New Year’s Day marks one year since the Mohawk Valley Compass published its first story. I want to thank everyone who has been faithfully reading and sharing our stories with others. Your support is encouraging and greatly appreciated!
With regular Compass writers Scott Mulford, John Becker, Ashley Onyon and Jay Towne, we published a total of 378 articles this past year. I am very thankful for their contributions and it has been a pleasure working with all of them.
The goal from the beginning was not to cover every story that happened in the Mohawk Valley. We knew that wasn’t possible for an all volunteer group. There were many stories I wished we could have covered but were not able to. The key to staying motivated and productive for the entire year was to concentrate on what interested us the most and to provide the details and perspective that may have been missed in the mainstream media. I very proud of the stories we all wrote this year.
I am also thankful for our handful of advertising sponsors. The small amount of revenue we took in went toward promotion and other minor expenses. My hope is in 2015, we’ll see additional sponsors come on board.
According to our WordPress generated stats, mohawkvalleycompass.com received 116,297 total page views last year. That’s an average of 9,691 page views per month. We also had an average of 2,487 unique visitors per month. Readers generated a total of 675 comments. In my opinion, it’s a very good start and I expect those numbers to be even higher in 2015.
With the city mayoral and common council elections this November, I predict the stories coming out of City Hall will be even more interesting than the previous year. Amsterdam city residents are going to need accurate, unbiased reporting in order to make good decisions on election day. I am absolutely committed to providing that reporting on the issues and on all the candidates who run this year. I am also committed to publishing opinion and analysis articles that go beyond the rhetoric and truly give readers an informed alternative view on local politics and other issues.
I’m looking forward to another great year of writing. And as always, I look forward to discussing the important issues with you on the Mohawk Valley Compass!
