2009 has been a great year for The Design Cubicle. In the past 12 months TDC has close to 2 million amazing visitors and approximately 5,000 comments on 151 articles (an average of 33 comments per article with a rate of 3 articles a week)—ranging from freelancing tips, logo and web design articles, typography insights and great giveaways—and 11,000 subscribers via RSS and email.
I owe each and everyone of the above (and more) accomplishments to all of you. Without your thought-provoking comments, appreciated retweets on Twitter and generosity of following along, 2009 would be just another year for The Design Cubicle. I thank each and every one of you for your contributions and involvement. Really, thank you.

I only hope in someway I have helped to enlighten or inspire you in 2009 and look forward to bring even more energy and passion to TDC in 2010. Below is a month-by-month recap of 2009′s Best Articles on The Design Cubicle.

January

12 Common Photoshop Mistakes, a list to help educate new designers and “users” of Photoshop, not only become popular via  TDC readers, but was 1 of 3 articles that hit the front page of Digg (accumulating 1,500+ Diggs).

Another January article shedding some light on the topic of What You Should Get From A Logo Designers, was an articled focused at both designers and those looking to hire a design professional. The post walks through all the files and formats and received 59 great comments.

February

How to drive traffic to your design blog provides personal insight into a few valuable tips that drove The Design Cubicle from the early stages. With 248 retweets on Twitter and 129 comments, this article still circulates around the web and Twitter quite frequently.

March

With the new year around the corner, its always good to start planning (or re-planning) your business, especially if you are a freelancer. The article, 28 Must Read Articles for Growing Your Freelance Design Business, highlights essential tools, resources, promotional tips and other articles that will expand any business.

April

April was quite a solid month for The Design Cubicle. With articles such as 50 Creative Business Cards of Graphic Designers, 600+ Free Design, Twitter and Social Media Icons, and 13 Beneficial WordPress Plugins For Your Design Blog, TDC had an impressive amount of positive feedback through comments, community contributions (designers participated to submit their own business cards) and traffic.

May

Articles that include 25 One Page Portfolio Websites of Designers on Twitter and The Hardest Part of Being a Designer were two popular articles that would not be possible without the participation of other designers on Twitter.

June

June marked the most successful giveaway and a popular article on the topic of typography: 15 Typography Books to Help You Learn and Love Typography. The book giveaway resulted in 116 comments with 2 lucky winners.

July

Another productive and memorable month was July. The logo-focused month not only provided information such as, 20 Questions to Ask Clients Prior to Designing a Logo and thought-provoking tips on How To Make A Flexible Logo, but I also gave away free logo services to one lucky reader.

August

August was more freelance and productivity-focused with popular articles that include:

» What to Include In Your Design Contracts
» How To Become A More Effective, Proficient and Informed Designer
» The ‘Hows’ of Pricing Your Design Work

September

September was bit of a slower month of new articles (hey, we call get busy from time to time) but I managed to follow up to last years popular post 10 Common Typography Mistakes (2008) with ten more.

October

TDC kicked it up a notch from the slower September with memorable articles such as:

» Content Heavy Websites with Beautiful Structure, Layout and Hierarchy (an astonishing 431 retweets on Twitter)
» How a design blog is attractive to clients – showcasing the benefits of a design blog and how it can built trust and stronger relationships with clients

November

Last month, November, was TDCs highest traffic month of the year. Four articles,consuming 216 comments and a combined 1,970, that include:

• What a logo does not have to be or do
• Custom WordPress blog design checklist and walkthrough
• Questions to ask clients before designing their website
• Typography is the backbone of good web design

We also  reached 10,000 subscribers in November, launched a more personal site, behoff.com and become a part of Smashing Magazine’s Smashing Network.

December

The ‘Vintage Posters’ post helped to inspire new color palettes and showcase beautiful typography. It also accumulated 530 retweets and 40 great comments.

What’s in store for 2010?

For the past few months I have been in the re-design phase of The Design Cubicle. Let’s just say, this is one of the toughest projects I’ve worked on to date, especially since it involves designing for myself. Hopefully in the next 2 months you will be looking at a brand new, custom TDC blog!

I am also working on a new ‘Typography Repository’ that will aggregate the highest quality, educational typography articles and videos that should be launching quite soon so stay tuned for that. The aim of the site is to help teach typography, not just inspire. Many articles out there show beautiful examples but few actually teach you how to improve your typography. To me, typography has always been the science of design, but an element that really sets apart the “men from the boys.”

I also look forward to bring more thought-provoking, discussion driven posts to The Design Cubicle. Bring back more of the educational aspect of design.

On a more personal note, I am also in talks with teaching at a local college and looking into speaking a design events. In short, I want to get more active in the design community.