Frugal Fridays: That Was The Year That Was
Fri Feb 08, 2008 at 12:12:53 PM PDT
Welcome to Frugal Fridays where we share money saving tips, discuss living frugally and generally talk about personal finance issues. It was one year ago last week that I posted the first Frugal Fridays diary, so I figured this would be a good time to look back over the year and revisit some of my highs and lows. I'd like to get some feedback from you on what you think worked and what didn't as well, so please comment freely.
Follow me below the fold for a trip though the wayback machine to see how it all started and where we've gone from there.
I had been kicking around the idea of doing a diary on personal finance issues for a while. I wasn't really envisioning a series, maybe one or two diaries and I'd run out of things to say (hah!). It's not that I'm a professional or an expert or anything. It was more that I kept seeing people say or do costly things that were easily avoided and I thought it might be nice to pass on the lessons I've learned over the years (often through making the same costly mistakes I was seeing others repeat). So, when kath25 solicited authors for her new series Kossacks Under 35, I volunteered. I figured there were a lot of things I wish I had figured out before I was 35, and if I could pass on some of them, that might be useful. Some of the comments in that diary led Kath to write one a few weeks later on Saving Money in general (or how to get by when you are broke). The overwhelming response to that one led to the formation of this series. The name was suggested by willers and a voila! A series was born. Incidentally, it took me a few weeks to notice that the tag and the diary title don't quite match, but by then I was too lazy to go back and fix the old tags, so now I'm stuck with the mismatch.
LOOKING BACK
Here are some of the diaries that stand out in my mind from last year.
Most Popular: This series started with a bang when the first one: Saving Money on Food rocketed onto the rec list. It took me a while to realize that the success of that first diary was a fluke (slow diary day? hungry readers? crossover effect from KU53? all or none of the above?) and it was not likely to be repeated any time soon. FF may float in the backwaters of dKos, but there is a dedicated core (corps?) of participants who make this series a great place for me each week. Yes, I know who you all are, and I miss you when you stop coming by. Just like Miss Nancy on Romper Room, I can look through my magic mirror and see you out there.
Second Place in Popularity: The second most popular diary I wrote also takes the prize in the diary that took me the longest to write, if you include the weeks of shopping and researching I did. Disaster Looms was a detailed description of how to put together personal disaster kits that are both useful and frugal.
Rescued: Thanks to the Rescue Rangers for rescuing one of my early efforts, Planes, Trains and Automobiles. I'm sure that helped let people know about this series in the early days and helped build my audience.
Most Deserving of a Second Chance: This wasn't the least popular diary I wrote, that one deserved to scroll off into obscurity, but the second least popular diary, Stop, Thief!, which was on preventing identity theft really should have gotten more attention, in my completely impartial opinion, of course. As long as were on the topic, the diary Linkolicious, which summarized many of the food related frugal links I had found, didn't deserve to be posted during Yearly Kos when the site traffic was much reduced.
Worst Title: For a while, I thought that maybe if I came up with catchy titles, I could get more readers. Unfortunately, what seemed "catchy" to me was often totally obscure and uninformative to the readers. The worst example of this has to be How to Shop When You're a Dog. I thought it was obvious this meant shopping on the internet, since, "On the internet, nobody knows that you're a dog," but somehow it seems that many people were not aware of an obscure cartoon that appeared in the New Yorker 15 years ago. Who could have guessed? By the way, I just noticed that 14% of the diary titles I've posted end in an exclamation point. I guess I am overly emphatic.
Most Surprisingly Successful: Sometimes I'll think of an idea and spend days working on the topic (researching, writing, re-writing) only to have the diary slip off into obscurity with little notice. I'm kind of resigned to that. This is a big site and it's easy for things to get lost. Plus my diaries aren't exactly on topic around here. It catches me by surprise when I do have a relatively high impact. What really floors me though is when I find something I have slammed out at the last minute with little thought or effort garners much more attention than many of the carefully crafted ones. The most striking example of this was just a few weeks ago, Tips and Hints.
SPECIAL THANKS
I really appreciate all the guest diarists who have helped out this year:
willers: on how to shop at the local dump Saving Money Down in the Dumps
AnnieJo: for her diaries on making gifts, Frugal Gifts and then Frugal Gifts Holiday Edition. Thanks also for her diary Good Garbage! on how to reduce the amount of garbage you produce.
1864 House: New Year's Resolutions, which was so good, we brought it back the following week New Year's Resolutions - Take 2
mbzoltan: the most recent guest author, who posted last week's DIY, the Internet, and Home Improvement
And last, but far from least, a shout out to jotter, for posting the top diary stats daily. It's not just for ego stroking that I go check out his list. I also use it to try to gauge which topics are of more interest.
LOOKING AHEAD
As I've been writing these, I've noticed that the topics tend to fall into four general categories:
Saving Money: Diaries devoted to a specific topic such as housing (My Rent is Killing Me!), cars (Car Talk), travel (Vacation - Had to Get Away!), clothes (I Haven't a THING to Wear!), etc.
Money Management: Diaries on personal finance topics such as budgeting (Step 1 - Make a Budget), credit cards (Charge!), children and money (Teach Your Children Well), debt management (Bad Debt and Good Debt), etc.
Investments: Diaries that discuss specific investments, such as real estate (Be It Ever So Humble), retirement accounts (Retirement Investing For Beginners), other investment accounts (Care and Feeding of Liquid Nest Eggs), other general info (What's in Your Mattress?), etc.
Links: I keep accumulating good links from these diaries and every so often, just repost a bunch of them. For example, Now With More Linky Goodness! and Linkapalooza.
Please use the poll to let me know which of these types of topics you'd like to see more of. I'll definitely continue to have some of each kind, but I want to know what interests you the most.
Frugal Tip of the Week: If you live in California, you should know about a new law that took effect January 1 this year. If you have a store issued gift card that has less than $10 left on it, the merchant must return the remainder balance to you in cash, if you request it. This law does not apply to preloaded debit cards issued by MasterCard or the like. Many merchants are either unaware of this law, or reluctant to follow it, but voluntary compliance is growing and if you stick to your guns, you will prevail. Here's an article you can check out for more details. Vermont, Montana and Washington have similar laws, but the dollar limit is lower in those states.
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