Thank you for helping Shap Shots grow

The site isn't going anywhere thanks to readers like you.

I’m a big believer in transparency when it comes to this site.

When I launched this site on Sept. 30, 2022, I called it a stopgap. I truly wasn’t sure what was next and I told readers in the first post that I would be making decision on a monthly basis of where we were going with this whole thing.

And after 19 months of making monthly decisions, I’m pretty happy to say this thing isn’t going anywhere.

See, we hit a pretty cool milestone this weekend.

Shap Shots now has more than 500 paid subscribers and more than 2,000 total subscribers.

To give you an idea, here is how our growth has gone for paid subscribers.

And total subscribers.

Thank you, all of you.

And if you are new to this space, feel free to subscribe here.

I never set an aggressive growth goal for this site, I know first hand that overly worrying about subscriptions sold is a recipe for disaster. It drives writers and publishers to look for clickbait and only focus on new readers as oppose to serving those who have supported them from the beginning.

In the 19 months we’ve been doing this, Shap Shots has a 71 percent retention rate after six months. That’s the number I’m most proud of — that so many of you have given this site a chance and still felt it was worth your while half a year later.

Again, thank you.

And all of that has happened as we’ve tried to figure out exactly what this site really is.

There isn’t a great elevator pitch for this site, it doesn’t pass the one-sentence marketing axiom tying it to one specific team or area of hockey coverage.

The best I’ve got is “Stories Sean Shapiro finds interesting.” Which only holds weight if you actually value Sean Shapiro’s opinion on anything.

For example, this week we are going to get nerdy with some goalie topics, look at the AHL playoff series between the Grand Rapids Griffins and Milwaukee Admirals, and cover the Western Conference final feature the Dallas Stars against either the Vancouver Canucks or Edmonton Oilers.

None of that falls into one simple, clean bucket.

Despite that we’ve seen growth and retention. Shap Shots has become home for some of my best work and has gone from a month-to-month “what-if?” project to a key part of me supporting my family.

Thank you, again.

Here are some of the things I’ve learned through this experience.

• There is a space for stories that don’t please the algorithm and are outside the box. For example, no one was asking for a story on the Anaheim Ducks new audio network or whether a team should dump the puck directly on the goalie on the power play. But those random, fun, and interesting stories have been some of the best received on this site.

• There is space for Dallas Stars fans and Detroit Red Wings fans to co-exist here. A large part of the audience here is either based in Texas or Michigan, those are the two teams I cover the most. For example, we’ve been doing 20/20s for every Stars playoff game while also focusing on the Red Wings prospect build and current AHL playoff run. Ideally once the Red Wings are an NHL playoff team, we’ll have 20/20s for both next spring.

• It’s OK when stories don’t have wide-spread appeal. There aren’t any failures in this space, only learning experiences that let me best serve my readership.

On that last note, I’ve put together a quick reader survey at the end of this post. It’ll help me best serve you in this space. Take a few minutes to fill that out.

To celebrate the growth of this site and hitting a milestone, I’ve also made a $500 donation today to the Jamie Daniels Foundation from some of the Shap Shots profits.

For those who don’t know the Jamie Daniels Foundation was co-founded by Red Wings broadcaster Ken Daniels in memory of his son Jamie, who passed away after battling substance use disorder.

One of my best friends, who is now sober, had his own struggles with substance use disorder. I only saw a glimpse firsthand of what he dealt with, and that’s not my story to share. But it was an eye-opening thing and for me is an important reminder of why the work of the Jamie Daniels Foundation is so important.

Thanks again for reading. Thank you for making this site a success. Please take a few minutes for the survey below so we can keep growing this site and best serving readers like you.