income report how I make money blogging for beginners

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So, this is new! I started income reports when I first started this blog, but then somewhere along the line I quit. Life got too hectic. And it still is. Life is messy, especially when you travel fulltime most of the time.

But that’s the exact reason why I need to publish income reports again. To keep track of things, to reflect and to set proper (public) goals.

When I first started out with taking my blog serious and aiming for five-figure months, I gained a LOT from reading all these income reports. I’m pretty sure this will be one of the most valuable blog posts I’ve ever written for new bloggers, so please read along!

What are some of the blog expenses and how do bloggers diversify their blogging income?

So here we are, here is my income report.

So a couple of years ago I was still freelancing. Right now I’m accepting new freelance writing/photography jobs or blog coaching clients when they come up and I’m in the mood (or have time), but I try to focus on building a business without clients.

I have been blogging for over 12+ years and I can’t describe how happy I am I do this fulltime now! Best decision I ever made. It took me years, A LOT of time and effort to get where I am today, but hopefully, I can give you some shortcuts, as I’m already living the fulltime blogging lifestyle.

But to be upfront, I’m foremost an online entrepreneur, and after that a blogger. Building online businesses is my passion, blogging is my ‘hobby gone wrong’ and helping other bloggers is what I do to combine these two passions.

I may use advanced marketing strategies and programs to build my businesses, as I have a marketing degree and you may not need all the programs I use, but I’m sure they will help you. That’s why I decided to combine my business expenses + blog expenses in this report.

My biggest takeaways from 12 years blogging and earning five figures:

Start a blog today

Most of what I’ve accomplished today comes from blogging. A blog is easy to monetize in a very passive way, so you can easily make some passive income with affiliate marketing or blog sponsors once everything is set up. Then start promoting your blog with PR & Free Publicity to gain followers.

Did you know that only 11% of all bloggers earn more than $30.000? So you better make sure you’re one of the top 11% bloggers! To be honest, it’s not that difficult, but you have to realize it’s not just blogging.

See, this blogger makes $50,000 (!) every month in a very passive way. Having multiple income streams is a start. I have collected over 50+ ways bloggers and online entrepreneurs can make money and many of the ways I have used to be able to travel the past three years.

If you don’t have a blog yet, start one today. You know why? Don’t do it for the money. Do it to share your passion(s) and who knows what comes from it. The way we blog will change all the time, but having a large ‘resume’ or creative portfolio online is worth a lot! And let me tell you: working with your favorite brands is a reward and awesome on itself!

Here’s the easiest tutorial on how to start your own blog. The easiest way to monetize your blog if you already have a blog is starting with affiliate marketing.

Already got a blog?

If you already have a blog or if you’re not interested in blogging, I suggest you create an online course for free with Teachable. The difference with other ideas to make a living online is that with a blog or an online course you can make (quick-ish) five figures without working harder or more, while if you’re doing survey’s for example, it will take forever and it will be a lot more work that’s less fun. You do the work once and sell your ‘work’ over and over again.

Create your online course now

Teaching people things you love and know about is so much fun! I absolutely love all my course students! I wish I’d started sooner with exploring my options to hosting an online course because I walked around with the idea for waaaay too long.

I didn’t know about Teachable and Udemy yet, so I just didn’t know how to technically create it. Now, you’ve got me. So create your own school on Teachable (or Udemy) for free now!

Get started with email marketing if you don’t want to create things (but sell!)

If you’re not a type that creates a lot, I suggest you get into email marketing, everyone can write emails right? Email marketing is a great way to stay in contact with people and building a following (who knows what you come up with later in life!) without creating something now. You can easily monetize your email marketing if you’ve got the right tools. I recommend Convertkit or AWeber to start with your newsletter and check out this post on earning recurring monthly income without a blog.

But even if you don’t want to get started on monetizing your own side hustle, business or blog, there are more ways to earn money online, so read further…

Monthly Income September 2017:

Blog sponsors 10%
Blog ads 0%
Social Media sponsored posts 15%
- Instagram (three accounts) 100%
- Twitter 0%
- Facebook 0%
Courses 40%
Coaching/Clients 0%
Affiliate marketing 35%
- #1.
- #2. –> Which tool is best if you want to grow your blog income when you only have a tiny audience?
- #3. –> How to start a blog from scratch without any technical knowledge in 4 simple steps
- #4. –> How I reach millions (yes really) just by using this app 30 minutes a week
- #5.
- #6.
- #7. –> How to stay safe online
- #8.
- #9.
- #10. Misc. programs

Reflection:

As you can see, courses were most profitable for me in September. I decided to sell my courses on Teachable and Udemy before I started fulltime travel a year ago. You know why? Because Udemy is free to use, but it’s very easy to get thousands of students enrolled. It’s great for getting feedback on the course and for introducing yourself to new people and a new audience. When I’m traveling full-time, I don’t have the exact time I have at home to promote my business activities, so this came in handy. I unpublished the course there now btw – I have more time to work when I’m not full-time traveling this holiday season.
I didn’t have time for coaching or clients as I made the move from Australia to Europe and I was kinda busy running my business while being heavily jetlagged or on a plane.
I wasn’t overly active on Instagram or Instagram Stories and I only worked with two brands. I was active on Pinterest thanks to the automations I’ve set up via Tailwind. I also like to Pin whenever I’m traveling, so I had plenty of time to ‘live’ pin too. Usually, I schedule my Instagram posts with Planoly but this month I didn’t even have time to schedule posts, so I had to publish them on the go.
I decided to stop selling $5k in 21-days until I launch my new course, so I’ve seen a small increase in sales from people who wanted to enroll before closure (now totally open again btw!).
I didn’t add display ads to the blog, so I made 0% on blog ads in September. No biggie 😉
I started using Shopify to create my own online store. I didn’t really make all the decisions yet regarding the products, so to be continued…

Monthly Expenses September 2017:

Convertkit $49
Teachable $99
Buffer $10
Tailwind $15
VSCO X membership $19.99
Planoly $19
ThriveCart
Deadline Funnel $67
Gleam $39
MailChimp $10
Lynx $5
Facebook Ads for my business, not my blog
Pinterest Ads for my business, not my blog
Hosting (annually, but one of my domains + hosting needed renewal)
Fiverr help $10
Dreamhost $29
PayPal fees
AWeber
Shopify $29
Mailerlite
Freshbooks
Later
Google Apps
Clickfunnels
Pretty Link
ZenMate

This month I decided to get started with ClickFunnels to integrate with DeadlineFunnel. More about that later.

*as you can see it may look like I use multiple tools for the same things but this is because I either run multiple accounts/or it’s for my second business.

Also read: the REAL costs of running a blog and business.

Blog goals for the last quarter of the year

Of course, it’s easiest to start with a money/stat goal first. Why are these the easiest to come up with? haha. I would like to earn at least $100.000 in the last quarter.
Roundup my blog + business strategies for 2018 and write + plan content 2 months ahead so I have more freedom during the week.
Grow my blog views to 750.000
Accept more blog coaching clients, press trips and interview requests to grow bigger and ‘leave my bubble’ more.
Feel good about working less. I like to work 50+ hours, but I also know daymn good, that my financial success does not require hard work (I actually got that from one of my Law of Attraction cards). It’s the season to spend time with friends and family so I will try to work really hard in October to slow down in November and December.

Check out my posts of weekly goals here!

Monthly goals October:

Launch two new courses. YES, TWO! I have created all the content already, but I’m not ready to launch them yet so that’s very exciting. If you want to stay updated, click here.
Grow my Facebook page. I recently got the page from my previous blog changed into one for this blog. I worked really hard building it, but then I completely neglected it for over a year. Such a waste! But traveling it wasn’t easy keeping up with everything. But these were my followers… my 15k nono’s. The band was broken, no more noni and the nonos…
Get all my posts via ‘SEO YOAST’ on green. I’m taking a course right now to update my SEO knowledge, as things are constantly changing and I don’t take SEO that serious that I read about it every day.
Join more Tribes on Tailwind.
Update old blog posts (read my article + free downloadable checklist here)
Video series training (sign-up here)
Start documenting my income in monthly income reports
Start with a weekly goal post + photo diary & vlog. (read the first here)
Add display ads to the blog (yes really..)
Work on stepping up my page view game
Go live with my e-commerce store (not affiliated with this blog)
Focus on promoting my recurring affiliate programs more. I wrote a new blog post about them here. How awesome?

Actionable steps you can take today to build your five-figure online business

The one things I love about blogging and creating online courses is that the income difference doesn’t come from how much you create. It’s all in how much you promote. It’s about 80% promoting and 20% creating. I used to work in PR and Communications so I know all about free publicity (heck, you can too if you enroll in my course!) and use a combination of (very awkward) press features + Pinterest to earn more every month.

I use Tailwind to skyrocket my Pinterest activity and have automated my PR strategy by using this tool. (read the full tutorial here).

I used to struggle for years before I found a good ‘flow’ in earning money online. I had to change the way I look at money and that took a lot of mindset changes and hard work. This course has helped me a lot.

Also, I realized early on that I needed multiple income streams so I got to work. I’m happy to tell you more about it, so head over to my free video training!

Want to get started yourself with diversifying your income? Head over to 50+ ways to make money online (as a side-hustle), download my free passive income 101 ebook or read this blog post.

$5k in 21-days

If you’re interested in changing the way you look towards money as a blogger, freelancer or online entrepreneur, check out my course $5k in 21-days. It’s a 21-day, step by step challenge course to help you earn $5000 in just three weeks, by changing your mindset, strategies and implementing new techniques that will help you make more sales. Enroll today!

The only requirement for the course is that you have your own business, as it’s not possible to earn more if have a 9-5 job with a monthly salary.