Paganistan Weekly numbers
I've been figuring out the cross over between all the different places where Paganistan Weekly is sent, and the number of people each place who are local, and right now Paganistan Weekly has the potential of reaching about 1150 local Pagans. The largest block of whom are on the Facebook group, then the Yahoo group, then all the other Yahoo groups combined, and then MySpace way down on the list (254 members, and no reason to believe that many of them actually read Paganistan Weekly, so they didn't really influence the number with more than a justification to round up).
I came up with that number because the Facebook group has 1045 members who are emailed Paganistan Weekly. The Yahoo group has 408 members, 170 of whom are confirmed on the Facebook group. Of the other Yahoo groups where Paganistan Weekly is sent, there are about 75 local people who are not the Twin Cities Pagan Yahoo group. That's 1358 recipients. These groups are overwhelmingly local. I'd say they're 85% local, which gives us 1154. There are probably some cross over numbers between yahoo and Facebook that I didn't account for, and also some MySpace readers who I didn't allow for, so I figure it all balances out and the number is somewhere around 1150.
Facebook has pretty much made MySpace obsolete and irrelevant, and is also contributing to the decline of most Yahoo groups. The Twin Cities Pagans Yahoo group is monstrously larger than any other local Pagan Yahoo group (408 members as compared to 191 in TCpagans) but dwarfed by the Facebook group (1045 members). However, the Yahoo group does continue to grow (two new members today).
A year ago, the calendar was plugging along full steam on the Twin Cities Pagans yahoo group, but there were only about 100 people on the group benefiting from it. Today, 10 times as many local Pagans are reaping the benefits of that calendar.That's pretty good for a year. I look forward to seeing how many local Pagans are being reached next year.
History of Paganistan Weekly:
August 12, 2008, I began posting events on the Twin Cities Pagans calendar. At the time, there were maybe 70 members of the group.
Thursday February 26, 2009, I set up accounts for Twin Cities Pagans on Myspace and Facebook in an attempt to reach more local Pagans.
March 9, 2009, I sent out a message to the Facebook group titled, "Full Moon and Gatherings". This was essentially an attempt to promote the Yahoo group and was followed within a couple days with promotion on other Yahoo groups.
April 15, 2009, I went through the members' lists for the other local Pagan Yahoo groups, found the locals who were not on the Twin Cities Pagans Yahoo group and invited them to join. 307 were invited, and over 100 joined at that time (many of the rest have since joined). This resulted in the Yahoo group growing to be the second largest Yahoo group after the Eye of Horus group (which it has since surpassed by about a hundred) and the discovery that at that time there were approximately 445 local people on the local Pagan Yahoo groups.
Apr 19, 2009, began sending the newsletter to the other local Pagan yahoo groups
May 17, 2009, after a focused title each week to represent the contents of the message, I began titling the message simply, "Weekly Update", and the format changed to pretty much what it still is today
July 5, 2009, the term "Weekly Update" was way to common, so I changed the name to "Paganistan Weekly Update" distinguish it from other weekly updates being sent out
October 12, 2009, the name was shortened to simply "Paganistan Weekly"
A couple days ago I checked the Yahoo member list against the Facebook list and found that of the 406 members at that time, 170 were already listed as friends on Facebook, 92 were on facebook but not on the friends'list, and 144 were not listed on facebook. I also went through the facebook friends' list checking profiles for yahoo addresses, and found approximately 460. I am currently inviting them to join the yahoo group, but so far they aren't replying to the invitations. This could indicate that the crossover between the groups is much higher than I realized, but people are simply not using different email addresses on the different groups, or that the Yahoo group has pretty much hit its saturation level for now. The Yahoo group is about a third the size of the Facebook friends' list at 1272. The facebook group tends to always be at about 85% of the facebook friends' list (I created an account and friend them to be able to then invite them to the facebook group)
Addendum: January 17, 2010
I went through the Facebook friends' list to find people who listed Yahoo addresses or Yahoo IDs, a process which took about 2 weeks and I found 502. I then invited them to join the Yahoo group, a process which again took 9 days because Yahoo only allows 50 to be invited per day. 57 were already members, 37 failed, resulting in 438. So far the number of people in the group has risen by 18 from 404 to 422.
Meanwhile, I exported the members list of the Yahoo group, converted it into an acceptable form, and plugged it into Facebook to find people to invite into the Facebook network, a process which took a morning. 170 were already in the network, 144 were not listed on Facebook, and 92 were actually invited. In that time, the group has gained 42 members.
In review, inviting 438 people on Yahoo with about a month of effort gained 18 new people, while inviting 92 people on Facebook with a morning's effort gained 42 new people.
Addendum: January 25, 2010
The following was produced by a Facebook application.
Here are some stats about my friends:
Number of friends:1370
Gender:37% male, 63% female
Relationship Status:39% single, 61% taken
Countries:12
States:39
Longest name:Sharada Lakhan
Shortest name:Lyz M
Most popular music:Rock (45 friends)
Most popular TV show:House (71 friends)
Most popular movie:Lord Of The Rings (44 friends)
Most popular book:Harry Potter (31 friends)
February 2010, all month, reviewing other local Facebook Paganesque groups and inviting them to join the Sacred Paths Center friends list (less purely Pagan, and so it makes a good filter). After completion, will invite them to join the SPC group, the Twin Cities pagan group, and to be friends with the Twin Cities Pagans, one at a time, allowing time in between for people to join. Then I'll review the SPC friends list and invite any who are left to the Twin Cities Pagans friends list.
February 16, 2010, I just emailed the following to Murphy:
Blessings Murphy,
As our local anthropologist, I thought I'd send you some information since we're quickly approaching the one year anniversary of the TwinCitiesPagans promotional network move to Facebook and Myspace, and it's on my mind. This might be useful to you, and if you have any friends studying online Pagan networking, feel free to forward it to them
The expansion was done to increase membership to the TwinCitiesPagans Yahoo group, which worked. At the time the Yahoo group had fewer than a hundred members (the sixth largest of the 10 noteworthy local Pagan Yahoo groups) and now it has 424, making it monstrously larger than any other local Pagan Yahoo group (the next largest is TC Pagans at 191 members). At a time when many Yahoo groups are dying, this one has greatly expanded.
However, the growth on Yahoo is being eclipsed by the growth on Facebook. There are three Twin Cities Pagans Facebook locales; the account with 1526 friends (this is useful for inviting friends to events, groups, and fan pages) the page with 488 fans (this is not particularly useful, but with the way Facebook reconfigures things, it might be useful in the future) and the group with 1226 members (this group receives the weekly newsletter, Paganistan Weekly). There is a great deal of overlap between these three locales, with almost all the fans and group members falling under the umbrella of the friends' list.
Also, I have endeavored to keep all the TwinCitiesPagans networks overwhelmingly local. I have looked through all the lists and would estimate all the networks to be at least 85% local. I have done this because the focus is to enhance community building in the local community. It also makes it easier to make estimates about the local impact of the networks. (this will probably shift with an increasing desire to showcase our awsomtastic community to the rest of the Pagan world).
What I've found is that Facebook is an incredible resource for Pagan networking. Whereas the Yahoo groups seemed to each be competing for dominance (there's a limit to how many Yahoo groups any one person can follow, so everyone wants there's to be the one people follow) Facebook allows for a much greater ability to be a member of multiple groups. This means that by encouraging people to join other local Pagan groups, more people end up discovering the TwinCitiesPagans network. This happens both passively and actively. Passively by people on other networks being able to trace back to the TwinCitiesPagans network. Actively because as people join other groups, in that instant they are more likely to also invite other people to join that group, and expand the networks I promote, which I can then look through and invite the new people back to the TwinCitiesPagans network as a way to find new people.
I'm also the publicity coordinator for the Sacred Paths Center which gives me access to their Facebook account which is set up almost identically with the three locales. The Sacred Paths Center is a local business and a good cause. About a month ago (from the TwinCitiesPagans account) I suggested that all the TwinCitiesPagans friends become friends with the Sacred Paths Center. Then (from the SPC account) I went into the TwinCitiesPagans friends' list and invited them to be friends with the SPC, so people got invited from two different directions. The end result is the 82% of the TwinCitiesPagans friends are now friends with the SPC (1260 out of 1524). I then went through and found all the local people (checking accounts to verify locality) on the other local Pagan Facebook groups, found about 1500 (I did not verify that they are all Pagan) and I've been inviting them to be friends with the SPC. Facebook only lets me invite about 50 per day, and I've got about 500 left to go. The SPC friends' list is currently 2225, up about 700 from a month ago. When I'm done, I'll encourage these friends to be friends of TwinCitiesPagans, then after a couple weeks I'll go through the SPC friends' list and manually invite them all to be friends with TwinCitiesPagans. I'll then wait a couple months and do the entire thing again from the TwinCitiesPagans account, and continue working back and forth bulking up the two accounts, and also encouraging people to be affiliated with the other local Pagan organizations. By this time next year, I expect the network to be reaching more than 4000 local Pagans.
This not only expands the network, it also gets people more involved in the community. The first step to someone becoming active is to declare an affiliation. By declaring affiliations to multiple local Pagan organizations, they are more likely to feel connected to the local Pagan community and therefore be more likely to not only have an on-line interest, but to actually show up at events. This has already started happening, with a general activation of many in the community. You've probably noticed a lot of new people showing up at just about every event you've been to. This isn't an accident.
In conclusion, Facebook rocks.
And as a footnote, Myspace is pretty much dead. There are 265 friends, but very little new activity since the account was created a year ago, and I'm pretty sure that just about everyone from that friends' list is on the Facebook friends' list.
Paganistan Weekly is published to the 10 major local Pagan Yahoo groups, The Facebook group, as a note to the Facebook account, as a blog on the Yahoo profile, as a bulletin on Myspace, and as a blog on Myspace. It's also printed off and sits on the counter at the Sacred Paths Center.
Locally I've found no real interest in Tribe.net, which a few years ago was popular with Pagans in a few areas such as Kansas City.
I've been collecting data at http://jdoggiedogg.livejournal.com/236628.html
Monday, March 8, 10am; I'm about to go into the Sacred Paths Center Facebook account and encourage the SPC friends' list (2573 friends, 1322 in common, 1251 not in common) to join the Twin Cities Pagans group (currently with 1257 members), and friend the TwinCities Pagans Account (currently with 1576 friends)
March 8, 10:45pm; there are now 1962 people on the Facebook friends' list, and 1466 members of the Facebook group.
March 9, 10pm; there are now 2,057 people on the Facebook friends' list, and 1547 members of the Facebook group. The law of diminishing returns is fascinating. Also, there are currently 777 friends of Sacred Paths Center who are not friends of Twin Cities Pagans
Also, there are currently 435 members of the Yahoo group. Yes, January 17 I noted that 3 weeks of hard work yielded 18 new members. A few more might have joined because of that, but not all of the 13 new members are because of that. The truth is that the Yahoo group numbers continue to increase despite what I do or don't do to make them increase. Not bad for an obsolete networking tool.
Saturday, March 13, 8am; On Facebook, Twin Cities Pagans currently has 2,123 friends, 1,611 members of the group, and 1,863 friends in common with the Sacred Paths Center, which has 2,594 friends. Every week I invite friends who are not yet members to join the group. I'm about to do that, which means that new group members are about to no longer be linked with last Monday's invitations from Sacred Paths Center.
Sunday, March 14, 11pm; Well, I didn't exactly get the huge jump in Facebook group members that I was hoping for, but it's hard to complain when this week's newsletter is going out to 394 more people than last week's update. The group now has 1,651 members (38 more than yesterday morning) whereas there are now 2,144 friends (21 more than yesterday morning) which is directly related to last Monday's promotion, so I can't honestly say that a significant part of the relatively small increase in the group membership might also have been linked with last Monday's promotion.
Chances are that this week's update just went out to around 1500 local Pagans.
Monday March 15, 8am; From the SPC Facebook account, I'm inviting friends to become fans of Magus (currently 1,924 fans) & the Eye of Horus (currently 1,751 fans) the other local metaphysical shops. I'll also notify them that it's being done, so it should be an impressive act of good will and camaraderie. Hopefully a hundred new fans will be enough to get this to show up in a few streams, and stimulate a few invitations which will get more people into the network where I can find them and bring them into the Twin Cities Pagan community.
9pm; Facebook numbers: Magus has 2,105 fans (an increase of 181) and the Eye of Horus has 1,958 fans (an increase of 207). Just for the sake of maintaining the tallies, Twin Cities Pagans has 2,155 friends, the group has 1,666 members, SPC has 2,593 friends, and the SPC group has 1,253 members.
Tuesday, March 16, 10pm; Magus has 2,182 fans (an increase of 258) and the Eye of Horus has 2,036 fans (an increase of 285).
Friday, March 19, 10pm; Summarizing the Facebook gains which are mostly attributable to invitations from the SPC account: Magus has 2,270 fans (an increase of 346) and the Eye of Horus has 2,147 fans (an increase of 396). Twin Cities Pagans currently has 2,180 friends (an increase of 604), and 1,694 members of the group (an increase of 437).
Sunday, March 21, 10pm; Summarizing the Facebook gains which are mostly attributable to invitations from the SPC account: Magus has 2,298 fans (an increase of 374) and the Eye of Horus has 2,184 fans (an increase of 433). Twin Cities Pagans currently has 2,193 friends (an increase of 617), and 1,693 members of the group (an increase of 436).
It's too bad I haven't been tracking the numbers since I started on Facebook. Along the way, I have continually been inviting people to join other groups. Most of the local Pagan groups got most of their connections because of the work I've done. But soon it will be time to begin tracking down those who I didn't add, and then adding them to the Twin Cities Pagans network. That is the goal for April and into May. Once it's done, I'll expand a whole lot of networks again. I love this community, and I am going to do what I can to see it grow.
March 23, I just found a couple local Radical Faerie groups on Tribe.net. Huron Valley Radical Faeries and Faerie Spirit Gathering. I also found a website for Kawashaway and the Northwoods Tribe of Radical Faeries which appears to have a sanctuary, sponsor gatherings, and the Northwoods Radical Faeries Yahoo group
March 26, 10:15 am; the Facebook friends' list just hit 2,222. The Yahoo group has 444 members. Meanwhile, the Facebook group has 1,720 members, which isn't as cool a number, but I figured I should note it while I'm tracking.
When someone friends TCP after being recommended by SPC, SPC gets a notification, so I know that most of the new TCP friends are no longer due to the invitations from SPC. There are still some, but no longer most. Also, there are still people accepting the SPC friend invitations from over a month ago.
March 30, 1:30pm; It's the end of the month, so I'm inviting members of the SPC friends' list to join the SPC group on Facebook. I'm inviting 773 friends who are not yet members. The group currently has 1,271 members. SPC has 2,644 friends. The difference is mostly due to outstanding previous invitations.
Saturday, April 3, 8:30am; I'm about to start inviting people to be friends of Twin Cities Pagans on Facebook within the next week or so. Before I do, I'm going to give a list of all sorts of numbers, including the places where I found the people. The first half are blatantly Pagan, so I'll be inviting everyone local from their lists. The second half are related spirituality, but not necessarily Pagan, so I'll have to actually look through the profiles and decide if they seem Pagan. Also, most of the people in most of these groups are there because I invited them to be there as part of my on-going promotion of this community, so I am totally okay with the pendulum also swinging back. In a month or so when the Twin Cities Pagans account has benefited as much as it is likely to from this, I'll go through and invite people to be members of most of these lists, so the pendulum will keep swinging.
TwinCities Pagans: 2,255 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 1,746 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 491 fans
TC Pagan Pride: 704 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 630 fans
NorDCOG: 511 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 472 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 350 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 104 fans
Temple of the River: 71 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin: 123 friends
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 70 members
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 5 members
Minnesota Pagan Parents: 14 members
Minnesota Pagans: 39 members
Harmony Tribe: 103 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 587 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 617 fans
SacredPaths Center: 2,651 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,480 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,025 fans
Evenstar Bookstore: 39 members
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,406 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 2,337 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 544 fans
Lake Harriet Spiritual Community (LHSC): 417 members
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 324 members
TC Energy Healers & Energy Workers: 399 fans
The Edge: Soul of the Cities: 356 fans
MN Shadows Holistic & Psychic Arts Faire: 269 fans
Mystic Underground: 165 fans
Tuesday, April 6, 8:30 am; I started inviting people yesterday. TCP now has 2,314 friends. I started with people who are on the TCP group, but not the friends' list, then people were on the TCP fan page, and now I'm moving on to people who are on some local Pagan group. So these are all people who have in some way self identified as Pagan. I invited 122 people yesterday, way more than the 50 per day that I had with SPC, so I don't know why the difference.
9am; today it let me invite 51 people, and then I got the warning message that I might be spamming people. Life is back to normal.
Wednesday, April 7, 9am: 2,356 friends
10:20am; 61 invited
Thursday, April 8, 8:30am; 2,394 friends. 9am; 2,401 friends. 66 invited.
Friday, April 9, 8am; 2,438 friends. 9am; 2,445 friends. 69 invited
Saturday, April 10, 6:30 am; 2,482 friends. 68 invited (437 invited so far, 227 new friends)
I should note that every day TCP gets several friend requests also, so not all the growth is directly because of the invitations. Although the friend requests are increasing right now (yesterday, there were about 15) so it might be related somehow, such as people seeing it in their friends' news feeds. The new friend requests are no longer due to the invitations from SPC, so they must be finding TCP somehow.
I started off inviting people who were either members of the group or fans of the page, and so very likely to accept the friend request. Then I invited people who were members of other Pagan groups, already making the choice of self-identification, and therefore likely to accept a friend request. Now I'm inviting people from related groups who might not have made the move to personally self identify as Pagan, and so significantly less likely to accept the friend request even though I am trying to screen everyone I invite to ensure that (a) they live near the twin cities and (b) there is some indication that they do or might identify as Pagan.
Right now I'm inviting friends of SPC, which means the same people who SPC invited to be friends with TCP who had not accepted the invitation. It might not yield huge results.
11:30am, TCP group has 1,779 members, and I just invited 179 friends to be members.
2:22pm, 2,500 friends! half way to the limit. The 2500th friend is Sandy Bailie
Sunday April 11, 8:15am; 2,508 friends, 64 invited.
Monday, April 12, 7:30am; 2,523 friends, 64 invited.
Tuesday, April 13, 8:20am; 2,549 friends, 161 invited. No spam message, but I ran out of profiles ready to add. I need to search more profiles for local Pagans.
9:30; invited 18 more. That's 744 invited so far.
Wednesday, April 14, 9am; 2,601 friends.
1:15 am, I'm about to go to bed. Invited 171 today. Currently 2,642 friends. SPC has 2,685 friends.
Thursday, April 15, 9am; 2,650 friends. 10:30 am, invited 34. All that's left to search is the Magus fan page, and maybe some general Facebook searches. 3pm; I reviewed a hundred profiles from the Magus Fan list, and invited 2 people. Fuck it, that's not a very good yield. This promotion is really reaching the point of diminishing returns.
So, 951 invited, and an increase of 415 new friends from 2255, to the current 2,670 friends. Although, Many of those were friend requests. I'll have to physically go through the list of invited people to see how many accepted the invites.
Friday April 16, 7am; inviting 164 to the TCP Facebook group, which currently has 1,888 members. TCP has 2,689 friends. SPC has 2,692 friends
11:30 pm: SPC has 2,689 friends. TCP has 2,702 friends. TCP group has 1,951 members
Sunday, April 18, 10:30pm; SPC has 2,693 friends. TCP has 2,718 friends. TCP group has 1,968 members
Tuesday, April 20, 9am; tomorrow I begin inviting friends to be fans of the local Pagan groups, so here's an inventory of where they are right now.
TwinCities Pagans: 2,725 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 1,978 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 478 members
NorDCOG: 515 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 111 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 323 members
Temple of the River: 74 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 545 fans
TC Pagan Pride: 712 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 645 fans
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 349 members
Pagan Kids N Kin: 128 friends
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 72 members
Pagan Professional Networking Group: 341 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 625 fans
SacredPaths Center: 2,695 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,555 members
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,485 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 2,482 fans
Lake Harriet Spiritual Community (LHSC): 425 members
Hawkdancing Studio: 374 fans
Keys of Paradise LLC: 181 fans
ReikiArtist.com: 191 fans
Mystic Underground: 178 fans
Ministry of Magick - Pagan Prison Initiative: 106 fans
Kari Tauring - Official Fan Page: 119 fans
Wyrdhaven Studio Fantasy Art by Beth Hansen-Buth: 213 fans
Akashawear: 234 fans
WildFlower: 409 fans
Valkyrie Design Studio: 372 fans
Kira Hagen Photography: 283 fans
Shadow Lights Minnesota Soy Candles and Metaphysical Shoppe: 99 fans
KateBarnett©RowanGingerRaven Art: 302 members
Halliwell Handfastings: 17 fans
TC Energy Healers & Energy Workers: 415 fans
Rural Minnesota Pagans: 31 members
TIPSMN: The Investigative Paranormal Society of Minnesota: 318 members
The Goddess of Glass: 524 fans
Spirit River Gallery & Exchange: 298 fans
J. H. R. Pieper, Outsider Artist: 181 fans
Living Waters Market & The Center For Harmonious Living: 284 fans
Sunday, May 9, Last Thursday I invited people to be fans of Sacred Harvest Festival. I'd been focusing on encouraging people to support only one group per day so as to not overwhelm people. Even so, over the last several weeks, I've invited people to support a lot of groups and events (several of the groups had events so I used the opportunity to promote the event at the same time). One person even wrote to complain. So I'm going to slow down even more and only invite people to support one or two per week for a while. I posted this on Facebook, and 5 people clicked the like button. Here's the growth of the groups I've invited people to so far:
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 478 -> 607 members (129)
NorDCOG: 515 -> 846 members (331)
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 111 -> 516 fans (405)
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 323 -> 667 members (344)
Temple of the River: 74 -> 369 fans (295)
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 553 -> 749 fans (196)
TC Pagan Pride: 712 -> 1038 members (326)
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 645 -> 887 fans (242)
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 349 -> 549 members (200)
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 72 -> 286 members (214)
Pagan Professional Networking Group: 341 -> 855 members (514)
Sacred Harvest Festival: 625 -> 821 fans (196)
Average growth = 282.667
By comparison, here are the ones which were not part of this latest promotion, and their growth:
SacredPaths Center: 2,695 -> 2,740 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,555 -> 1,699 members
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,485 -> 2,552 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 2,482 -> 2,636 fans
Lake Harriet Spiritual Community (LHSC): 425 -> 434 members
Hawkdancing Studio: 374 -> 381 fans
Keys of Paradise LLC: 181 -> 181 fans
ReikiArtist.com: 191 -> 211 fans
Mystic Underground: 178 -> 182 fans
Ministry of Magick - Pagan Prison Initiative: 106 -> 114 fans
Kari Tauring - Official Fan Page: 119 -> 215 fans
Wyrdhaven Studio Fantasy Art by Beth Hansen-Buth: 213 -> 216 fans
Akashawear: 234 -> 234 fans
WildFlower: 409 -> 480 fans
Valkyrie Design Studio: 372 -> 375 fans
Kira Hagen Photography: 283 -> 280 fans
Shadow Lights Minnesota Soy Candles and Metaphysical Shoppe: 99 -> 102 fans
KateBarnett©RowanGingerRaven Art: 302 -> 306 members
Halliwell Handfastings: 17 -> 17 fans
TC Energy Healers & Energy Workers: 415 -> 422 fans
Rural Minnesota Pagans: 31 -> 52 members
TIPSMN: The Investigative Paranormal Society of Minnesota: 318 -> 345 members
The Goddess of Glass: 524 -> 539 fans
Spirit River Gallery & Exchange: 298 -> 314 fans
J. H. R. Pieper, Outsider Artist: 181 -> 207 fans
Living Waters Market & The Center For Harmonious Living: 284 -> 294 fans
There's an average growth of 29.27. Sacred Paths Center group had significant growth because I invited friends of Sacred Paths Center to join the group, and that had growth because it's still gaining from the massive friend requests a couple months ago. Kari Tauring had significant growth because she was on a Norwegian reality TV show for four weeks. I don't know why Eye of Horus grew so well, but kudos to them. Without those four, the average growth is 14.7.
Sunday, June 27, 2010: I've been focusing more on promoting Harmony Tribe before their festival. I've been only doing minor work to expand the rest of the networks. Here's the growth of stuff I've promoted:
TwinCities Pagans: 2,999 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,177 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 486 fans
TC Pagan Pride: 1,112 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 933 fans
NorDCOG: 875 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 636 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 601 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 554 fans
Temple of the River: 407 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 335 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,390 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 602 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,324 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,376 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,726 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,042 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,930 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,019 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 789 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 773 members
Lake Harriet closed their group in an attempt to create a Page instead, which now has 247 fans. I've not yet encouraged anyone toward the page.
Monday, June 28, 2010; Jo Owen is our 3000th friend!
Monday August, 23, 2010; It's been a while since I noted the status of things, and the last week or so I've noticed more new members than usual on the Yahoo group. Not a huge number, maybe only 10, but more frequent than usual. It's now up to 489 members.
Also, After Sacred Harvest Festival, I went into the Harmony Tribe Facebook account and encouraged their friends to join the Twin Cities Pagans Facebook group. I also encouraged the TwinCities Pagans friends to join the PNC-Minnesota Bureau Facebook group. Of course I regularly encouraged people to join the groups associated with their respective accounts: Twin Cities Pagans, Sacred Paths Center, & Sacred Harvest Fest. Here's some numbers:
TwinCities Pagans: 3,118 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,417 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 491 fans
PNC-Minnesota Bureau group: 323 members
TC Pagan Pride: 1,781 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 946 fans
NorDCOG: 875 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 638 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 608 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 577 fans
Temple of the River: 429 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 348 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,657 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 618 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,505 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,550 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 2,052 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,058 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 3,138 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,246 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 778 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 785 members
Sunday, September 5, 9:59am; we reached 500 members of the Yahoo group!
Monday October4; Not much new. I haven't done any major invitations lately, but it's been about a month so I figured I should log some numbers.
TwinCities Pagans: 3,164 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,466 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 506 fans
PNC-Minnesota Bureau group: 534 members
TC Pagan Pride: 1,838 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 959 fans
NorDCOG: 879 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 640 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 616 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 593 fans
Temple of the River: 504 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 360 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,700 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 624 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,561 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,706 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 2,096 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,067 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 3,259 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,456 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 783 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 799 members
So the numbers keep growing little by little. Temple of the River had a nice increase after PNC wrote an article about them that got picked up by the national press. TCPaganPride had a small increase after their event.
December 16. I suppose it's time to review the numbers
TwinCities Pagans Yahoo group: 529 members
TwinCities Pagans: 3,305 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,560 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 520 fans
PNC-Minnesota Bureau group: 617 members
TC Pagan Pride: 1,874 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 994 fans
NorDCOG: 876 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 635 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 615 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 642 fans
Temple of the River: 545 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 364 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,623 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 619 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,671 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,883 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 2,094 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,100 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 3,475 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,830 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 786 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 799 members
The 2011 records can be found at here.
I came up with that number because the Facebook group has 1045 members who are emailed Paganistan Weekly. The Yahoo group has 408 members, 170 of whom are confirmed on the Facebook group. Of the other Yahoo groups where Paganistan Weekly is sent, there are about 75 local people who are not the Twin Cities Pagan Yahoo group. That's 1358 recipients. These groups are overwhelmingly local. I'd say they're 85% local, which gives us 1154. There are probably some cross over numbers between yahoo and Facebook that I didn't account for, and also some MySpace readers who I didn't allow for, so I figure it all balances out and the number is somewhere around 1150.
Facebook has pretty much made MySpace obsolete and irrelevant, and is also contributing to the decline of most Yahoo groups. The Twin Cities Pagans Yahoo group is monstrously larger than any other local Pagan Yahoo group (408 members as compared to 191 in TCpagans) but dwarfed by the Facebook group (1045 members). However, the Yahoo group does continue to grow (two new members today).
A year ago, the calendar was plugging along full steam on the Twin Cities Pagans yahoo group, but there were only about 100 people on the group benefiting from it. Today, 10 times as many local Pagans are reaping the benefits of that calendar.That's pretty good for a year. I look forward to seeing how many local Pagans are being reached next year.
History of Paganistan Weekly:
August 12, 2008, I began posting events on the Twin Cities Pagans calendar. At the time, there were maybe 70 members of the group.
Thursday February 26, 2009, I set up accounts for Twin Cities Pagans on Myspace and Facebook in an attempt to reach more local Pagans.
March 9, 2009, I sent out a message to the Facebook group titled, "Full Moon and Gatherings". This was essentially an attempt to promote the Yahoo group and was followed within a couple days with promotion on other Yahoo groups.
April 15, 2009, I went through the members' lists for the other local Pagan Yahoo groups, found the locals who were not on the Twin Cities Pagans Yahoo group and invited them to join. 307 were invited, and over 100 joined at that time (many of the rest have since joined). This resulted in the Yahoo group growing to be the second largest Yahoo group after the Eye of Horus group (which it has since surpassed by about a hundred) and the discovery that at that time there were approximately 445 local people on the local Pagan Yahoo groups.
Apr 19, 2009, began sending the newsletter to the other local Pagan yahoo groups
May 17, 2009, after a focused title each week to represent the contents of the message, I began titling the message simply, "Weekly Update", and the format changed to pretty much what it still is today
July 5, 2009, the term "Weekly Update" was way to common, so I changed the name to "Paganistan Weekly Update" distinguish it from other weekly updates being sent out
October 12, 2009, the name was shortened to simply "Paganistan Weekly"
A couple days ago I checked the Yahoo member list against the Facebook list and found that of the 406 members at that time, 170 were already listed as friends on Facebook, 92 were on facebook but not on the friends'list, and 144 were not listed on facebook. I also went through the facebook friends' list checking profiles for yahoo addresses, and found approximately 460. I am currently inviting them to join the yahoo group, but so far they aren't replying to the invitations. This could indicate that the crossover between the groups is much higher than I realized, but people are simply not using different email addresses on the different groups, or that the Yahoo group has pretty much hit its saturation level for now. The Yahoo group is about a third the size of the Facebook friends' list at 1272. The facebook group tends to always be at about 85% of the facebook friends' list (I created an account and friend them to be able to then invite them to the facebook group)
Addendum: January 17, 2010
I went through the Facebook friends' list to find people who listed Yahoo addresses or Yahoo IDs, a process which took about 2 weeks and I found 502. I then invited them to join the Yahoo group, a process which again took 9 days because Yahoo only allows 50 to be invited per day. 57 were already members, 37 failed, resulting in 438. So far the number of people in the group has risen by 18 from 404 to 422.
Meanwhile, I exported the members list of the Yahoo group, converted it into an acceptable form, and plugged it into Facebook to find people to invite into the Facebook network, a process which took a morning. 170 were already in the network, 144 were not listed on Facebook, and 92 were actually invited. In that time, the group has gained 42 members.
In review, inviting 438 people on Yahoo with about a month of effort gained 18 new people, while inviting 92 people on Facebook with a morning's effort gained 42 new people.
Addendum: January 25, 2010
The following was produced by a Facebook application.
Here are some stats about my friends:
Number of friends:1370
Gender:37% male, 63% female
Relationship Status:39% single, 61% taken
Countries:12
States:39
Longest name:Sharada Lakhan
Shortest name:Lyz M
Most popular music:Rock (45 friends)
Most popular TV show:House (71 friends)
Most popular movie:Lord Of The Rings (44 friends)
Most popular book:Harry Potter (31 friends)
February 2010, all month, reviewing other local Facebook Paganesque groups and inviting them to join the Sacred Paths Center friends list (less purely Pagan, and so it makes a good filter). After completion, will invite them to join the SPC group, the Twin Cities pagan group, and to be friends with the Twin Cities Pagans, one at a time, allowing time in between for people to join. Then I'll review the SPC friends list and invite any who are left to the Twin Cities Pagans friends list.
February 16, 2010, I just emailed the following to Murphy:
Blessings Murphy,
As our local anthropologist, I thought I'd send you some information since we're quickly approaching the one year anniversary of the TwinCitiesPagans promotional network move to Facebook and Myspace, and it's on my mind. This might be useful to you, and if you have any friends studying online Pagan networking, feel free to forward it to them
The expansion was done to increase membership to the TwinCitiesPagans Yahoo group, which worked. At the time the Yahoo group had fewer than a hundred members (the sixth largest of the 10 noteworthy local Pagan Yahoo groups) and now it has 424, making it monstrously larger than any other local Pagan Yahoo group (the next largest is TC Pagans at 191 members). At a time when many Yahoo groups are dying, this one has greatly expanded.
However, the growth on Yahoo is being eclipsed by the growth on Facebook. There are three Twin Cities Pagans Facebook locales; the account with 1526 friends (this is useful for inviting friends to events, groups, and fan pages) the page with 488 fans (this is not particularly useful, but with the way Facebook reconfigures things, it might be useful in the future) and the group with 1226 members (this group receives the weekly newsletter, Paganistan Weekly). There is a great deal of overlap between these three locales, with almost all the fans and group members falling under the umbrella of the friends' list.
Also, I have endeavored to keep all the TwinCitiesPagans networks overwhelmingly local. I have looked through all the lists and would estimate all the networks to be at least 85% local. I have done this because the focus is to enhance community building in the local community. It also makes it easier to make estimates about the local impact of the networks. (this will probably shift with an increasing desire to showcase our awsomtastic community to the rest of the Pagan world).
What I've found is that Facebook is an incredible resource for Pagan networking. Whereas the Yahoo groups seemed to each be competing for dominance (there's a limit to how many Yahoo groups any one person can follow, so everyone wants there's to be the one people follow) Facebook allows for a much greater ability to be a member of multiple groups. This means that by encouraging people to join other local Pagan groups, more people end up discovering the TwinCitiesPagans network. This happens both passively and actively. Passively by people on other networks being able to trace back to the TwinCitiesPagans network. Actively because as people join other groups, in that instant they are more likely to also invite other people to join that group, and expand the networks I promote, which I can then look through and invite the new people back to the TwinCitiesPagans network as a way to find new people.
I'm also the publicity coordinator for the Sacred Paths Center which gives me access to their Facebook account which is set up almost identically with the three locales. The Sacred Paths Center is a local business and a good cause. About a month ago (from the TwinCitiesPagans account) I suggested that all the TwinCitiesPagans friends become friends with the Sacred Paths Center. Then (from the SPC account) I went into the TwinCitiesPagans friends' list and invited them to be friends with the SPC, so people got invited from two different directions. The end result is the 82% of the TwinCitiesPagans friends are now friends with the SPC (1260 out of 1524). I then went through and found all the local people (checking accounts to verify locality) on the other local Pagan Facebook groups, found about 1500 (I did not verify that they are all Pagan) and I've been inviting them to be friends with the SPC. Facebook only lets me invite about 50 per day, and I've got about 500 left to go. The SPC friends' list is currently 2225, up about 700 from a month ago. When I'm done, I'll encourage these friends to be friends of TwinCitiesPagans, then after a couple weeks I'll go through the SPC friends' list and manually invite them all to be friends with TwinCitiesPagans. I'll then wait a couple months and do the entire thing again from the TwinCitiesPagans account, and continue working back and forth bulking up the two accounts, and also encouraging people to be affiliated with the other local Pagan organizations. By this time next year, I expect the network to be reaching more than 4000 local Pagans.
This not only expands the network, it also gets people more involved in the community. The first step to someone becoming active is to declare an affiliation. By declaring affiliations to multiple local Pagan organizations, they are more likely to feel connected to the local Pagan community and therefore be more likely to not only have an on-line interest, but to actually show up at events. This has already started happening, with a general activation of many in the community. You've probably noticed a lot of new people showing up at just about every event you've been to. This isn't an accident.
In conclusion, Facebook rocks.
And as a footnote, Myspace is pretty much dead. There are 265 friends, but very little new activity since the account was created a year ago, and I'm pretty sure that just about everyone from that friends' list is on the Facebook friends' list.
Paganistan Weekly is published to the 10 major local Pagan Yahoo groups, The Facebook group, as a note to the Facebook account, as a blog on the Yahoo profile, as a bulletin on Myspace, and as a blog on Myspace. It's also printed off and sits on the counter at the Sacred Paths Center.
Locally I've found no real interest in Tribe.net, which a few years ago was popular with Pagans in a few areas such as Kansas City.
I've been collecting data at http://jdoggiedogg.livejournal.com/236628.html
Monday, March 8, 10am; I'm about to go into the Sacred Paths Center Facebook account and encourage the SPC friends' list (2573 friends, 1322 in common, 1251 not in common) to join the Twin Cities Pagans group (currently with 1257 members), and friend the TwinCities Pagans Account (currently with 1576 friends)
March 8, 10:45pm; there are now 1962 people on the Facebook friends' list, and 1466 members of the Facebook group.
March 9, 10pm; there are now 2,057 people on the Facebook friends' list, and 1547 members of the Facebook group. The law of diminishing returns is fascinating. Also, there are currently 777 friends of Sacred Paths Center who are not friends of Twin Cities Pagans
Also, there are currently 435 members of the Yahoo group. Yes, January 17 I noted that 3 weeks of hard work yielded 18 new members. A few more might have joined because of that, but not all of the 13 new members are because of that. The truth is that the Yahoo group numbers continue to increase despite what I do or don't do to make them increase. Not bad for an obsolete networking tool.
Saturday, March 13, 8am; On Facebook, Twin Cities Pagans currently has 2,123 friends, 1,611 members of the group, and 1,863 friends in common with the Sacred Paths Center, which has 2,594 friends. Every week I invite friends who are not yet members to join the group. I'm about to do that, which means that new group members are about to no longer be linked with last Monday's invitations from Sacred Paths Center.
Sunday, March 14, 11pm; Well, I didn't exactly get the huge jump in Facebook group members that I was hoping for, but it's hard to complain when this week's newsletter is going out to 394 more people than last week's update. The group now has 1,651 members (38 more than yesterday morning) whereas there are now 2,144 friends (21 more than yesterday morning) which is directly related to last Monday's promotion, so I can't honestly say that a significant part of the relatively small increase in the group membership might also have been linked with last Monday's promotion.
Chances are that this week's update just went out to around 1500 local Pagans.
Monday March 15, 8am; From the SPC Facebook account, I'm inviting friends to become fans of Magus (currently 1,924 fans) & the Eye of Horus (currently 1,751 fans) the other local metaphysical shops. I'll also notify them that it's being done, so it should be an impressive act of good will and camaraderie. Hopefully a hundred new fans will be enough to get this to show up in a few streams, and stimulate a few invitations which will get more people into the network where I can find them and bring them into the Twin Cities Pagan community.
9pm; Facebook numbers: Magus has 2,105 fans (an increase of 181) and the Eye of Horus has 1,958 fans (an increase of 207). Just for the sake of maintaining the tallies, Twin Cities Pagans has 2,155 friends, the group has 1,666 members, SPC has 2,593 friends, and the SPC group has 1,253 members.
Tuesday, March 16, 10pm; Magus has 2,182 fans (an increase of 258) and the Eye of Horus has 2,036 fans (an increase of 285).
Friday, March 19, 10pm; Summarizing the Facebook gains which are mostly attributable to invitations from the SPC account: Magus has 2,270 fans (an increase of 346) and the Eye of Horus has 2,147 fans (an increase of 396). Twin Cities Pagans currently has 2,180 friends (an increase of 604), and 1,694 members of the group (an increase of 437).
Sunday, March 21, 10pm; Summarizing the Facebook gains which are mostly attributable to invitations from the SPC account: Magus has 2,298 fans (an increase of 374) and the Eye of Horus has 2,184 fans (an increase of 433). Twin Cities Pagans currently has 2,193 friends (an increase of 617), and 1,693 members of the group (an increase of 436).
It's too bad I haven't been tracking the numbers since I started on Facebook. Along the way, I have continually been inviting people to join other groups. Most of the local Pagan groups got most of their connections because of the work I've done. But soon it will be time to begin tracking down those who I didn't add, and then adding them to the Twin Cities Pagans network. That is the goal for April and into May. Once it's done, I'll expand a whole lot of networks again. I love this community, and I am going to do what I can to see it grow.
March 23, I just found a couple local Radical Faerie groups on Tribe.net. Huron Valley Radical Faeries and Faerie Spirit Gathering. I also found a website for Kawashaway and the Northwoods Tribe of Radical Faeries which appears to have a sanctuary, sponsor gatherings, and the Northwoods Radical Faeries Yahoo group
March 26, 10:15 am; the Facebook friends' list just hit 2,222. The Yahoo group has 444 members. Meanwhile, the Facebook group has 1,720 members, which isn't as cool a number, but I figured I should note it while I'm tracking.
When someone friends TCP after being recommended by SPC, SPC gets a notification, so I know that most of the new TCP friends are no longer due to the invitations from SPC. There are still some, but no longer most. Also, there are still people accepting the SPC friend invitations from over a month ago.
March 30, 1:30pm; It's the end of the month, so I'm inviting members of the SPC friends' list to join the SPC group on Facebook. I'm inviting 773 friends who are not yet members. The group currently has 1,271 members. SPC has 2,644 friends. The difference is mostly due to outstanding previous invitations.
Saturday, April 3, 8:30am; I'm about to start inviting people to be friends of Twin Cities Pagans on Facebook within the next week or so. Before I do, I'm going to give a list of all sorts of numbers, including the places where I found the people. The first half are blatantly Pagan, so I'll be inviting everyone local from their lists. The second half are related spirituality, but not necessarily Pagan, so I'll have to actually look through the profiles and decide if they seem Pagan. Also, most of the people in most of these groups are there because I invited them to be there as part of my on-going promotion of this community, so I am totally okay with the pendulum also swinging back. In a month or so when the Twin Cities Pagans account has benefited as much as it is likely to from this, I'll go through and invite people to be members of most of these lists, so the pendulum will keep swinging.
TwinCities Pagans: 2,255 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 1,746 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 491 fans
TC Pagan Pride: 704 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 630 fans
NorDCOG: 511 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 472 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 350 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 104 fans
Temple of the River: 71 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin: 123 friends
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 70 members
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 5 members
Minnesota Pagan Parents: 14 members
Minnesota Pagans: 39 members
Harmony Tribe: 103 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 587 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 617 fans
SacredPaths Center: 2,651 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,480 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,025 fans
Evenstar Bookstore: 39 members
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,406 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 2,337 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 544 fans
Lake Harriet Spiritual Community (LHSC): 417 members
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 324 members
TC Energy Healers & Energy Workers: 399 fans
The Edge: Soul of the Cities: 356 fans
MN Shadows Holistic & Psychic Arts Faire: 269 fans
Mystic Underground: 165 fans
Tuesday, April 6, 8:30 am; I started inviting people yesterday. TCP now has 2,314 friends. I started with people who are on the TCP group, but not the friends' list, then people were on the TCP fan page, and now I'm moving on to people who are on some local Pagan group. So these are all people who have in some way self identified as Pagan. I invited 122 people yesterday, way more than the 50 per day that I had with SPC, so I don't know why the difference.
9am; today it let me invite 51 people, and then I got the warning message that I might be spamming people. Life is back to normal.
Wednesday, April 7, 9am: 2,356 friends
10:20am; 61 invited
Thursday, April 8, 8:30am; 2,394 friends. 9am; 2,401 friends. 66 invited.
Friday, April 9, 8am; 2,438 friends. 9am; 2,445 friends. 69 invited
Saturday, April 10, 6:30 am; 2,482 friends. 68 invited (437 invited so far, 227 new friends)
I should note that every day TCP gets several friend requests also, so not all the growth is directly because of the invitations. Although the friend requests are increasing right now (yesterday, there were about 15) so it might be related somehow, such as people seeing it in their friends' news feeds. The new friend requests are no longer due to the invitations from SPC, so they must be finding TCP somehow.
I started off inviting people who were either members of the group or fans of the page, and so very likely to accept the friend request. Then I invited people who were members of other Pagan groups, already making the choice of self-identification, and therefore likely to accept a friend request. Now I'm inviting people from related groups who might not have made the move to personally self identify as Pagan, and so significantly less likely to accept the friend request even though I am trying to screen everyone I invite to ensure that (a) they live near the twin cities and (b) there is some indication that they do or might identify as Pagan.
Right now I'm inviting friends of SPC, which means the same people who SPC invited to be friends with TCP who had not accepted the invitation. It might not yield huge results.
11:30am, TCP group has 1,779 members, and I just invited 179 friends to be members.
2:22pm, 2,500 friends! half way to the limit. The 2500th friend is Sandy Bailie
Sunday April 11, 8:15am; 2,508 friends, 64 invited.
Monday, April 12, 7:30am; 2,523 friends, 64 invited.
Tuesday, April 13, 8:20am; 2,549 friends, 161 invited. No spam message, but I ran out of profiles ready to add. I need to search more profiles for local Pagans.
9:30; invited 18 more. That's 744 invited so far.
Wednesday, April 14, 9am; 2,601 friends.
1:15 am, I'm about to go to bed. Invited 171 today. Currently 2,642 friends. SPC has 2,685 friends.
Thursday, April 15, 9am; 2,650 friends. 10:30 am, invited 34. All that's left to search is the Magus fan page, and maybe some general Facebook searches. 3pm; I reviewed a hundred profiles from the Magus Fan list, and invited 2 people. Fuck it, that's not a very good yield. This promotion is really reaching the point of diminishing returns.
So, 951 invited, and an increase of 415 new friends from 2255, to the current 2,670 friends. Although, Many of those were friend requests. I'll have to physically go through the list of invited people to see how many accepted the invites.
Friday April 16, 7am; inviting 164 to the TCP Facebook group, which currently has 1,888 members. TCP has 2,689 friends. SPC has 2,692 friends
11:30 pm: SPC has 2,689 friends. TCP has 2,702 friends. TCP group has 1,951 members
Sunday, April 18, 10:30pm; SPC has 2,693 friends. TCP has 2,718 friends. TCP group has 1,968 members
Tuesday, April 20, 9am; tomorrow I begin inviting friends to be fans of the local Pagan groups, so here's an inventory of where they are right now.
TwinCities Pagans: 2,725 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 1,978 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 478 members
NorDCOG: 515 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 111 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 323 members
Temple of the River: 74 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 545 fans
TC Pagan Pride: 712 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 645 fans
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 349 members
Pagan Kids N Kin: 128 friends
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 72 members
Pagan Professional Networking Group: 341 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 625 fans
SacredPaths Center: 2,695 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,555 members
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,485 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 2,482 fans
Lake Harriet Spiritual Community (LHSC): 425 members
Hawkdancing Studio: 374 fans
Keys of Paradise LLC: 181 fans
ReikiArtist.com: 191 fans
Mystic Underground: 178 fans
Ministry of Magick - Pagan Prison Initiative: 106 fans
Kari Tauring - Official Fan Page: 119 fans
Wyrdhaven Studio Fantasy Art by Beth Hansen-Buth: 213 fans
Akashawear: 234 fans
WildFlower: 409 fans
Valkyrie Design Studio: 372 fans
Kira Hagen Photography: 283 fans
Shadow Lights Minnesota Soy Candles and Metaphysical Shoppe: 99 fans
KateBarnett©RowanGingerRaven Art: 302 members
Halliwell Handfastings: 17 fans
TC Energy Healers & Energy Workers: 415 fans
Rural Minnesota Pagans: 31 members
TIPSMN: The Investigative Paranormal Society of Minnesota: 318 members
The Goddess of Glass: 524 fans
Spirit River Gallery & Exchange: 298 fans
J. H. R. Pieper, Outsider Artist: 181 fans
Living Waters Market & The Center For Harmonious Living: 284 fans
Sunday, May 9, Last Thursday I invited people to be fans of Sacred Harvest Festival. I'd been focusing on encouraging people to support only one group per day so as to not overwhelm people. Even so, over the last several weeks, I've invited people to support a lot of groups and events (several of the groups had events so I used the opportunity to promote the event at the same time). One person even wrote to complain. So I'm going to slow down even more and only invite people to support one or two per week for a while. I posted this on Facebook, and 5 people clicked the like button. Here's the growth of the groups I've invited people to so far:
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 478 -> 607 members (129)
NorDCOG: 515 -> 846 members (331)
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 111 -> 516 fans (405)
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 323 -> 667 members (344)
Temple of the River: 74 -> 369 fans (295)
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 553 -> 749 fans (196)
TC Pagan Pride: 712 -> 1038 members (326)
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 645 -> 887 fans (242)
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 349 -> 549 members (200)
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 72 -> 286 members (214)
Pagan Professional Networking Group: 341 -> 855 members (514)
Sacred Harvest Festival: 625 -> 821 fans (196)
Average growth = 282.667
By comparison, here are the ones which were not part of this latest promotion, and their growth:
SacredPaths Center: 2,695 -> 2,740 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,555 -> 1,699 members
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,485 -> 2,552 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 2,482 -> 2,636 fans
Lake Harriet Spiritual Community (LHSC): 425 -> 434 members
Hawkdancing Studio: 374 -> 381 fans
Keys of Paradise LLC: 181 -> 181 fans
ReikiArtist.com: 191 -> 211 fans
Mystic Underground: 178 -> 182 fans
Ministry of Magick - Pagan Prison Initiative: 106 -> 114 fans
Kari Tauring - Official Fan Page: 119 -> 215 fans
Wyrdhaven Studio Fantasy Art by Beth Hansen-Buth: 213 -> 216 fans
Akashawear: 234 -> 234 fans
WildFlower: 409 -> 480 fans
Valkyrie Design Studio: 372 -> 375 fans
Kira Hagen Photography: 283 -> 280 fans
Shadow Lights Minnesota Soy Candles and Metaphysical Shoppe: 99 -> 102 fans
KateBarnett©RowanGingerRaven Art: 302 -> 306 members
Halliwell Handfastings: 17 -> 17 fans
TC Energy Healers & Energy Workers: 415 -> 422 fans
Rural Minnesota Pagans: 31 -> 52 members
TIPSMN: The Investigative Paranormal Society of Minnesota: 318 -> 345 members
The Goddess of Glass: 524 -> 539 fans
Spirit River Gallery & Exchange: 298 -> 314 fans
J. H. R. Pieper, Outsider Artist: 181 -> 207 fans
Living Waters Market & The Center For Harmonious Living: 284 -> 294 fans
There's an average growth of 29.27. Sacred Paths Center group had significant growth because I invited friends of Sacred Paths Center to join the group, and that had growth because it's still gaining from the massive friend requests a couple months ago. Kari Tauring had significant growth because she was on a Norwegian reality TV show for four weeks. I don't know why Eye of Horus grew so well, but kudos to them. Without those four, the average growth is 14.7.
Sunday, June 27, 2010: I've been focusing more on promoting Harmony Tribe before their festival. I've been only doing minor work to expand the rest of the networks. Here's the growth of stuff I've promoted:
TwinCities Pagans: 2,999 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,177 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 486 fans
TC Pagan Pride: 1,112 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 933 fans
NorDCOG: 875 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 636 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 601 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 554 fans
Temple of the River: 407 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 335 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,390 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 602 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,324 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,376 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 1,726 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,042 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 2,930 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,019 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 789 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 773 members
Lake Harriet closed their group in an attempt to create a Page instead, which now has 247 fans. I've not yet encouraged anyone toward the page.
Monday, June 28, 2010; Jo Owen is our 3000th friend!
Monday August, 23, 2010; It's been a while since I noted the status of things, and the last week or so I've noticed more new members than usual on the Yahoo group. Not a huge number, maybe only 10, but more frequent than usual. It's now up to 489 members.
Also, After Sacred Harvest Festival, I went into the Harmony Tribe Facebook account and encouraged their friends to join the Twin Cities Pagans Facebook group. I also encouraged the TwinCities Pagans friends to join the PNC-Minnesota Bureau Facebook group. Of course I regularly encouraged people to join the groups associated with their respective accounts: Twin Cities Pagans, Sacred Paths Center, & Sacred Harvest Fest. Here's some numbers:
TwinCities Pagans: 3,118 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,417 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 491 fans
PNC-Minnesota Bureau group: 323 members
TC Pagan Pride: 1,781 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 946 fans
NorDCOG: 875 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 638 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 608 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 577 fans
Temple of the River: 429 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 348 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,657 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 618 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,505 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,550 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 2,052 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,058 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 3,138 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,246 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 778 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 785 members
Sunday, September 5, 9:59am; we reached 500 members of the Yahoo group!
Monday October4; Not much new. I haven't done any major invitations lately, but it's been about a month so I figured I should log some numbers.
TwinCities Pagans: 3,164 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,466 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 506 fans
PNC-Minnesota Bureau group: 534 members
TC Pagan Pride: 1,838 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 959 fans
NorDCOG: 879 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 640 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 616 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 593 fans
Temple of the River: 504 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 360 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,700 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 624 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,561 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,706 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 2,096 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,067 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 3,259 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,456 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 783 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 799 members
So the numbers keep growing little by little. Temple of the River had a nice increase after PNC wrote an article about them that got picked up by the national press. TCPaganPride had a small increase after their event.
December 16. I suppose it's time to review the numbers
TwinCities Pagans Yahoo group: 529 members
TwinCities Pagans: 3,305 friends
TwinCities Pagans group: 2,560 members
TwinCitiesPagans page: 520 fans
PNC-Minnesota Bureau group: 617 members
TC Pagan Pride: 1,874 members
UMPA - Upper Midwest Pagan Alliance: 994 fans
NorDCOG: 876 members
Earth House Project of Minnesota: 635 members
Twin Cities Witch Sisters' Night Out: 615 members
The Tree and the Well Institute for Deep Cultural Studies: 642 fans
Temple of the River: 545 fans
Pagan Kids N Kin group: 364 members
Harmony Tribe: 2,623 friends
Harmony Tribe group: 619 members
Sacred Harvest Festival: 1,671 fans
SacredPaths Center: 3,883 friends
Sacred Paths Center group: 2,094 members
Sacred Paths Center page: 1,100 fans
Magus Books & Herbs LTD: 3,475 fans
Eye of Horus Metaphysical: 3,830 fans
Magical Gardens of Twin Cities: 786 fans
Western Wisconsin Fire Circle: 799 members
The 2011 records can be found at here.