Category: Income Reports - At Home, Online, Blogging

1. April 2017 Blog Income, Stats and Goals (over £800)

   Posted on 2:25pm Tuesday 2nd May 2017

   How much money I make from blogging at home

   See my previous blogging income reports:
   January 2017
   February 2017
   March 2017

   April 2017 Blog Income: £840.99

   

   I’m very pleased I made well over my £500 target again.  I was secretly hoping to hit £1000, but things were a lot quieter in April because of the Easter holidays taking up half the month.  Things are back to normal now and I hope May will be a busy month too.

   Most of my blog income came from sponsored posts, reviews and giveaways.

   This income includes a £60 payment from Google Adsense (my yearly payment!) and £56 from affiliate marketing, which I’m yet to master.

   April 2017 Stats

   

   (The dashes just mean I hadn’t started recording these results each month)

   Website stats were down in April and even less than March or February, but I’m still very happy with these.  Things are always quieter over bank holidays and during school holidays so I expected my stats to be down as people enjoyed family time and holidays at Easter. 

   My social stats are up.  My main focus this year is Instagram which I’m trying to increase, whereas I’m letting Twitter just be and I honestly never bother trying on Pinterest!  I just post each blog pic there when I publish and that’s as much as I use that network.  I keep reading how amazing it is and other bloggers get the majority of their traffic from Pinterest so I just need to find more time in the day to improve mine.

   I expect my Tots score will crash in May as all my website stats are lower.  It changed from 25 to 26 in April as someone moved charts.

   My DA is finally back in the thirties, though who knows for how long!  I’d not made a note of the previous scores, but last year it was always in the 30s. Here’s my blog post about how I think I got it back up: 4 ways to improve your domain authority (DA)

   Did I Achieve My April Blogging Goals?

   • Increase Instagram followers by 500 – yes this was achieved and I’m doing my best to scroll through my feed, relevant hashtags and similar bloggers to interact with their posts.
   • Make £500 from blogging – yes and over by more than £300
   • Create a catchy blog heading and add intro paragraph to every blog post before the first image (at least 50 blog posts) – I’ve done 133 blog posts, only 457 to go (!!)
   • Continue adding internal links 2-3 per blog post (at least 50 blog posts) – yes, I’m doing this as I do the above
   • Run two blog giveaways – yes, exactly two in April which end this month so check out my blog giveaway section as the handbag one ends very soon
   • Revise Social Oomph blog updates – not totally, but I’ve been through some and cleaned up some of the queues.  I’ve also added all my shop items to a queue to share the stock I have left and hopefully clear some as I continue to cut down my stock.

   May Blogging Goals:

   • Remember to post on Instagram
   • Increase Instagram followers by 300 (less as I want to complete more blog posts this month)
   • Make £500 from blogging
   • Continue adding blog headings, intro blog posts and internal links – aim for at least 50 blog posts
   • Run two blog giveaways
   • Revise Social Oomph blog queue updates to freshen Twitter feed

   I don’t have many goals at the moment as revising all my old blog posts is taking a lot of time!  I have 457 left to do.  I cannot wait until it’s complete.  I always seem to set myself humungous tasks and I just have to finish them.

   Ooh – one great thing is I only have two weeks left at my employed job, then I’ll have an extra 10 hours per week for blogging and earning from home!  Read all about it here:  How I’m going to make £1000 a month as a Mum working from home

   Want to know how I find paid opportunities?  Click here: 4 ways to find paid blog opportunities

    

    

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2. March 2017 Blog Income, Stats and Goals (over £1000!)

   Posted on 8:00am Monday 3rd Apr 2017

   How much money do I make from blogging?

   See my previous blogging income reports:
   January 2017 Blog Income
   February 2017 Blog Income

   March 2017 Blog Income: £1422.86

   EEEEEEEK!  I made way over £1000 with my blog in March and my target was only a modest £500 so I am super chuffed!  Can I officially call myself a full time blogger now?  I am spending around 50 hours per week on my blog so I guess that qualifies!  I have this fear that if I get too excited then it will all stop and the work will run dry.  I guess that’s a big fear for every self-employed person/freelancer.

   

   I did take the plunge and reduce my evening cleaning shifts from five nights to only three.  I could finish altogether, but because of the fear above I’m not ready to take that risk just yet.  It’s also great exercise!  I started three shifts only at the beginning of March and I’ve put on half a stone since!  I guess it’s six hours less exercise a week.  So I think I may keep up with it as long as possible just for the exercise!

   Amazingly I’m also still owed £295 for blog posts I’ve completed so this is a nice start to my April blog income.  I only include the amounts I was actually paid within the month in my totals.

   I’ve just checked my Google Adsense and I’ve finally reached the £60 threshold for a payment, so this may come in April too.  It’s taken me ONE YEAR to reach the £60 so I’m making a whopping £5 a month from Google ads!  I just have one in my footer now so I’m not making the most of them, but I also don’t want to plaster them all over my website.  Especially for so little return!  I guess the people killing it with Google ads have ridiculously high traffic.

   Most of my income this month was through sponsored blog posts and reviews.  £25 was from an advert on my ads page and £60.34 was an affiliate payment.

   March 2017 Google Analytics

   My stats have increased very slightly again:

   Page Views:  15520 (Feb: 14500)(Jan: 12300)
   Sessions: 9025  (Feb: 8167 )(Jan: 6600)
   New Users: 4704  (Feb: 4600) (Jan: 4400)

   Social Followers

   I haven’t been noting these down, so I’ll start now!  I’m really concentrating on my Instagram this year to increase followers.  I’d love to hit 7500 by the end of the year.  I never work on my Pinterest, hence the smallest number.  I literally just post my images there once I post a new blog post and leave it be.  One day I will learn how to optimise all my descriptions and give my boards a good clean up!  Twitter is still my favourite channel and I use Social Oomph to schedule tweets so I’m visible there all day.  I also check my notifications a few times a day to reply to comments.  Every now and then I’ll have a little retweeting spree too.

   Instagram: 4402 (Feb: 3150)
   Twitter: 55568
   Pinterest: 706

   Did I Achieve My March Blogging Goals?

   • Increase Instagram followers by 250 – ooh yes thrashed this one!
   • Instagram at least once every other day – nope – I’ve still been bad at trying to post a pic all the time.  My life just isn’t that exciting!
   • Make £500 from blogging – yes I whooped this one!
   • Change all ads to affiliate ads – Almost!  I’ve around 30 blog posts to change and I also decided to leave just one Google ad in my footer
   • Have a blog spring clean and clear out old irrelevant posts – yes I did this and I think I’m happy with all the content left.  I may just go through some of the older posts and tidy them up/bulk them out/improve the writing
   • Add internal links, check image descriptions and add keywords to at least 20 posts – yes I definitely did 20 of these, maybe more like 40-50
   • Research SEO for blogs – I watched a video and read a little.  It’s still a minefield to me, but I’ll be implementing some things this month.
   • Send out new blog posts daily via newsletter to test if it increases click through rate – yes I’ve started sending daily newsletters and I need to check the click through rate as I’ve not really looked yet.
   • Run two blog giveaways – yes I ran more than this – check out my Giveaway link in my menu bar ^^^
   • Revise Social Oomph blog updates – I’ve revised a few, but I really need to go through the whole lot and change the hashtags and titles

   April Blogging Goals:

   • Increase Instagram followers by 500
   • Make £500 from blogging
   • Create a catchy blog heading and add intro paragraph to every blog post before the first image (at least 50 blog posts)
   • Continue adding internal links 2-3 per blog post (at least 50 blog posts)
   • Run two giveaways
   • Revise Social Oomph blog updates

   Want to know how I find paid opportunities?  Click: 4 ways to find paid blog opportunities

    

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3. February Blog Income, Stats and Goals

   Posted on 12:34pm Wednesday 1st Mar 2017

   How much money do I make from blogging?

   See my previous blogging income report: January 2017 Blog Income

   February 2017 Blog Income: £820.97

   Woah it’s the first of March already - time for a roundup of my February blog stats. Yet again I thrashed my £500 target which is amazing.  I feel like perhaps I should have a £800-1000 target, but I don’t want to make my target unreachable!  It’s my first year of totally focusing on my blog, so I shall start modestly.

   

   I’m actually owed over £200 for blog posts too, so I would have gone over the thousand pound mark if these payments were quicker, but they’re a nice starting point for my March blog income.

   Most of this income is from sponsored posts, £4 is from a PPC campaign and £10 is from one new ad on my business/blog ads page.

   Next month I should have some income from affiliate marketing too.  I’m getting rid of Google ads and replacing them with affiliate ads instead.  I’m hoping these will be more profitable.  I only make about £60 every 6-8 months from Google ads.  I think you need HUGE amounts of traffic to make a lot of money from their AdSense scheme.  I also only have them at the bottom of my blog posts and one in the footer of my website.  I could add them to the top and sides of my website, but I’d rather keep the ads to a minimum and not clutter my website.

   I know I’m already up to about £40 in affiliate sales since starting in February, so this is much better than the ads already.

   February 2017 Google Analytics

   I’m pleased to see my stats have increased from last month and they are so much higher than last year:

   Page Views:  14500 (Jan: 12300)
   Sessions: 8167 (Jan: 6600)
   New Users: 4600  (Jan: 4400)

   February Blogging Goals & whether I achieved them:

   • Increase Instagram followers – Yes this has been achieved.  My followers are now at 3150 and have been steadily increasing.  I didn’t make a note of the number last month, but we'll now know for next month!
   • Try to post at least once per day to Instagram – I’ve not posted once per day, but much more than usual, I’ll try again next month
   • Increase newsletter subscribers and send new blog posts via newsletter twice per week – done, but opens are quite low.  Perhaps newsletters are like this?  I’d like to increase clicks.
   • Run two giveaways – I’ve ran three and they’ve had a great response!  Two are still active in my giveaway section.
   • Make £500 from blogging – smashed this target – over £800!
   • Write at least two personal blog posts per week – I must have hit this target as there are over 50 blog posts this month!  Lots of sponsored ones, but I’ve had great fun relating these to my own experiences and writing about my own life within many of them.
   • Add all blog posts to a spreadsheet (640ish, phew!) in order to find evergreen posts and add to a Social Oomph queue – done!  What a mammoth task!  It’s also inspired me to spring clean out old irrelevant blog posts or things I don’t want to promote anymore like foods with refined sugar, etc.
   • Promote 3 blog posts a day with Pick a Blogger – I’ve done this most days, but some days I have forgot or just not had enough time.  It would be fab if there was a way to link to our RSS feeds and this is done automatically.
   • Write at least two guest posts –done!  One has been published and I think the other is scheduled.  I’ve also featured in lots of interviews on blogs this month.  I love answering interview questions!
   • Enjoy blogging, stay positive and focused – yes, yes and yes.  It’s scary trying to make my main income from blogging, but also so rewarding.  There are quiet days, but then there are days filled with opportunities.  Things will get much easier once Reuben is at nursery/play school more and I have more time to devote to improving my blog.

   March Blogging Goals:

   • Increase Instagram followers by 250
   • Instagram at least once every other day
   • Make £500 from blogging
   • Change all ads to affiliate ads
   • Have a blog spring clean and clear out old irrelevant posts
   • Add internal links, check image descriptions and add keywords to at least 20 posts
   • Research SEO for blogs
   • Send out new blog posts daily via newsletter to test if it increases click through rate
   • Run two giveaways
   • Revise Social Oomph blog updates

   Want to know how I find paid opportunities?  Click here: 4 ways to find paid blog opportunities

    

    

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4. Blog Income and Stats: January 2017 (and why I’m changing my focus this year)

   Posted on 11:05am Tuesday 7th Feb 2017

   Why I’m not concentrating on my shop anymore

   I made a decision in December that I will concentrate on my blog in 2017 rather than my online shop.  My online fashion boutique has been my main focus for four years, with an eight month maternity break in the middle.  It’s been my absolute passion and I’ve worked tirelessly to promote it.  My main source of promotion is Twitter using the networking hours and various retweet hashtags. 

   Before I took my maternity leave things were looking good.  I was taking around £2000 per month and the possibility of it making a real income for me looked promising.  I was getting sales every day and things were great.  After my maternity leave things were great for a few months, but I had returned in October perfectly timed for Christmas shopping.  After Christmas shopping season things slowed down significantly and never really picked up. 

   I decided to cut down my stock which may have affected this, going from around 500 items to 200 now.  Towards the end of 2016 I was feeling a little tired of the relentless promotion for very little profit.  I could get sales every day, but only if I spent 7 hours in all the Twitter networking hours.  Sometimes I’d only get a couple of £5 or £10 sales and when you take off the cost of the item, packaging, payment fees, website fees, eBay fees, promotion fees and all the time and effort I was putting in, was it really worth it? 

   To make a decent wage I’d have to be selling vast quantities of such low priced and lowly marked up items to make enough money to survive on.  I do love selling online and will continue with my little shop, but for 2017 it is not my main focus.  If I get sales, that’s great and I am still passionate about my lovely boutique, but I just can’t continue to give it this much energy.

   

   Focusing on my blog in 2017

   Last year I also made the decision to start monetising my blog.  Before this I’d blogged for three years purely for pleasure and never dreamed I could actually make an income from my blog.  I reviewed lots of items for free and this was a bonus to me.  One week, however, I had around ten reviews to do and realised I was giving so much of my time and effort for free to make others money whilst I was skint. 

   I decided then things had to change and I needed to value my time more.  After all it’s taken me years to build up my followings and hours of time each day.  I was giving all this away for free.  I also noticed other SEO companies charging upwards of £100 for links on blogs with a domain authority such as mine, so needed to reconsider giving anything away for free!  It’s evergreen advertising for a company to have a blog post on my blog and they’d pay far more for a monthly magazine advertisement or similar. 

   I started accepting some sponsored blog posts, one or two a month, in spring 2016 to test the waters.  I also decided in December 2017 I would no longer review items for free.  After all, products don’t pay bills and I needed to value the two hours of my time more wisely (plus all the other time spent building my blog, increasing followers, etc, as that’s all part of the package).

   January Income Target

   I set myself a target of £400 for January and thought if I make £500 then that will be a bonus.  £100 a week didn’t seem too crazy a starting point.  I shifted my entire focus to my blog in the New Year and set about searching for paid opportunities.  This was something I hadn’t ever done before.  I’d only taken part in those which had landed in my inbox (and I thought were a good fit).  I put myself out there and started applying for any I was suited to.

   Incredibly, my plan worked and I doubled my target!  I’m still so amazed and I’ve no idea if it will continue, but I’m super chuffed and shifting my focus to my blog seems to be the right decision for me.

   January 2017 Blog Income

   Before expenses my blog income for January 2017 is £974.28. 

   I’m so amazed.  This shows real potential for making blogging a real income.  It’s now been my main source of income for a couple of months. I would have hit £1000 had some of my invoices been paid on time, but this reflects the money I was actually paid in January.  Anything outstanding will go in next month’s blog income when it is paid.

   I absolutely thrashed my target!

   January Blog Stats

   I upped my game with sharing blog posts in January, ran two blog giveaways, tried to post on Instagram every day, joined some blogging groups and networks and most importantly I wrote so many more blog posts than I usually do and devoted as much time as I could to this, the best part – the writing.

   All of this had a great impact on my blog traffic which was the best it’s ever been:

   January 2017 Google Analytics
   
   Page Views: 12300
   Sessions: 6600
   New Users: 4400

   

    

   February Blogging Goals

   • Increase Instagram followers
   • Try to post at least once per day to Instagram
   • Increase newsletter subscribers and send new blog posts via newsletter twice per week
   • Run two giveaways
   • Make £500 from blogging
   • Write at least two personal blog posts per week
   • Add all blog posts to a spreadsheet (640ish, phew!) in order to find evergreen posts and add to a Social Oomph queue
   • Write at least two guest posts
   • Enjoy blogging, stay positive and focused!

    

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