Timeline

We improved the accuracy of the book lists we recommend on search pages.

The lists we recommend are now much better matched to the genre and topic. Try this one for Space Opera under “book lists connected to space opera.”

We launched the Book Boost perk for Founding Authors a year ago! We have learned a lot and upgraded it in the following ways:

• As a special holiday gift, we are switching all the website ad inventory to Founding Authors for December, January, and February (I removed all the ugly display ads on the website and will launch a paid book ad program in March).
• We are moving from a 60-day burst of advertising for Founding Authors to persistent exposure every month. We will get each Founding Author in front of 100 to 200 of the most likely readers for their book (depending on their membership plan).
• We are improving where the ad goes on the pages.
• We are rolling out new ad designs.

I've got more details here...

In our third full year since launch, we welcomed over 3.2 million visitors!

This was a decline versus the 5 million we had in 2023. Why?

Google is struggling with the quality of its search engine, and 2024 was rough as we lost a lot of the traffic they usually send us. They are no longer showing independent publishers and have made a massive shift toward large brands like Forbes (yuck). If you are curious about the situation, here is a breakdown of what is happening by other indie publishers (HouseFresh, RetroDodo, Healthy Framework (part 2), RePlay, etc..). 

This is painful in the short term, but I hope to regain even more traffic over the coming years as they fix their search engine. We also have a lot of non-Google traffic, which continues to grow fast. I wrote up my thoughts here to share with Google. 

This, along with the shift to an AI world, is why we are focused on building a full app for readers so they come straight to us (and eventually, we will launch phone apps).

We added a referral program for authors, online communities, and readers. How does that help them?

• For authors - If you refer a reader who shares their 3 favorite reads of 2024, your book will be featured at the bottom of their list in a promoted spot. I thought this would be a cool reward for authors who encourage their fan base to share as part of our Readers’ Favorite Books of 2024.
• For online book communities and fan bases, we can build a custom setup for their communities to vote on their favorite reads of the year. This year, we partnered with Subreddits like LitRPG and Truelit on this, as well as authors like Michael J. Sullivan. I have a lot more plans for this feature in the coming years.
• For readers - Readers who refer other readers will get entered into a prize to win a book gift cretificate to a bookstore of their choice. And I have more perks planned for them in the future.

We launched the 3 Favorite Reads of the Year program in 2023, but we did everything manually, and authors submitted their picks via a Word document. Now, readers and authors can submit everything online!

Try it here and share your 3 favorite reads (here are mine)! This uses our new Book DNA review format that I have been testing. It is designed to help understand why you liked a book so that as we grow, we can help you find readers who share your Book DNA and deliver better recommendations.

It has been a long time coming, but we finally have user accounts in place. This will power every feature we build for readers and authors in the coming years. The first feature it will power is the upcoming 3 favorite reads of the year event!

Do you want amazing book recommendations from readers like you?

Readers can pick three of their favorite authors/books and three of their favorite genres/topics and get personalized book recommendations each week. This is in beta as we work to fine-tune and gather feedback.

We upgraded our front page to make it easier to navigate and pretty 😄.

This puts the focus on search as that is the most efficient way for readers to start using Shepherd. Especially with the improvements we have made to that system.

We made massive improvements to our search feature. We now return search result pages that help readers start exploring the website. They can search for an author, book, genre, topic, or age-group.

Try our page on Stephen King, the book Tom Swan and the Head of St. George, a topic like pandemics, a genre like fantasy, or an age group like young adult (we also have specific ages and grades).

In our second full year since launch, we welcomed over 5 million visitors!

For the first time, we received 500,000 visitors in a single month, thanks to the publicity surrounding the Best Books of the Year feature.

We launched a big perk for our Founding Authors to help their books get a little extra publicity. As long as they are members we put them in front of 100 to 200 of the most likely readers for their book every month with Book Boost Ads.

We've got more perks coming for members!

Every year, we ask readers for their 3 favorite reads of the year. This combines all that data to show which books are the most favored. Plus, you can dive deep into genres, topics, and age groups.

Our goal here it to delight readers with great books and give authors more publicity who have a book with that “magic spark.”

Authors can now share their 3 favorite reads of the year, and we promote one of their books alongside their list. Check out author Ingrid Ricks’ favorite 3 reads of 2023. It is a great way to engage your fan base and remind them about your book, and Shepherd also promotes this list to our visitors.

We added genre, topic, and age filters to all our bookshelves to help you discover the type of book you want! Plus, you can sort the results by serendipity, most-recommended, newest books, and oldest books.

Try our bookshelf on science fiction and use the filters to zoom in on only science fiction books with artificial intelligence.

We added genre and age data to the backend and many tools to manage those. This is the culmination of many months of work and research, and it will power many future features.

Previous to this, we did everything manually. Now, we only need to find an ISBN/ASIN, check for errors, and find a high-definition book cover image.

We also added some protections to help us identify duplicate books and authors. In the long term, I hope to create direct access for authors to fix data and our own "librarian program" for readers who want to help improve data (the data is so messy).

In our first full year since launch, we welcomed over 1.8 million visitors in 2022!

For the first time, we received over 250,000 visitors in a single month!

We added book explore points across Shepherd so that you can easily dive into individual books and see:

• The book description (from the publisher)
• How many recommendations it has on Shepherd (and click to read those)
• A link to view books similar to that one
• A link to view book lists that include that book
• Links to jump to bookshelves on topics or genres that book contains

Just click “What is this book about?” to try it!

Now, you can find books based on a book you already know and love!

Even better, these recommendations are from fans of that book and not some silly computer algorithm. Try this page with books like Kitchen Confidential (by one of my heroes, Anthony Bourdain).

We added individual book pages to explore each book and why you should read it (try Kitchen Confidential or Dune). We have a lot more planned for this section in the coming years.

We also added a page showing the book lists this book appears on.

This switches the format to one column instead of two, and it shows more about the person making the recommendation (plus, you can meet them and their book). Try our bookshelf on dystopias to try it. This is the finished version as we tried a few different options during testing.

We launched a new recommendation system at the bottom of each book list. This allows readers to keep following their curiosity through the website. Try it at the bottom of Steven Pinker’s list on rationality.

We launched a massive update for the front page that integrates search, book lists, and bookshelves. Prior to this our front page was just a giant list of all the book lists we had so far.

For the first time, we received over 50,000 visitors in a single month (67,000 in January)!

Readers can explore books based on Wikipedia topic, favorite author, and favorite book. Over time we will evolve search as we grow.

Bookshelves are based around topics and help readers explore books in fun ways. We use machine learning and NLP to do this at scale (plus some LOC data). We launched with 1,000+ bookshelves on everything from World War 2 to dinosaurs.

We launched in April and we've already had over 260,000 thousand readers visit us to find a book!