2013 has come to a close and here at Parkjets, we like the idea of looking back and seeing what we accomplished and what we want to do in the near future, also known as 2014. It was a busy first half of the year and we rounded out the year with some more plans and some new resources. Let’s take a dive into what was 2013 and see what we can remember.
New Plans – We set the rather lofty goal of adding 3 plans a month last year and fell well short. We only found nine plans we felt met our criteria. You see, there are plans out there to add, but unless we are confident they will fly and the documentation is good enough to help the builders out there, we won’t post them. Case in point, one plan we posted managed to unseat the most popular plan on Parkjets, the Steve Shumate F-22. Again, we are going for quality, not always quantity. What plans did we add? Here you go:
For those of you wanting more plans, we have a few cued up already this year, so we are hopeful to get back into the 20-new-plan-range again in 2014. Right now, Parkjets features 128 totally free downloads, by far the most parkjets available anywhere in one easy place. It would be awesome to get to 150 plans by the end of the year!
Interviews – We continued to build on our interview series with interviews by two of the best designers out there, Tomas Hellberg and Chris Carpenter. These two guys have cranked out some very popular designs including the F-22, F-18, Morningstar, and SU-31! We love hearing from these folks out there, it lets everyone get a little insight into the design process, the desire to make something from scratch, and any tips and tricks learned by designing.
Sponsorship – Nothing new to report here. 6mmFlyRC continues to keep the computer running, the lights on, and the bandwidth covered. It does take some resources to run Parkjets and we are grateful for the support and money 6mmFlyRC provides. Do yourself a favor, visit their site, check out their offerings and save yourself some hours this winter by picking up a kit rather than cutting your own.
Traffic – Good news here, Parkjets continues to grow its audience. In 2013, Parkjets pushed out 2.6 million pages (2.5 million in 2012) and had over 400,000 unique visitors (305,000 in 2012) to 155 different countries! That’s pretty awesome. Even more exciting is the fact Parkjets gained 50% more subscribers to our free monthly newsletter. More and more people are coming to Parkjets, and that means more and more people will submit plans and that means more to give away to you.
Endorsements – Last year we reviewed and endorsed a couple of products, which is fantastic. And we just finished up our review and endosement of a slightly different but better offering, designed to get you building and flying faster than ever before.
Twitter – When we started 2012, we had a very small Twitter following, so we set the goal and worked at increasing out Twitter footprint. In fact, when we started 2013, we had an incredible 165 followers. Today, we have 2,274 followers. Now math isn’t necessarily a strong suit over here at Parkjets, but that’s an increase of 1378%!! Now we set our sights on 5,000 new followers in 2013 and fell short, but we feel good about the awesome momentum. If you are on Twitter and are not following us (@parkjetsusa) what are you waiting for? Come on, help us spread the word!
Well, that puts a stake in 2013 for Parkjets. We are looking forward to a new year and we are going to continue to work on making our site better and packed full of more resources. Look for an all new Parkjets.com in 2014 that will allow for faster navigation, more search options, and more product recommendations. Happy New Year everyone and thank you for your continued support!