I am usually the last person to know about something, and The Yakezie Challenge is no exception! In place of my planned Frugal Friday post, I make this announcement instead.

It’s a challenge set up by Sam over at Financial Samurai (a blogger favourite of mine).

* Yakezie is about networking

Whenever you get a hobby, there will be like-minded individuals you will probably hook up with. There might even be an Association, or Club or Team you can join. Yakezie is a club for personal finance bloggers, and contains some of the best in personal finance blogs in one single directory.

* It’s about helping others

These days it’s not what you know necessarily, it’s who you know. You could write the most amazing posts for 5 years about x, y or z but never be found. Part of Yakezie is helping find new content, and giving helping new readers discover new, amazing content.

* It’s about sharing

Here in the UK we have no mandatory module at the compulsory education level to learn about personal finance. It may explain why virtually everyone I know has at some point ended up with more debt than they can comfortably repay, and ended up dragging themselves out of it in some shape or form.

When I learn something about personal finance, or when I have a topic I think the world should know about – I will post it.

* It’s about making dreams a reality

I’ll be honest when I say I don’t want to do my current day job forever. I’d love to be able to write full time while also being able to keep the lights on, a roof over my head and my tummy full. The side-goals of Yakezie are to increase Alexa Rank, making it more likely folks seeking knowledge will arrive at Five Pence Piece.

* It’s about the challenge

Getting into Yakezie is hard. There are tasks to perform (such as halving your Alexa rank), and posting at least 4 times a week for a minimum of 6 months. Looking back at my own posts I did pretty well in 2009. 2010 and 2011 was a fail,  but 2012 is looking to be right on track.

So what does this all mean for you, my dear readers? Other than guaranteeing regular posts from me from now on – you shouldn’t really notice any difference. I’m already very proud to say my UK Alexa Rank is 88,172 at the time of writing. What I really hope to work on over the next 6 months is my overall global rank, which currently stands at 2,055,805 but that could be quite difficult given my UK focus.

Update: Since I drafted this post 2 days ago, my Alexa rank has already changed to 1,967,931 so I’m heading in the right direction it would seem. Woo!

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