’re going through a bit of a slow period, but I expect that things will start picking up again soon as people finish their semesters at college, find more time as work slows down in December, or decide to start sharing some of the things they’ve been working on during the past few weeks.

2009 Goal 2.  The forum will have 200 members by January 1st, 2010.

This is the goal we’re most likely to miss.  To be fair, I wasn’t entirely certain how quickly the forum would grow when I first started WritAnon.  As I compared this to other sites with similar goals, we’re growing at about twice (or more) the rate of the other sites.  This is phenomenal…it’s very difficult to grow that much more quickly than other sites.

It’s still possible for us to reach 200 members by the end of the year, but we need your help to do so.  Please consider referring a friend, or asking your friends to check out the forums when talking to them in person or online.  You can also help us grow by displaying flyers in your area.

2009 Goal 3.  The blog will be updated at least once every week.

This goal has been surpassed.  The blog has been updated every Monday and Friday for the past two months, plus some bonus posts for holidays or other notes.  I plan to continue this pace for the foreseeable future.  We’ve had several articles that became popular on Reddit, plus a few that have been linked by other blog writers.

From a search engine point of view, we now have enough posts that people discover WritAnon via Google or other search engines every day.  Once they’re here, they tend to hang around for awhile, checking out our services or forums.

Summary:

Overall, I’ve been very pleased with the growth shown here at WritAnon. I’m especially glad that the site already become self-sufficient financially–there are very few businesses that can say that within their first year.

I’ve made many new friendships, and I’m looking forward to continuing to grow those relationships throughout the rest of this year and in the years to come.  I’ll update you again in January with how we performed against these goals, and tell you about my goals for WritAnon in 2010.

Keep writing!