2020 has finally ended! Happy New Year to you! May you, your family, and your loved ones be happy and healthy the whole year long! And may your writing flow easily!
I started posting regularly to my YouTube channel during the last week of April. The impetus was watching all of the AuthorTube community posting their success stories from the April Camp NaNoWriMo. The livestreams with writing sprints were motivational, and I wanted to take part in the community. I also wanted to finish the story I’d started in November, but hadn’t been able to get off my butt and write.
The decision was made to start streaming writing sprints and hold myself accountable to those who were watching. It has worked wonders!
I’m extremely proud of all the writing I’ve accomplished this year. Additionally, I’m excited to have developed a writing routine that is working for me.
What are you proud of having accomplished in 2020?
I’ve tried to keep posting my monthly analytics here so that I would be able to look back and see the growth of my stories as well as my channel.
Let’s take a quick look back at the analytics for my small YouTube channel and writing for December, and then the analytics for the whole of 2020.
YouTube Analytics
For December 2020
Number of Videos: 16
Views: 1,558
Watch Hours: 700.8
Subscriber Growth: 11
I have also been able to stream simultaneously to my Twitch account www.twitch.tv/thedawdlingwriter . I started doing this only in December. Feel free to catch my writing sprints on either YouTube or Twitch any time you like.
8 Months of Writing Livestreams in 2020 (May-Dec.)
Number of Videos: 177
Views: 13,446
Watch Hours: 6.1K
Subscriber Growth: 319
Subscriber total on December 31st: 354
For me, this is an amazing number! I didn’t know if anyone would even pay attention to my channel, nor want to write along with me. The fact that there are over 350 people who thought my channel, myself, or my writing was entertaining enough to follow is amazing.
As corny as it sounds, I have made so many new friendships this year. Despite the chaos of 2020, or perhaps because of it, the writing community continues to grow. Maybe people are searching for ways to be productive and focused at home, turning to creative outlets in the midst of stress, or finally getting the time to write the novel they always dreamed of. Whatever the reason, I am so grateful to have become a part of the online writing community and have the opportunity to meet all the wonderful people there.
I’m not crying; I swear!
Writing Analytics
December 2020
Pages Edited: 100
Words in YA Fantasy WIP: 5,684
Words in Paranormal Romance WIP: 0
Words in Novellas/Short Stories: 6,556
Words in Web Content (blogs, video scripts, freelance, etc.): 15,148
Words in Research & Notes: 0
Words in Journal: 3,841
Monthly Word Count: 31,229
Adding all the words for this year (since the end of April when I started tracking) and I have written a grand total of:
401,243 Words
Isn’t that AMAZING?! I had no idea I was capable of writing that much in only 8 months! This was a wonderful experiment that I decided to start.
When I started this experiment, I wasn’t sure how much I could write in a month. I have found that even in my worst months, I can write over 30 thousand words. And in my better months, I’ve reached nearly 70 thousand words.
This is a huge deal for me as I now have more confidence in my ability to churn out the words. I have developed a good habit and routine of writing regularly, which was another goal for this experiment. Now I can begin to shift my focus to COMPLETION of projects.
What did you accomplish this year that you’re proud of? Let me know in the comments!
The Dawdling Writer 