St Fillan’s website went live on 1st April 2020 which luckily coincided with lockdown and so for the next two years the website was able to provide online services and be a means of communication with the community both near and far. 2022 saw an easing of restrictions, a return to ‘normality’ and Sunday peaks were reduced.
In 2023 we have been celebrating our 900th anniversary and the graph below shows peaks of usage around important events such as ‘Any Questions?’. There was also a peak with the report from the Historic Churches Working Group as it removed the immediate threat of closure. Since the end of the celebrations, the usage has reduced but its key function remains. In 2021 there were 13.8K pageviews, in 2022 16.8K and in 2023 20K.
At the end of 2022 the 850th & 900th Anniversary pages were added. During 2023 five new pages were added; Panorama, Church Newsletters & Magazines, Who was St Fillan?, the Primary School Poems and ForthView Parish.
The most popular webpages by page views in 2023, after the home page were: News, 900th Anniversary, History: The Early Years, Contact, Church Newsletters & Magazines, Events, Worship, Historic Churches Report & Stained Glass. It is interesting to see from old magazines that a website was first discussed in 2001.
The most popular posts by page views in 2023 were: ‘Any Questions?’, the Historic Churches Report, April Songs of Praise, Farewell to Peter Gerbrandy-Baird and then many of the 900 event posts.
Through 2023 the ‘Reflections from the Pew’ weekly post has concentrated on Rev Rutherford’s children’s addresses from 1967. The most viewed Reflection was not one of his, but was about Birnie Kirk, followed by his: the Castle Garden Wall, the Bell, and Daffodils, etc. There are also weekly ‘Notices’.
During 2023 the website has been viewed by users in 61 countries, including 83.7% from the UK, 8.0% from the US, 0.8 % from Ireland, 0.8% from Netherlands and 0.7% from Canada.
2003 has seen the ‘users by mobile’ exceed ‘users by desktop’ for the first time 53% to 39%, ‘users by tablet’ has halved to 8%.
The St Fillan’s Facebook page went live on 21st July 2022. At the end of 2022 there were 129 followers, this has slowly risen to 207. The graph below shows the reach of 28,360 in 2023. You can see there was a large spike of 11,424 on 30th January related to ‘Any Question?’, the later peaks in July/August are related to events around the time of the Aberdour Festival and in September the Inchcolm Pilgrimage.
During 2023 there have been 351 posts which equates to about 7 per week and a total of 7,717 visits with peaks on 31st March (Peter GB leaving) & 24th December.
Facebook has a more local reach: 94.7% of followers in the UK, 1.9% in the USA, with a few in Australia, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, India and Netherlands. 70% are women, 30% are men.
In 2024 St Fillan’s will be part of ‘Fife: Forthview Parish Church’. There will be a new website for the cluster, St Fillan’s website will continue.
Feedback, comments, and suggestions are welcome on both the Website and Facebook.
The Website Review for 2022 is available here.
