You’ve heard me mention my Year of the Pencil blog post before, right? In January, I blogged about my commitment to only use pencils this year.

I realized I had dozens of them stashed away in my office desk drawer and our kitchen junk drawers. (Plural. We have several.) I vowed to use up part, maybe all, of my stash in 2020.

For some reason, that pencil post is now the most-visited page on my website — and when I say “for some reason,” that’s because I don’t know how this post went (in my little world, at least) viral.

Blog Visits Don’t (Always) Bring New Business

The traffic’s been a mystery to me, so I checked Google Analytics a few times to see if a pencil-lovers’ site was, perhaps, linking to mine. But I found nothing remarkable. I saw a big traffic spike on February 13 (359 views) and consistent traffic every week since then.

The visits are fun to track, but the pencil post isn’t paying my bills. I know where every new business lead comes from, and the post gets no credit. But it’s brought in a few kudos and, now, an opportunity to treat some kids.

In Google Analytics, here’s a year-to-date look at my website’s traffic showing the pencil post in the lead with the most visits. Line no. 2 shows traffic that came to my home page.

“I Googled for Pencils, and Your Name Came Up.”

Earlier this month, someone named Theresa used my Calendly (my online calendar) link to schedule a 20-minute call with me with this message:

Need to talk about pencils. We are in Mesa AZ.

As I waited two days for our call — somewhat on pencils and needles, LOL — I wondered why she was calling. Was I showing up as a pencil vendor somewhere?

When Theresa and I finally spoke, she explained how she found me. She was googling to find pencils for a volunteer project, and my blog post came up. Once she realized I was a marketing consultant and not a pencil vendor, Theresa said she decided to take a chance and reach out anyway.

I learned that Theresa is the on-site house manager for a sober living home about a half-hour from me. The women who live there will be packaging up 300 Halloween bags for another area nonprofit, and they’re hoping to include pencils with the candy.

Long story shorter, Theresa asked if I’d consider donating. I said yes and that I’d kick in pencil sharpeners, too. (Her response, Really? That’s wonderful!, made my day.)

Scored a Pencil Deal on Amazon Prime Day

I placed my order on Amazon Prime Day and bought 600 pencils (more fun at two per kid!) and 300 sharpeners. Full disclosure: My husband did the actual Amazon searching and purchasing. He found pre-sharpened pencils. (“They’re cheaper,” he said.) A Prime Day discount made for an even sweeter deal, so he placed the order for me. He’s a good man.

Here’s our Amazon Prime Day pencil and sharpener haul!

When Serendipity Calls …

I may never know why my pencil post scores as many views as it does, but here’s what I do know:

• Gifting these pencils means my hub and I are still participating in Halloween. That feels good because we decided to skip handing out treats this year because of COVID-19.
• I will take more chances like Theresa. If there’s a phone call I’m stalling to make due to fear of rejection, I’ll reach out anyway. Also, Theresa could have emailed me, but I bet she knew she could be more persuasive by phone. That’s another best practice to copy.
• If content marketing is one of your business strategies (and well it should be), don’t think you always need to talk about business. It’s a people-to-people world — even though we call our outreach B2B and B2C — and stories resonate.

I hope you remember my serendipitous story. Have a safe, socially distanced Halloween. Let’s all pray 2021’s holidays aren’t so darn scary.