Pretty much right on par with last month here at Pulling Curls!
Over 3 times what I earned last year! Gotta love that!
(Always a huge self esteem booster when I compare last year to this year).
As always, my income reports are brought to you by my blogging income spreadsheet. It tracks all of this. I just pop the numbers in, it tells me how much rpm I’m making per network (a lot of ad company’s are wrong, especially if you have separate mobile vs desktop companies). Seriously, it’s the bomb. I even made a brand new sales page that outlines it even better!
Ok, on to the numbers!
Sessions: 217k Hits: 268k
These are both up 12% from last month. I’m working on ways to improve my Pinterest traffic after they made adjustments. You can see how I’m doing that in last month’s income report. Always trying to work within an ever-changing system. 🙂
Ad income: $2325
This is up 54% (woot-woot). I run my ads through MediaVine and PadSquad, but I did run a special ad for my church for a bit on my blog this month also, which accounts for some of that change. Although, even without that I would be up 30%. I think my MediaVine ads have stabilized and I’m really happy that I moved. My desktop RPM is over 10 bucks and my overall CPM is over 12 dollars. Keep in mind that mobile RPM is always less. Just more room for ads (and big ones) on a pretty desktop! Also, a reminder that this is the end of the quarter when income for ads usually jumps up. I plan to see a bit of a drop next month (although, I thin PadSquad has even’d out considerably from last year).
Affiliate Income: $2000
This is up 32% — Affiliate income is so random. I am not sure why I did so much better. Amazon is certainly still up from when I changed my hospital bag post (and subsequently have been implementing those ideas on other posts).
Sponsored Posts $25
I had a few campaigns set to run this month that got pushed to next month. Again, super variable, but this number will be a lot larger next month.
Own Content $200
At the end of January I launched my prenatal class. On March 1 I raised the price (by quite a lot) and it tanked. I’m hoping I didn’t kill it. I am down 81% in this category. I had SO many people say that raising the price would make more people buy.
Those people are wrong.
So, this month I adjusted a lot and I finally finished with 4 options, including a free option and a fairly low cost option. I also updated my landing page, so it looks pretty snazzy. I’m hoping that sales pick up. I’m hoping a couple of larger affiliates will put it out there. It’s a quality product and now I have the most expensive price point doing an online course when I constantly update (and will likely raise the price yearly as there is more and more content). Who knows, either way — big mistake this month, by raising the price. I hope something normalizes here.
I am accepting affiliates for both my spreadsheet and my prenatal class. I am giving an adjustable 40% affiliate for my programs (it’s adjustable as you can ask for a coupon for a smaller % back).
Grand total: $4500
Which is basically even steven from last month. {hands in the air} who knows? I just write a blog. 🙂
Full blog CPM is $21.00 — that means for every 1k hits I’m making that amount (total between all income sources). Down a couple of dollars from last month, but I still think it’s pretty good! Average CPM from last year was just over 13 dollars so I have made quite an increase!
Time: Too little!
I have tried to be a little more realistic with my time commitment lately. So, now as I schedule my day I give 1/2 hour working on my own products. I really only have about a 1/2 hour attention span so, while I know this wouldn’t work for a lot of people I can actually get quite a lot done in that 1/2 hour. That time is split between a new book I’m working on, updating my prenatal class, working on lead pages (more on that below — but I bought thrive leads and I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it!)
60 minutes for blog writing (about 30 minutes of that is actual writing, and 30 minutes of photo editing — I have started making 4 photos for most posts, which takes FOREVER).
60 minutes for upkeep/social media/newsletter (each day has tasks assigned to it).
I probably also have 30 minutes (about) to answer email. But, I am still PTO president (only 29 days more) so some of that time is there also.
** A big shoutout for my mom for teaching me to type at a young age. That has certainly come in handy. I type FAST. Thank goodness!
Introducing Blog Coaching! Interested in a personalized look at your blog from someone earning her family’s income by blogging? Check it out here!
I did want to share some of the things that have REALLY been helping me this month:
Six Best Practice Tools for a Blog!
**I have taken note that the majority of bloggers who make a good income from blogging do it by selling things to bloggers. I will say that is NOT my income strategy. But I will say there are some products I really recommend and I wanted to share those with you. My big plan is to make it big with my prenatal class, so if you appreciate this info I’d love it if you share my prenatal class with your peeps. 🙂
I will say that while I do use some affiliate links in here, these are products I would recommend either way. They are ALL things that I am CURRENTLY using on my blog and find great use out of. They are all things that will help you build your blog well.
A Great Host:
I made the switch from Blogger in 2014. I loved blogger, and I totally recommend it if you 100% just plan on having only a blog. I do NOT recommend it if you plan to expand.I have finally come to the point where I am REALLY grateful for my move to Wordpress.
I now host all my sales on my own blog using the plugin WooCommerce. I have now started hosting my own course on my blog through Lifter LMS. It. Is. AWESOME. So, while I don’t believe that you HAVE to be on Wordpress to make a great income as a blogger. But if you want to expand and be more of a brand than a blog (by selling your own product, which is the best long-term way to make money as a blogger) then I totally recommend Wordpress. Which also means having a GREAT host of your own.
I use In Motion Hosting and I am REALLY satisfied by them. You can read my whole post about the crazy game of hosting. BUT, if you’re looking to start small, you might want to try BlueHost where it costs under 4 bucks/month to start a blog. In Motion Hosting also has a great small plan that you can upgrade as you move along (I would certainly recommend leaving BlueHost once your blog starts to grow, and I would be skeptical of anyone who only recommends bluehost for a blog — their affiliate fees are high).
Studio Press:
Once you have WordPress, I would recommend having a good child theme so you can make small changes. I do use a Studio Press theme that was installed by my one of my blogging BFF’s Katie Clark from The Blog Help. She is the bomb, I totally recommend her (especially if you’d like get wordpress on your site, but you’re worried about installing it on your own).
ConvertKit:
I started with Mailchimp with my newsletter. It is free up to a good # of subscribers. HOWEVER, it’s open rate wasn’t awesome and while it was pretty, it turns out that pretty emails often don’t get opened or clicked on.
Last November I made the change to ConvertKit. I am seeing blog hits REALLY increase with using ConvertKit for my readers. It’s easy to create lead magnets, and tag subscribers to only get what they’re interested in. My blog is so varied, that was really important to me. I can’t recommend it enough. I will say that you need a good amount of time to set it up. While once it is set-up there is a good amount of “set it and forget it” mentality, there is also a LOT of time devoted to setting that up. Now, I spend about an hour adding content to my drip systems and maintaining the list. I have a whole post about ConvertKit here.
Spreadsheet:
You know I had to put that in here, right? I will say that having a very grown-up spreadsheet that tracks your entire system. It is a-mazing. It comes with week’s worth of emails to help you set it up. It tracks hits, ad income (including making sure you’re getting an accurate RPM and CPM, which it also calculates), affiliate income, personal income (like my prenatal class) and sponsored post income. Plus, it has extra sheets to work on your sponsored posts (track dates and hashtags), your non-traditional income (think items brands send you that you need to count on your taxes), and an ability to compare last year with this year. That’s always a good self esteem booster. 🙂
ThriveThemes Pages:
I was looking pretty hard into lead pages. I had heard so many good things, and people who sell really well with them. They are awesome for selling stuff. BUT, the price tag is monthly, and very similar to my hosting rate, monthly. Which made me REALLY wonder if it was worth it. Katie from The Blog Help mentioned to look at Thrive Lead Pages. And, HELLO. It’s just the same as Lead Pages, but a one time fee that I was MORE than happy to pay. I can also use that on any page on my blog. They are easy! and AWESOME! I totally recommend them. Check them out.
BoardBooster:
Pinterest is my main revenue builder. Board Booster helps me set up to make pins with me lounging at the pool with a frosty beverage. You create secret boards and Board Booster will loop all those through like a freaking magical train of personal laziness. Dennis is amazing and I love it! Now, I will also say that this is NOT a set it and forget it. I strongly recommend diving into your google analytics and your Pinterest Analytics and finding out what’s doing well, and making sure that you pin those VERY frequently. I spend about an hour doing that each week. But, compared to the 45 minutes I was probably spending each day before that. #dreamland 🙂
So, that’s my six for success.
Do you use these tools?
Do you have any others you recommend?
Sure, I have lots of different blog tools that I recommend, but these six keep the steam train running. I’m happy to recommend them to you, or my closest friend!
Be sure to sign up for my blogging newsletter!
Also, check out all my other blogging posts:
[pt_view id=”cdc635ded0″]
Leave a Reply