I’d like to do things a little differently. First, most income reports from ‘make money online’ bloggers do not include expenditure, or if they do, the information is rather limited.
I would like to be more candid in revealing exactly how my business is operating. So, you will get the full monty. Besides, if these were just gross income reports, there would be very little to report at this point! 😉
Typically, these reports will be monthly. Because there has been so little to report in the way of income, I am bundling my first four months into one post. The format of the reports will probably change as my business develops, but now, you are simply getting a copy-and-paste from my Excel spreadsheets!
May 2011
There is very little to say about May – I only started my internet marketing efforts near to the end of the month. Modeling For Kids was launched on May 23rd, and I paid for the year’s hosting up front. I also bought a seven day trial subscription to The Best Spinner for article marketing.
June 2011
I went into full on ‘shiny object syndrome’ in June, using Fiverr on more than one occasion for pointless jobs that took me nowhere. Lesson learned there – maybe Fiverr is good for certain things, but more often than not, you’re going to get what you pay for. And $5 doesn’t tend to provide much value.
I paid £17.03 to sign up to the ViperChill VIP Forum (edit: now defunct), which turned out to be a waste of money, as the forum is very quiet indeed. I also experimented with stock photos, but decided in the end that Flickr photos used under the creative commons licence would suffice.
Some money was also spent on Modeling For Kids – I bought a couple of (pretty awful) books for research purposes. The quality (or lack thereof) of the books backed up my assertion that the niche was in dire need of a quality authority site.
I also invested a bit in Leaving Work Behind prior to the launch, buying an ‘under construction’ theme, as well as the Canvas theme from WooThemes (which I would heartily recommend). I also signed up to Aweber – just $1 for the first month.
June also saw my first AdSense earnings – an awesome £3.67!
July 2011
July saw some mystery expenditure, as well as more Fiverr jobs. I spent the month dabbling with AdSense (for the majority of the month, I did not have AdSense on my niche site), so earnings were very modest indeed.
August 2011
I signed up to Build My Rank this month, and to date it has been very effective. However, I have not even been using it for a month yet, so am not in a position to endorse it.
I also bought the Thesis theme for my Modeling For Kids site redesign. I have mixed feelings about the theme. I don’t think it is made clear that the theme is only for those with a pretty good understanding of CSS, HTML and PHP. It is extremely powerful, but only if you have the knowhow to take advantage. If you are looking for a turnkey theme, Thesis is definitely not it. I also was victim to a bug that I couldn’t shake off – so I had to completely reinstall the theme and design the site again from scratch. Not much fun.
My AdSense earnings increased about threefold, but again, there were not adverts live on my site at all times.
What’s In Store For September?
I am determined that September will mark the end of my shiny object syndrome issue. I have resolved to not buy any more eBooks or courses – there is plenty I can be doing to build upon my existing knowledge. Learn by doing, as I say!
I am hoping that September may be the first month that I turn a profit. A combination of not buying any more crap combined with a considerably higher income could make my wish come true. I am at the mercy of Google in terms of both my traffic and AdSense earnings, so we will have to wait and see!
Photo courtesy of Images Of Money