Wednesday, November 3, 2021

2021 Webmaster Notes for Annual Meeting

It is with great pleasure, that I present the UPRRC Webmaster annual report to our distinguished board and entire membership on this the 6th day of November, 2021.

While the world in 2021 did not return to the pre-pandemic normalcy we had in 2019, it was much better than the lockdowns of 2020.  Social distancing and masking were still part of everyday life but running (in groups) and racing came back.  Two of the spring Marathon Majors (London and Boston) were pushed back to this fall, making it a busy marathon season along with Chicago and New York.  At the Olympics in Tokyo this fall, Americans had strong showings with Galen Rupp finishing eighth in 2:11:41 and Molly Seidel had a breakthrough performance, capturing a bronze medal in a time of 2:27:46, which launching her from unranked to #42 in the world. 

For the UPPRC, the volume of races started to make a comeback as well.  Using the UPPRC online calendar as a barometer, there were 27 events on listed for this year.  While this was only half of the 53 events listed from 2019, it was more than double the 11 events on our calendar from the pandemic plagued 2020 year.   

Here are the specifics on our website from 2021.

Website Traffic

  • Overall traffic to our website was steady in 2021 when compared to 2020
    • 3,544 page views in 2021
    • 3,510 page views in 2020
    • The heaviest volume of page views was during the summer months of June and July.  
  • Since we launched the new website in 2015, we have had 45,460 page views
  • After the home page, users visit the calendar views the most often, making up 55% of all page views.  The calendar monthly view is about twice as popular than the calendar list view. 
  • Users spend an average of 1 minute 37 seconds on our website per session. 

Website Demographics

  • Our website was only slightly more popular with 25-34 age bracket (215) than 35-44 year old’s who made up 19% of all visitors.  Age brackets 45-54, 55-64 and 65+ made up 16% each and 18-24 year old’s were the smallest group at 10%.

  • While in previous years our site was accessed about equally by males and females, this year the traffic was 55% male and 45% female

Accessing the Website 

  • Google Chrome was the most popular web browser to view our website, used by 46% of people (down slightly in popularity over 2020).  Safari usage was up from 26% in 2020 to 38% in 2021.  Edge, Firefox and Internet Explorer make up the remainder of browser activity.
  • The website was accessed from desktop computers 53% vs. 47% from smart phones and tablets. 
  • Of the mobile users, over 69% of those were from Apple devices, which is a significant increase from only 50% in 2020.    
  • The geography of users with the highest sessions were 54% from Michigan, 11% from both Illinois and Wisconsin.  Ohio, Minnesota and other regional states make up the remainder.
  • Our site was accessed by people from 42 different states, which was up from just 35 states in 2020.

Online Club Registrations 

We are always taking suggestions on improving the website.  Please submit those to eric.charette@yahoo.com
 
Cordially, 
 
Eric Charette
UPRRC Webmaster