YOUR THURROCK has just passed two million page views for the year.
Since we launched on September 1st 2008, we have seen a steady increase in our readership.
2008: 40,000 page views (8,221 uniques)
2009: 312,588 page views (54, 467 uniques)
2010: 633,652 page views (83,617 uniques)
2011: 835,207 page views (126,617 uniques)
2012: 1,006,701 page views (193,518 uniques)
2013: 1,273,401 page views (295,718 uniques)
2014: 1,346,747 page views (346,007 uniques
Jan to Aug 8th 2015: 2,002,568 page views (739,112 uniques)
As you can see, this year has seen a tremendous leap in our readership. Building up an audience takes a long time and takes a lot of hard yards. Those first few years certainly bore testimony to that.
We are pleased to say that we have, we feel, stayed loyal to our "hyperlocal roots’ Which in ordinary money means that we only publish stories that are Thurrock based.
Let’s be honest, if you want to hear about Kim Kardashian’s clothes, George Osborne’s budget or The Ashes, then you will go to the nationals but, if you want to know about the traffic on the A13, where all that smoke is coming from or why there is police tape in that park, then you will come to us.
For us, it is less a job and more a way of life. It is like being on call for the borough.
Two weeks ago: It is 9pm, you settle down for a glass of wine and Ray Donovan on Sky Atlantic, when the DM on Twitter asks: "Where is all that smoke coming from".
As the twitter continues to ping, you put glass of wine down and head back upstairs to the office. Four hours later, at 1am, you call it a day. But in that time (this is the Thurrock Tech story) we gained 20,000 page views in four hours.
Our Twitter followers stand at 7,867 which is pretty good. We neglected Facebook, which was pretty stupid. We only had 600 likes on Jan 1st and so have made a real effort to improve that. We now stand at 3,043 likes. Getting there.
On August 7th, we went into partnership with Local World. They own the Essex Chronicle, Brentwood Gazette and the Harlow Star. It has been a big boost for us (yes we know, you find the pop up adverts annoying). In our opinion, Local World have a real grasp on the demands ad opportunities for digital news in the 21st century.
IN 2015, the most viewed stories have been.
1. Senior police officer updates on search for Brad Arthur: 24,000 page views.
2. Woman found with serious injuries between Grays and Tilbury: 24,000 page views
3. Jumping Giants open in West Thurrock: 20,000 page views
4. Another tragedy as Ockendon Academy announce death of another pupil: 18,000 page views
5. A13 speed limit to be reduced to 40mph: 16,000 page views
6. Delays on Dartford Crossing after lorry crashes: 16,000 page views
7. Horror as boy has foot stuck in escalator in Intu Lakeside: 15,000 page views
So there we are. Every day is a blank canvas and it is our job to paint the picture of Thurrock on a daily basis.
If we folded tomorrow, then we would like to think that in a hundred years time, if anyone wanted to see what Thurrock life was like between September 1st 2008 and August 9th, 2015 then they might just look at our site.
So……Thanks again for looking in and off we go!
