It’s been a tradition for years now around here for me to do a year-end wrap-up. It’s a great way of reflecting on the year, sharing some random interesting statistics, and most importantly, saying thank you to everyone who comes to this site.
Thank You
I don’t say it often enough, but thanks to all the people who come to this site. Hopefully you come here to learn or reference something and that’s useful to you, but of course that’s also useful to me, as running a popular site has obvious benefits.
Thank you to AdPacks for serving the ads on my demo pages. They are a subsidiary of BuySellAds, who still serves all other ads on the site and makes my life way easier.
Thanks to all the current advertisers: PSD2HTML, CodeCanyon, FreshBooks, Site5, FlippingBook, SiteGrinder, XHTMLWeaver, FoxyCart, SendLoop, WPCoder, and Elegant Themes.
Thank you Media Temple for the hosting.
Thank you Typekit for the custom web fonts.
Thank you to NetDNA for the content delivery.
Thank you to IGN for the video hosting.
Milestones
Redesigns
There have been two redesigns this year, from v7 rolled out in August and v8 this December. I’m extremely happy with v8 still. One of my favorite little touches is how search results come in without page reload. The biggest lingering issue is some PC font rendering stuff that I hope to be able to solve somehow yet. The bold colors aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but they are my cup of tea.
Forums
The forums were transferred from phpBB to Vanilla. They are easier to use and administer and have less spam. The design fits nicely into the rest of the site I think. After the update, the forums are now seeing double the traffic they used to. However it’s still fairly low compared to the rest of the site. For instance, in the last month the entire forums have seen about 66,000 pageviews across all pages combined while the single most popular article this month saw about 82,000. Over the course of the year, the forums as a whole are 4% of total site traffic. I’d like to see that grow in the coming year and I’m sure it will. Seeing people get direct personal help there is awesome.
Wufoo
I worked over half the year at Wufoo. It’s an unbelievably great job. I work with great people on a great product where my job duties are flexible and perfectly suited to me. More importantly, I’ve made great friends of my co-workers. This job has taken me to Tampa, Florida, which was a big move. My life in Florida is much better than it was in Chicago thanks to my new friends there (including my new puppy Digby) and my more spacious home.
Simplification
Over the past few years I’ve gotten busier and busier. There were times of serious stress where I was spending time on things I didn’t really want to be. I feel like I’ve gotten better in the last year about keeping my life simplified and only working on things I want to be. I plan to defend this better life management vigorously and hopefully get even better at it.
Statistics
- This is the 753rd post. There are 396 snippets and 94 screencasts for a total of 1,243 unique bits of content.
- There are 31,613 comments which makes an average of 25 comments per piece of content, although there are pages with hundreds of comments and some with none.
- There has been a 77% increase in visits compared to last year, with an 11% drop in time spent on site per visitor.
- The homepage is the most visited page on the site. Of the total 25 million pageviews through the year, 2.8 million of them where to the homepage, which is about 11.5%.
- There were about 11 million “entrances” to the site, of which 2 million were to the homepage. That means over 4/5 of the traffic to this site enters via a “deep link.”
- Search engines provide 44% of all traffic, referring sites 34%, and 20% direct. 2% is “other” whatever that means in Google Analytics world.
- The top referring sites are 1) Google 2) Smashing Magazine 3) Web Design Ledger 4) 1st Web Designer 5) Twitter
- The most popular non-article section of the site is the downloads area which represents about 3.5% of traffic. The demo pages themselves have 6.3 million pageviews which is about 25% of traffic.
- RSS feed subscribers, according to Feedburner, are hovering right at about 65,000. There were about 40,000 this time last year, meaning we’ve added 25,000 people this year, which is far more than subscribed in total in 2007.
The Future
As every year, I’m excited for the next! No huge secret plans. I’m mostly excited just to continue learning about design and sharing that stuff here. Working on this site is always a great pleasure for me.
I’m tossing around the idea of doing a CSS-Tricks book. I have a few ideas for that I’m trying to decide between. I feel it’s pretty likely that’ll happen in 2011, but no particular promises.
I know screencasts have been few and far between lately. They were losing steam big time for over a year even when I was doing them regularly. I’m sure that contributed to my slowing down on them, even though I like to think that’s not why. I still plan to keep up with them, but will likely be later in January when I kick them back up. I have a big ol’ list of ideas I think would be good ones.
That’ll do it for this year’s wrap up, see ya’ll next year!
Keep up the great work Chris – we all love what you do and learn from it by each article you place online.
Happy holidays and see you in 2011!
I’m a big fan of your videos. They (and you) are my biggest inspiration for me. Wish you have the best 2011. Thank you!
I always enjoy visiting this site, you have a great mind and opinion on things.
Hope to see great things in 2011!
Marry Christmas Chris. Happy new year
A site as yours definitely deserves these great statistics. Keep it up!
Dear Chris ,
Have a great new year and wish you the best in this very new year .
I’m really a fan of your great videos , they were really good guides and inspirations to me , you are one of a kind to me when I think about web dev/design.
Thanks for all your efforts and may god help you to be more successful
Merry Christmas and thank you, Chris!
Hey Chris!
I owe you a huge thank you!!! I have learned so much through your site regarding CSS, HTML, and Jquery. I am a huge fan of the screencasts, and can’t wait for the upcoming year!
Keep up the great work, and Merry Christmas!
Elliott
>Hopefully you come here to learn or reference something and that’s useful to you
Dead sure, Chris
I really enjoy the articles you post and everything the site is a great resource for when I need pointers on things. Especially the videos I really enjoy them, I hope you do more, I don’t see why they don’t get as many views.
Merry Christmas
Cheers Chris thanks to your easy to use tutorials I have actually been able to build my portfolio site …… Ok it’s still a work in progress but hey I come so far in such a short time
Thank you
Sanjit
Merry Christmas and thank you, Chris!
Wish you the best mate.
Thanks to you Chris! for all your contributions to the design/development world and for being such a great influence and inspiration.
Salud!
Thanks a million code mentor! Don’t get rid of the videocast!
A big hug for you Chris.
Since I discovered your site has been one of my favorites. I visit daily and follow your tweets. I enjoy your articles and your videos are awesome.
I´m sure that you will surprise us with all your new projects for the new year.
Merry Christmas and happy new year!
If I run your feedburner feed through SimplePie, does it register as “subscribing”? If not, that sucks. I love styling my own feeds. :)
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Please keep the screencasts comming. I love them.
Absolutely loving the site, and I’ve been visiting it regularly for about a year-and-a-half now. Wishing you all a merry christmas, and a happy new year! Oh, and I’m totally loving the screencasts, so do keep them coming! :D
Also, on a random side-note, what’s the font used in the image? I’m feeling it! I really am!
Thank YOU, Chris! You make web design more fun. Would love to see a book.
Chris,
Almost everything you do is fun and interesting.
Keep up the good work :-)
Chris thank for sharing all your insights and investigations into CSS and Jquery. I sincerely appreciate the attitude you seem to have: ie, This is how I did something, I think it’s cool, and maybe someone else will find it helpful, and maybe even help me make it better.
So often people have an attitude of “this is The Right” way to do something, and if you disagree you’re and idiot.
Happy New Year.
Chris,
Keep up the good work!
Thanks
Thanks Chris, and I like the bold colors ;)
Thanks so much for all of the great content you provide us! I visit several times per week to check for new content, updates, and any other bits of info I can find.
The site has grown to become a great resource for so many people, and you do a fantastic job keeping things looking fresh and interesting.
Kudos on a great year, and I look forward to another great year 2011 with much great content!!!
All the best!
I hope you have a merry Christmas.
Hey Chris. First of all, Merry Christmas.. I hope you had a great holiday as well as a great year.
I love your site so much, your posts, your screen-casts, and snippets. I found this site maybe late 2009 – 2010 when I was a beginning web developer and ever since then, your blog has helped me so much. Your posts are easy to read, You go straight to the point of the subject, and describe it so well. Its hard to have that kinda skill.
Your screen-casts are the best ever, seriously. Yours and Jefferey Ways are probably the best on the web! [You both should think about doing a collab screen-cast!/Blog Post]. I love how you always did everything on point. Even if you made errors while coding, you fixed it doing the screen-cast so no one else makes that mistake again.
If you don’t mind, I would love to suggest some screen-casts. More about jQuery would be lovely, and more about Coding sites too. I wish you did another screen-cast based on what kinda tools you use. Like with the Wufoo and eCommerce apps you did.
But I just can’t wait for any screen-cast you’ll be curating!
I bought the Lynda PSD to WordPress course. Before then I couldn’t understand how to do it… Now I know so much, THANK YOU! Made my life so much better. By the way. THANK YOU for the cleaned theme you gave out for it….
I love your posts Chris, each and every day I look on my Google Reader to check if theres a new post from you. I love to read them! Your so brilliant. You make the final touch with the nice graphics you make with the posts.
I would love to see more posts about PHP. I know your probably not a professional, but like you did with jQuery.. you posted everything you learned. I really hope you could start doing that with PHP. I would love some more posts about jQuery too.
Your latest reDesign is AWESOME. I have bad eye site… 5-9 inches from the computer and I can’t read nothing. Its all blurred. The typography looks well done, the font-size is perfect. I can read without no difficulties . I love the nice colors you put in the site too. The site looks really good in Brown. Haha. The advance CSS3 touches you have on your site is amazing too.
Thank you Chris, you helped me so much. You have the best resources on the web, and the best thing it is… its free! Thank you much.
merry christmas and happy new year, Chris. love your site, and all you contribute to the developer/designer world.
Chris:
(1) You are a genius.
(2) Your design for this blog ROCKS! Absolutely fabulous.
(3) Thanks for all the great tips, tricks and tuts. The web is a better place for it.
(4) A CSS Tricks book would be awesome!
(5) You are a genius.
Have a great year in 2011 — because if you do, the rest of us will too!
Hey Chris,
Thank you for all great work you did & still doing :)
I just want to tell you that I’m so excited about the CSS-Tricks Book idea!
Go for it man, I know you’ll rock it too :D
Merry Christmas and happy New Year!
Merry Christmas and happy New Year Chris!
Thanx 4 all….
Chris, I just want to say: awesome website, merry christmas and a happy new year!
As cheesy as that sounds :P I think what you’re doing is awesome!
– Rick
thanks for the update Chris
I’ve been coming here for quite a few years now and do visit at least once daily, as others do, I do enjoy the videos and everything else about the site. did have trouble reading the new site with IE7, since upgraded to IE8.
keep up the good work,
thanks for all the effort
Al
Happy Holidays Chris. Thank you for the wonderful tutorials you have given me. Your ideas and tutorials have given me great ideas for my own websites. You will continue to be one of my bookmarks :) As I work on a rethinking of one of my websites, I will certainly keep in mind all that this website has taught me thus far.
I look forward to good things in the future (and the exciting screen casts!!!!!).
Jason
great blog i hope you continue to succeed in your growth. The tutorials are to die for. Not literally :)
but they are really good :D
Holy crap, I just clicked on the trademark CSS-Tricks Asterisk in your logo, and my head exploded. Nice touch! =)
Merry Christmas!
Happy Holidays & All The Best!
Thank You for everything to share to others become better.
Eileen
Chris, thank you for taking the time to share all your great knowledge on this amazing blog!!! No joke, your site (and w3schools) was the first sites I ever used to do any PHP/MySQL programming. Your site has been an amazing resource for me and I will always be here to check out what cool things you got in store. Keep it up!!!
Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!!! :)
Nice to see the year’s wrap-up.You’re doing great Chris.I already become your huge admirer for all the css tricks oyu give us daily on the newsletter.Keep the good work going.
Thanks
Kiyan
Hi Chris. Your site get’s better and better as time goes on. I’ve been subscribed since early 08 and check it whenever I see a new feed come through. Probably helped me quite a bit with css tips throughout the years.
I believe every web designer/developer should be mastering css before they get heavily involved with the rest of the web world because no matter if you are front end, or back end you will most likely need css at some time.
Also as a side note, keep up the great work with updating the site, it’s amazing how much even you yourself have grown each time you do a redesign.
Nice article and a wonderful site !
You should have a ‘Like’ button next to the article, so that I person like me, who read the article but not interested in putting a comment can just click the ‘Like’ button(and not like another facebook button !).
Keep up the good work !
Pawan Pillai
Chris,
I just want to thank you and your site for mentoring a great deal of web designers. I have grown and implemented many ideas that you have shared. This site truly is one of my must read sites that I visit almost everyday.
Thanks for all your hard work.
Best wishes to you and yours this 2011! Thank you Chris for your time and work in making this website what it is. PS, My girlfriend surprised me on Christmas by giving me your DVD: “WordPress 3.0: Creating and Editing Custom Themes.”, howd she know! Best shizel ever.
Thanks for everything have done here, it has helped me a ton. And welcome to Tampa.
Thanks for doing what you do. My job would be far more difficult without CSS-Tricks.
I Follow up… Thanks
Thanks for the shout out :) Keep up the good work!! The site looks great!
Thanks for all the great stuff!!!
Thanks Chris,
Hope you had a Great Christmas and a Happy New year.
Your work inspires and influences countless thousands of graphic/web designers world wide. Be proud dude, you deserve it.
I learned CSS via your site – and I’ve made a lot of money as a result. Thank you man.
-Josh
Many compliments for your beautiful work on this site and on Digging into WordPress! And thanks a lot for the WP course on Lynda.com. I really like all of your ideas!
Thank You!
No, no, thank you for all the valuable info you provide!
Marry Christmas Chris.
thx for all :)
Thanks for helping us all out in 2010, here is to an other successful year in 2011!!!
LOVE your site.
See you all in 2011.
Chris, thanks a million for all the hard work you put into this site. I am a high school computer science teacher who had to take on Web Mastering I classes a few years back (CS enrollments are dropping (why?!?!) in Texas every year). I knew nothing about web development at all. I started with the W3 Schools site, and then I found your blog.
Everything here on your blog works: your clear, concise writing; exact, straight-forward directions; and engaging wit/humor. I have learned a lot, and quickly. I now teach classes that make my students interested, and hopefully motivated. The good students ask me where to go to learn more; I always point them to your site.
Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and thanks a million again!
Thanks for this awesome site and resource! I just found it and am looking forward to using this tool to help me become a better web designer.
You rock!
I definitely consider your site a great resource and check it regularly. Thanks for all the useful info and insight. Hope 2011 is just as successful!
Thanks for all the great content Chris!
Thank you for all the tips and content!!! I can’t wait for the next screen cast; it’s what originally brought me to your site.
Thanks for all your vidoes. They are really wonderful. M much inspired by you!
Thanks for all that knowledge throughout the year, hope you teach us more ans more coming year.
Wish you a wonderful year 2011
I certainly owe a BIG thanks to Chris and the friendly, helpful folks who have assisted me in the past with CSS issues in the forum. It’s a community like this that is so appreciated! Thank you!
And Chris…regarding the new website revision, I think it looks great! I unfortunately, don’t have any “improvements” to offer at the time. But, overall, the site has a fresh look that I think is inviting. I really love these “CSS roll-over features” in the bottom of the site–I know that’s something you didn’t have (or at least I don’t think it existed in previous site versions)?
Regarding criticism: My personal opinion is that if people can’t offer constructive criticism, then their hateful comments are just B.S. The comments are not valid and I’ve dealt MANY times with these types of comments. Design is subjective and it’s impossible to please every single person in the world.
Thanks to you and a Happy Merry New Year! :)
Chris,
Thanks for what you do. Your professional expertise is matched only by your kind tone and sincerity.
What’s what with getting a new puppy and not posting pics?
Happy New Year!
Ron
Thank you for all the Share! It really helps all my training.
Wish you a good New Year to come!
Could you share some general stats and accomplishments in regards to aremysitesup.com?
Future ideas? I love that one.
Troy
Belated Happy New Year, Chris !
Yes, Yes – the fact that you share your knowledge here and makes money on the side is big thing which makes quality content.
If you are writing a “CSS-Tricks Book” – I will make sure to get a copy myself :)
PS : I have received “Digging into WordPress” Print Edition, as you and Jeff sent me as Give away ! Many thanks :)
Happy New Year Chris, keep up the good work
Hi Chris,
thanks for all the tips and tricks. I stumbled a while ago over your page and your screen cast actually made me stick around. Besides that I like your voice – which makes it easier and even nice to just listen – I finally took the time and started understanding CSS so much better.
Beside that are your articles every time again a great inspiration also aside from the CSS.
Maybe next to the Book a training DVD from 0 to css pro would be something to think about.
Good luck and a great 2011
Nadja
A CSS-Tricks Book would be cool.
I’m a fan of yours Chris and what I liked about you is that you never forget to thank the people behind your success. You make sure that everybody who help you reach this far is worth your time. Cheers!!
Thanks Chris for your wonderful effort to make the web a happier place to be!
Happy New Year to You!!
-Vaishakh Pushpoth
(=] )
Chris
I am happy to say that this site has been in my bookmarks now for many years and for many more years to come. While I am not a fan of the current design I am glad to see you continuing to push the envelope design wise and sticking to your guns regarding what you want to see rather than what everyone else is expecting to see.
Happy new year and congrats on your continued success. :D
Shane
You can always count on Chris to deliver something fresh, and cool. Keep up the great work and best wishes for 2011!
Pete