How the hell is it the end of 2018, damn I’m getting old. We hit year 6 of the blog going, where I think we hit some personal milestones, while we also saw some beautiful places around the world that will stay long in the memory.
I always like to review how I did with last year’s New Year’s resolutions before planning the following year, so without further ado…
Last Year’s Resolutions
- Build Instagram account to 15,000 – Success, hit the ball out of the park, having started the year with under 8,000, we saw our numbers shoot through the roof, especially at the tail end of the year. Raquel put in some serious hours into growing the account, so I’m proud to say it has paid off.
- Go to Traverse in Rotterdam for a week of travel events – Success – This was my second year of Traverse and Raquel’s first. Not somewhere I’d instantly have on my list of places to see, it certainly exceeded my expectations and must have heavily boosted their tourism levels considering there were around 500 travel bloggers present over the week. This included two of the biggest names in the industry, in Nomadic Matt and Adventurous Kate.
- Build Twitter account to 30,000 – Success – Despite this being the target for the past few years, I finally made it and flew past this figure, ending with more than 33,000, a growth of more than 7,000.
- Visit Sri Lanka – Success – recommended by virtually every travel blogger at Traverse in 2017, Sri Lanka was spectacular. It was picturesque, the wildlife was incredible and the people were so friendly, but you are taken aback a little by the extreme level of poverty. Something we didn’t have on the list was the Maldives, but we sneaked this in with our trip to Sri Lanka.
- Build The YouTube Channel & Get 100 Subscribers – Ish – We created regular videos and started taking the channel seriously in 2018, but we didn’t reach the 100 mark. However, we also created a separate channel for reviews and after a very short period of time we saw a significant level of growth, beyond 100 subs, therefore I guess we can call it a success…Kind of.
- Be Featured On TV – Success – I really hoped to gain a TV appearance, but I didn’t have huge faith. But two months in I got the chance to appear on BBC news, not a huge feature but something that made me smile. The biggest opportunity came in August, where we discussed potentially having our own TV show where we’d travel through Europe, with discussions with BBC, but it never quite worked out in the end, something I hope I won’t regret.
- Go On A Press Trip – Success – We had a number of trips which we arranged events with PR companies, hotels, tourist boards and venues, however I think some of our best opportunities might not be until 2019. We had some further talks with the Japan tourist board, so hopefully that blossoms into something as that would be a dream come true!
- Increase Spaghetti Traveller Organic Traffic by 15% Y-o-Y – Fail – We posted regular content and made some strong moves forward with the website, but the traffic has stayed pretty much level with the year before from Google.
- Build Birthday Website – Ish – This one is a mixed result, as it became a slight conflict of interest with a client, so I changed my plan slightly. We moved towards a drink based site, a sort of combination between Tripadvisor and DesignMyNight, with Google Maps thrown into the equation. 2019 will truly be the big step forward for Drinkspal though.
- Build Feed-A-Sausage Campaign – Fail – Ah the ideas that float through the head. The plan was to setup a charity, where 100% of donations went towards feeding stray dogs, with no money leaked on wages or overheads, as we would go out there and help the dogs ourselves. We decided the concept of setting up a charity would be a huge commitment and I think it’s fair to say we don’t have a huge amount of time left after all these items on the list.
- Take A Video Editing Course – Fail – Ah, this one might move over to 2019. I’m not one to make excuses, so let’s just say I failed here. BUT, I did start making videos on a regular basis using basic video platforms and I’m very comfortable with video editing now, however I truly need to take on Premier Pro.
- Save At Least £500 Per Month – Ish – This was a decent result, with most months seeing a £500 saving, however in the months where we went on holiday I didn’t manage to save.
- Run The Bubble Football World Cup – Fail – I’m sad this never went ahead, however I also feel I dodged a bullet, as the challenge was beyond stressful just to get the England qualifiers over the line.
- Go To The Dentists – Success – I know I shouldn’t be, but I’m incredibly proud of myself for this. After not going for 6 years, I went along to a private dentists and put my money down for the whole lot. I got a route canal, a hygienist clean, a jet clean and a filling, so the bill added up, but worth every penny to feel confident my teeth were in order.
2019 New Years Resolutions
- Reach 10,000 on Tik Tok
- Get 100 subscribers on YouTube
- Launch DrinksPal
- Look after my dental care
- Get back to a healthy way of life
- Go globally viral
- Learn Premier Pro
- Party in Vegas
- To win an award