October Holiday Hop- Data Analysis

So, the little hidden nerd in me LOVES analyzing data!  So for the October Holiday Hop I just organized, I put some pieces together that would make it easy to gather data.

The first thing I did was post my freebie WAY in advance.  I made it $100.00 though so no one would buy it.  I needed the URL because I made a bitly link.  If you don't know about bitly, it is a website that creates shortened URLs.  I wasn't really concerned about the length of the URL, but it also has free analytics. I used the bitly URL to link my facebook page to my product.

I also made a small table that I could record before and after information.

Here is the raw data-

Before the Hop, I had 1295 FB followers, 270 TpT followers, no freebie downloads, 1 sale and 2 wishlists of the Fall WWP Bundle and 5 sales and 4 wishlists of the full product that my freebie came out of.

After the hop, I had 1484 FB followers, 273 TpT followers, 245 views, 101 downloads;  The stats didn't change on my linked products.  Just to clarify, my freebie was a usable portion of my October Wednesday Word Problems.

All in all, I'm pleased with the FB growth.  I grew 189 FB followers.  I also grew by 3 TpT followers, which wasn't anything I was thinking about.

The part that I found interesting was that bitly data.  According to bit.ly, the link was clicked 338 times, which is more than my freebie was viewed according to TpT.  I added the bit.ly link because I wanted to track how many of the views came from the actual FB hop and how many views came from people stumbling upon it through a search on TpT or from being in my store for another product.

So?  What happened?  How did I more bit.ly clicks than views on TpT?  One thought was that maybe the definition of a view on TpT was different than bit.ly.  I also thought maybe there was a time delay between when things are clicked and when the data shows up.  I don't really think that is the case though.  I wish I knew more.

Also, I think my next product will be not as specific to Kindergarten and something that can be used in several grades.

Reflections:

This was the first FB Hop I have organized.  I've taken place in a few and helped run them, but never organized it from beginning to end.  Overall, I think the hop was a success.  There are definitely things I will change for the next time.

We started on a Friday, which made straightening out the glitches difficult.  Just about everyone was at work so it was difficult to get things worked out.  At one point, I was sitting in a workshop, trying to look information up on my phone and iPad without being obvious.... In November, we will start on a Saturday so we will be more available.

Although most links were checked prior to the start, things still went a little wonky.  Next time, we will do a quick run through the evening before to make sure it all works.  

Also, we had a good number of people sign up for the PK-2 and 3-5 groups, but the middle and high school groups were so slim, they combined to a group of 4.  For November, I'm going to advertise specifically for middle and high school participants.

Even though it was a lot of work, I really enjoyed the Hop.  I'm super excited to start planning the November Holiday Hop so keep your eyes and ears out!