Y’all know I love my stats…about books, the blog, and the podcast! A couple of my biggest takeaways from this year…
- Though I read less than I did last year (turns out running a podcast eats into your reading time!), I’m incredibly happy with my reading year! I read twelve 5 star books (compared to 8 last year) and a lot of the books publishers hyped actually panned out!
- Tracking my best recommendation sources continues to be the single biggest factor in improving my reading quality. And, after tracking my recommendation sources and publishers for 2 years now, I’m noticing some consistency in both recommendation sources and publishers.
- In 2020, I’m going to experiment with breaking down my successful recommendation sources further into specific types of books I should look to each source for.
Putting this post together was a breeze compared to two year’s ago because my Rock Your Reading Tracker had been automatically compiling these stats for me throughout the year (it’s available for purchase for $14.99 here).
Let’s dig into the numbers…
Quality and Quantity
2019 Quality Goal (% Successful Books)
I personally view a “successful” book as a 3.5 rating or higher. 69% (79 of 114 books attempted, which includes DNFs) of my 2019 books were “successful.” Last year, this number was 69% and my goal was to break 65%…so, I’m happy with that! I feel like this is a solid number and anything I get above this is gravy!
I also tracked my % of Successful Books I Finished which removes the DNF’s from the equation…and ended up with 89% successful books finished (compared to 86% last year)!
My 2020 Goal
Again, I’m not setting a quantity goal for 2020 and am going to focus solely on a quality goal, which will be 65% Successful Books Attempted and 85% Successful Books Read (the same as last year…it feels like it’s my sweet spot).
2019 Reading Quantity
For the first time ever, I didn’t set a reading quantity goal and I didn’t miss it at all. I did track how many books I read (89), but didn’t have a set target I was trying to reach. I read 7 fewer books than last year, which doesn’t surprise me since my reading time was slashed this year because of the podcast. I’m actually surprised I got that close to last year’s # of books read!
Picking Better Books
Over the past few years, I’ve been tracking my best and worst recommendation sources as well as my top publisher imprints. Knowing my best recommendation sources and top publishers helps me know who to pay attention to when looking for books that best fit my reading taste. There is so much clutter out there, so knowing which voices speak to my particular taste helped me improve my reading quality 43% since before I started tracking these things! My 2020 Reading Tracker can help you track your recommendation sources and publishers / imprints and is available for purchase for $14.99!
Recommendation Sources
- My recommendation sources are fairly consistent with last year. Annie Jones, Susie from Novel Visits, and Anne Bogel from Modern Mrs. Darcy and What Should I Read Next? are all still in the top 3. Read it Forward moved into the top 4…I love their monthly favorites lists!
- One thing about this list surprises me…I’d always kind of thought Anne Bogel and I were reading anti-twins (meaning our tastes don’t align super well). She loves quiet books and I like a bit more action. She’s a HSP (highly sensitive person) and I don’t mind going super dark and demented. So, I was surprised to discover I netted 14 successful recommendations from her this year! I think I’m figuring out the types of books where our tastes will probably align and the types where they won’t.
- I’ve also started doing this for other recommendation sources and I’m looking forward to experimenting more with this in 2020. Maybe I’ll even be able to build something into next year’s Reading Tracker to help see these kinds of patterns.
Publishers / Imprints
- Random House was barely my top imprint this year (with 8 books)…a return to the top spot after falling to #3 last year.
Favorite Books: Save Me the Plums, The Age of Miracles, Fleishman is in Trouble, American Royals - William Morrow (7 books) was a close second to Random House and is making an appearance in my top imprints list for the first time!
Favorite Books: The Last Romantics, Beyond the Point, Mystic River, Tell Me a Story: My Life with Pat Conroy - Knopf and Putnam tied for 3rd with 5 books each…Knopf fell from the #1 spot last year and Putnam is making its first appearance.
Favorite Books (Knopf): Inheritance, The Secrets We Kept, The Year of Magical Thinking, Notes from a Young Black Chef
Favorite Books (Putnam): Talk to Me, The Editor, After the End - After tracking my most successful publishers / imprints over the past 3 years, I’ve noticed that Random House, Knopf, St. Martin’s Press, and Simon & Schuster tend to consistently be among my top publishers. Other than that, my top publishers change from year to year. For example, Riverhead is already out to a lead for 2020 with 2 successful books in January alone!
Genres
The only real change in my genre breakdown from last year is that my nonfiction was more heavily weighted towards memoir / essays (I read less general nonfiction). I’d like to read more general nonfiction in 2020 (especially investigative journalism).
Audiobooks
I listened to 19 audiobooks this year, 21% of my overall reading. This is about the same as last year. I still love my podcasts, so audiobooks will always have to fight for listening time.
Backlist
I read 18 backlist books (20% of my reading) this year…down from 25 last year and 32 in 2017.
My backlist reading continues to fall and I’m not happy about it. I know this is because I’m always susceptible to shiny new releases (and I have to read a certain number of them to produce the content I want for the blog and podcast), but I also want to make some more room for backlist. So, stay tuned for something new I’ll be starting in January that will give me an incentive to read more backlist (and will give you some additional bonus podcast episodes!).
Debuts
I read 35 debuts…39% of my overall reading (up from 32% last year). And, 2019 was a particularly fantastic year for debuts!
DNF’s
I DNF’d 25 books this year…22% of the books I attempted to read. This is down from 34 books (28%) last year. I’m surprised and thrilled that I DNF’d less books this year because that means I’m picking better books!
Longest Book Read
The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo (532 pages)…and I did “feel” it’s length a bit more than I would’ve liked.
Shortest Book Read
The Body in Question by Jill Ciment (192 pages)…a weird little book about a jury.
Diversity Stats
I don’t set particular diversity goals, but I am interested in seeing where my reading naturally falls…
75% of my 2019 reading was by female authors (down slightly from 78% last year) and 91% of my Best Books of 2019 were by female authors.
12% of my 2019 reading was by POC authors, compared to 11% last year. 25% of my books read were diverse books (i.e. about diverse topics and/or people).
Podcast Growth
Since 2019 was the first year of the Sarah’s Book Shelves Live podcast, I don’t have any comparison data other than the podcast’s growth from Episode 1 through the end of 2019.
However, I couldn’t be more thrilled with the podcast’s growth. Honestly, I never imagined it would be where it is now. I did notice per episode downloads spiked in the summer and fell slightly in the Fall months, which is interesting. I’m not sure why that is. Episodes were only airing bi-weekly this summer, while they aired weekly in the Fall…and the Fall brought the mini episodes.
| Downloads (from episode drop date) |
Growth from Ep. 1 – Top Episode of 2019 |
| 1 Day | 590% increase |
| 7 Day | 369% increase |
| 30 Day | 210% increase |
Favorite Episodes
By Downloads:
1) Ep. 27: Fall 2019 Book Preview
2) Ep. 28: Annie Jones
3) Ep. 25: Siobhan Jones (Editorial Director of Book of the Month)
Your Favorites (via Instagram and Facebook votes):
1) Ep. 25: Siobhan Jones (Editorial Director of Book of the Month)
2) Quarterly Book Previews (Fall 2019 Book Preview)
3) Ep. 34: Books in the Classroom with Sara from Fiction Matters and Ep. 38: Garrett M. Graff (author of The Only Plane in the Sky)
4) Ep. 16: Meredith & Kaytee from Currently Reading podcast and Ep. 22: Angie Kim (author of Miracle Creek)
5) Ep. 28: Annie Jones
My Personal Favorites (in no particular order):
- Ep. 25: Siobhan Jones (Editorial Director of Book of the Month)
- Ep. 34: Books in the Classroom with Sara from Fiction Matters
- Ep. 38: Garrett M. Graff (author of The Only Plane in the Sky)
- Ep. 28: Annie Jones
- MINI Ep. 37: Elizabeth Chapman from @samandscout
Blog Growth
Pageviews
My blog traffic grew much faster this year (last year, pageviews grew 17% from 2017) despite posting less frequently. I’m guessing this is because I acquired some new readers from the podcast.
- Pageviews increased 28% over 2018.
- My best months (by pageviews) were December, May, and July (in that order). December did better for me this year and May and July have always been good months for me. The Fall (when many big books are published) continues to not be a great time on the blog for me…while the summer is peak season.
Overall Blog Traffic Source Comparison (Sessions):
| Top 5 Sources | 2019 % Traffic |
2018 % Traffic |
| Google Organic Search | 42% | 48% |
| Direct | 17% | 13% |
| 13% | 11% | |
| 10% | 14% | |
| Facebook Mobile | 2.5% | 3% |
| 2.5% | 1% |
Social Media Network Traffic Source Comparison (Sessions):
| Top Networks | 2019 % Traffic |
2018 % Traffic |
2017 % Traffic |
| 75% | 74% | 79% | |
| 19% | 15% | 10% | |
| 15% | N/A | N/A | |
| 6% | 6% | 7% |
Best Performing Posts/Pages of 2019 (regardless of publication date)
Like previous years, evergreen book lists (that I continually update) and spoiler discussion posts continue to do well. And, I’m thrilled that my Summer Reading Guide finally made my top 5 posts of the year (surprisingly, this is the first time this has happened!).
- Book Club Recommendations (“evergreen” book list) – 6% of traffic (mostly Google search)
- 2019 Summer Reading Guide – 3% of traffic (Google search, email, and Pinterest)
- Page Turner Books (“evergreen” book list) – 2.5% of traffic (mostly Google search)
- Behind Her Eyes and THAT Ending: Spoiler Discussion – 2% of traffic (mostly Google search)
- An Anonymous Girl Spoiler Discussion – 1.7% of traffic (mostly Google search)
Best Performing Posts/Pages Published in 2019
- 2019 Summer Reading Guide – Google search, email, and Pinterest
- Best Books of 2019 – Email and Pinterest
- 2019 Holiday Gift Guide – Email and Instagram
- Eight 2019 Books That Deserved the Hype…and 5 That Didn’t – mostly Pinterest
- Best Books of 2019 (so far) – mostly Email
Best Performing Book Reviews of 2019 (all mostly Google search)
- Behind Her Eyes and THAT Ending: Spoiler Discussion (2017 post)
- An Anonymous Girl Spoiler Discussion (2019 post)
- Am I the Only One Who Didn’t Love Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine? (2017 post)
- Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
- Why I Didn’t Like Circe by Madeline Miller (2018 post)
What interesting things did you learn from your reading and blogging stats? Who were your most successful recommendation sources and publishers?
Sarah, I love the tracker and love seeing my end of year stats. I’ve definitely improved my percentages since I took your lead and got over being a “completionist”!
I have a question about tracking your recommendation sources. Over half the books I read are ARCs and I often read them before the people I follow. Or I already have the ARC before I read blog and Goodread reviews. I know you read a lot of ARCs too so how do you track the sources for them? Do you track if they like or don’t like a book you already have even though they weren’t necessarily a “source” for the book?
I read ahead of the curve as well and for me the source is where I ‘found’ the book- Edelweiss, the publisher, an author I like, and sometimes a blogger. So, those are what I put in my Recommendation Source column. It’s kind of the same thing as Annie B Jones and Mrs. Darcy- they’re reading even further out than we are (6-8 months).
Catherine that’s what I’ve been doing as well and it’s an imperfect system (for me). It hasn’t given me the stats I need as far as trusted sources. Once I’ve read them, I’ve been relying on my memory as to who liked which books I also liked (or didn’t). Any my memory is faulty!
So glad to hear that!!
To answer your question –
1) I keep an email saved in my draft folder with all the ARCs I have or are interested in organized by pub date. That’s where I quickly note recommendations as I come across them. It enables me to make a quick note anywhere…since I don’t always have access to my spreadsheet. Then I go back later and add them into my tracker.
2) There are people that read even farther out than I do (other bookstagrammers, bloggers, but also booksellers…they read really far in advance). I keep an eye out for books I have on my list that appear on Instagram or friends rate on Goodreads.
3) I DO add someone as a recommendation source even after I’ve finished the book and even if I didn’t initially hear about the book from that person / source. This is because the purpose of tracking my rec sources is to pinpoint who I should trust for recommendations and, just because a source read a book after I did doesn’t mean I shouldn’t trust them for future recommendations. Their taste still aligns with mine!
So…here’s what I do step by step:
1) Add a book I’m interested in to my email draft – and any rec sources I already have for that book.
2) Keep an eye out on Goodreads, IG, and podcasts / blogs for others who end up liking that book. Add them to my email draft as I see them.
3) At the end of each month, I enter all my rec sources for that month’s books into my tracker. At that time, I also check the Read it Forward Favorites of the Month and Amazon Best of the Month lists and add them as rec sources to any of my books that are on the lists.
4) Quarterly (when I do my quarterly recommendation source blog post), I fill in the recommendation sources Summary Chart in my tracker.
5) I usually don’t add anymore rec sources for a book after my quarterly Summary Chart update.
So, I guess I kind of batch things…
I’m considering doing a podcast episode where I walk through how I personally use the tracker. Some have asked for that. It would probably be a patrons only episode. Would you be interested in that?
Sarah, yes I’d love a podcast episode on the tracker!
Also, thanks for sharing how you track recommendation sources. That makes so much more sense and doesn’t rely on my faulty memory as to who liked or didn’t like a book that I’d already read. So my trusted sources info wasn’t helpful.
I’ll start doing it this way. Thanks so much!
Also I got busy and forgot to answer your question on a previous episode. I’d definitely enjoy a Sarah only episode where you talk about what you’ve read. Great idea!
I love looking at stats! Sarah – how do you remember your recommendation sources? Sometimes I can vaguely remember that someone talked about a book on a podcast or maybe I saw it in a Facebook group, then I add it to my Goodreads list. By the time I read some of them, I can’t remember where I heard about them from.
Great question!
I keep an email saved in my draft folder with all the ARCs / books I have or are interested in reading – organized by publication date. That’s where I quickly note recommendation sources as I come across them on IG, Goodreads, blogs, podcasts, etc. It enables me to make a quick note anywhere…since I don’t always have access to my spreadsheet. Then I go back later and add them into my tracker.
You could also use a notes app on your phone. I think it’s just key to have a place to jot down a note in the moment wherever you are.
Wow! Your end of year stats are amazing….college level compared to mine, stuck in middle school! Seriously, I’m glad you had such a great reading year and that you’ve honed down the way you select books to a system that really works for you. I’m also going to pay more attention to the imprints I read most this year.
The Tracker REALLY helped me put my end of year post together, so thank you for that. Here’s to another great year of reading and talking about books!
So interesting! This was my first year using your tracker and it was great. I learned quite a bit about my reading tastes, preferred publishers, and it gave me some things to focus on for my reading goals in 2020.
Another great year of reading! I’m a ruthless DNFer, so I love that you’re honest about what you read and what you just have to put down. I introduced my book club to your blog — specifically the summer and holiday reading lists — and we’re pretty much picking everything we read from there!
Also, I’m excited to see what you do with more backlist books in 2020. 🙂
Thank you so much! Thrilled you’ve got your book club reading the blog!
I’m always interested in your stats breakdown! I need to be better about tracking my recommendation sources…..I’m just not very good at that. Last year, you had a tracker for Best of Lists and which lists aligned most with a person’s reading tastes……any chance you are doing that again because that was totally informative for me!
I decided not to do the Best of lists tracker this year…it was a TON of work to keep track of all the lists coming out and enter the books into my tracker. With the podcast now, I just didn’t have time this year!! So sorry!
If you’re dying for it, you can download last year’s and just update all the books to this year’s lists.
Wow, you keep track of a lot of stats. I love your graphic. I’ll eventually do a stats post on my blog, but it won’t be this pretty. Happy 2020! Good luck with your goals.
Sarah, Do your podcast stats only count if an episode is downloaded? I ask because I often listen, but rarely download.
Great question – let me look into it. I do know that different hosts (who track stats) define downloads differently. However, I do know that if you do download, it saves you some data usage! If you stream it directly without downloading, you’re using data that entire time!
I love these posts. Great geeky reading stuff.
I always like see people’s book stats, though I don’t keep them myself.
Wow Sarah, you are the data mining queen! I haven’t done anything with my stats yet, which is really embarrassing.
I’m flattered that people like our preview episodes so much. Hopefully, I’ll be able to keep increasing my positive picks numbers!
My stat that will mean the most to you: I now read more e-ARCs than print. 54%! For backlist and debuts I read 30% each which I’m happy about. I loved reading so much backlist in Nov/Dec. A new stat that I found really interesting is that 65% of my reading this year was new-to-me authors. That makes me happy.
Love the new logo and theme!
I DNF’d lots of books this year! I used to never DNF, but after reading your thoughts on the topic I made the jump. I couldn’t be happier.
Thank you! Congrats on jumping on the DNF bandwagon!
This post has inspired me to do a post on my stats too 🙂 I love looking at people’s stats. Have a great year!
EMILY THE BOOK NERD
emilythebooknerdxo.blogspot.com
I also am easily distracted by shiny new books! I’m still working on my stats from last year, but I’d be surprised if I’d read any more backlist books than you.
I wonder if your podcast downloads could just reflect some people having more time in the summer. I’m not sure 🙂