Yes, 2020 is not over yet, but still, there’s enough to talk about. And we’re just here to talk about Selective Elective in 2020…which actually was a really good year despite everything else happening in the world. New food types tried, a push to be more consistent with food reviews, and great overall performance.
I’ve broken down the major highlights of the year below.
Food Review Trends/Highlights
- Vegan food – I think if anything defined 2020 it would be my vegan food reviews. There was a lot of new Vegan food tried this year. Vegan jerky, vegan sausage, vegan candy, vegan cream cheese, vegan cheese…it was all great and exciting to try. Based on my post tags, all but one of my vegan food reviews were reviewed in 2020! Went from 1 to 16. Crazy!
- Candy – For October, I did a slew of candy reviews. Highlights include the YumEarth lollipops and the Wholesome DelishFish gummy fish. Delicious!
- Tea! – July’s Patreon poll had an even split between three options—which included tea reviews. So I ran through quite a few tea reviews. There’s always more I could do, though. Tea reviews are hard but they are interesting to do and it helps me remember what tea I like since I drink so much of it!
- I did my second ever food tool review: The Power AirFryer. Very exciting! Tool reviews aren’t something I intend to do often, but sometimes it just feels right!
- Mule Sauce by Sticker Mule and Adagio Fandom Blends were two posts that stand out to me due to what company made them and my connection with the product/company. Both are quirky too!
Website Changes
- I started being an affiliate for Adagio Teas with CJ Affiliate. That didn’t really yield anything besides some clicks. It was interesting trying it out, though.
- I created pages for some of the major category of foods instead of linking to the category archive page. This reads and flows better than the alternative in my opinion. These pages have also done pretty well in terms of page clicks and reads.
Which brings us to…
Top Reviews
The below are the top five reviews in 2020 ranked by views:
- September Wonder Apple – Unsurprisingly, this was very popular in September! #4 in 2018, #3 in 2019, and now #1!
- Nikita/Nicoter/Kanzi Apple – I’m guessing this is cause this one is a strange mystery! This was #1 in 2019 and #2 in 2018
- Seaside Rugged Mature English Cheddar – I believe this is because it was at Whole Foods—not sure. This was #2 in 2019 and #1 in 2018 for context.
- Juici Apple – Brand apple? It’s good.
- Golden Flower Tea – The only post that was published in 2020! It became very popular for some reason.
Overall Performance
Those posts and more contributed to the fact that 2020 had the highest views of any year. 2020 had over 7,600 views for the whole year (for comparison, 2019 was only ~4,500). Not only that, but in 2020 I hit over 200 posts as well! I published 40 this year versus 25 in 2019. The Patreon push has really increased my productivity to push out reviews. Thanks to all my patrons for supporting me!
Now, some of these stats will definitely change with the rest of December (hoping to hit over 8K and if anything major changes I’ll post a follow-up), but regardless: 2020 is the best year Selective Elective’s has had to date!
This food review blog originally started as some obsessive apple review hub and it grew into this little empire of weird food product reviews over the years. So thank you all for reading my reviews and joining me on this ride. I really appreciate it and hope it continues to grow!
Here’s to hoping 2021 continues this trend up!