Welcome to Ink Heist Version 1.5! Why 1.5 and not 2? Well, it’s because we aren’t quite at the next level of where we want Ink Heist to go just yet, but we’ve started the journey to get there.

First and foremost, Shane and I would like to thank everyone who has supported Ink Heist so far in our first year. Whether you’re a long time reader, a fellow blogger, author, or contributor, we can’t thank you enough for supporting us. Without any of you visiting Ink Heist or helping to spread the word about our content, we wouldn’t be nearly as successful as we are. In the first three months of 2019, we’ve already received 60 percent of our total traffic from all of last year. We share that not to brag, but as a way to show how the support of our community can really make a difference. About how people will rally to support you and offer you support when starting something new. So, again, thank you all for your overwhelming support!

You may have noticed that the site has undergone some minor cosmetic changes. That’s because as Shane and I discussed our goals, we realized we should probably upgrade the look and feel to reflect that direction. When we started Ink Heist, our goal was fairly straight-forward. Shane and I developed a close friendship over the years through running our own individual sites and wanted to work together. It was really that simple. We wanted to be able to offer more content to readers, have more fun than we could by doing things solo, and expand our coverage to include other genres than strictly horror. That was it.

However, through our first year of working together, we started to brainstorm and realized we wanted Ink Heist to be more than just a review site. We wanted to launch more features, in-depth interviews, and more journalistic articles. Our first recurring feature was our series highlighting true stories of the weird, Signals from the Abyss. After launching that, we were hooked. This was when we decided to get serious and set out on the course of transforming into Ink Heist 2.0 – a bonafide online literature magazine.

We’re still in the early stages of that journey, but we wanted to share our hopes and goals with you so you know where we’re heading. The biggest goal we have is launching a podcast. For the longest time, due to logistical reasons, we conducted all of our interviews through email. There’s nothing wrong with that approach, but sometimes it makes it difficult to establish a natural dialogue. So, we launched “Semi-Live”, a series of live chats with authors. Our first guests were John C. Foster and John F.D.Taff and we had a blast talking with them. As fun as those are, it only further fueled our desire to launch a legitimate podcast. We’re currently in the process of figuring out the logistics to make that happen.

That’s our biggest goal as far as content, but it’s only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to our overall vision for the future of Ink Heist. We want to move beyond WordPress and get shared hosting. Why? So we (well our behind the scenes webmaster Shane, who does a killer job) can have full control over every aspect of the site. We want to get professional graphics done because Ink Heist is here to stay for the long haul and we want our site design to reflect that. We want to establish lasting features. A user forum where authors and readers can talk everything book related. More importantly, our dream is to reach a point where we can compensate our contributors and maybe even feature the occasional piece of short fiction.

We may have gone a bit overboard with this post regarding something simple as a small design change, but that’s because Shane and I are filled with a rabid enthusiasm for making Ink Heist something special and long lasting. That enthusiasm not only comes from our lofty goals and visions of what the future could be for Ink Heist, but also from you, the reader. The support everyone has shown us in our first full year of Ink Heist (our official anniversary is next month) has been nothing short of humbling. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts for visiting us consistently and cheering us on every step of the way. We do our best to pay that goodwill forward and we are excited to be a part of such a caring, supportive community. We look forward to doing everything we can to bring you guys more cool stuff in 2019 and the many years still to come.