November 2018 Income Report

Welcome to my first ever income report since joining WealthyAffiliate.

I decided to write a monthly income report for a few reasons:

1. Publishing my results keeps me accountable to myself and the results I'm getting
   
2. I believe in being transparent, so I wanted to share my journey with the community
3. It forces me to tally up all my income and expenses and think analytically about the month that has just passed.

Income

I derive my main income from my offline businesses but I decided (for now) to keep the income reports dedicated to my online efforts. I earn money online through a few sources and I estimate that the income from each source will fluctuate each month so I'll just explain things as I go along.

So, let's dive in!

My total revenue generated through affiliate programs for the month of November was $167.95. The affiliate income was a mix between WA affiliate sales and affiliate sales on my website, which was only launched last month.

I also made $12.50 from the WA platform from SiteComments etc. This brought my total revenue for November to $180.45.

Definitely not life changing, but it's a step in the right direction.

Expenses

I'm a finance guy.... so the thing that annoys me most about online businesses is when someone reveals their income numbers, without discussing their expenses. At the end of the day, we should always be concerned with our profit and to calculate that we need both income and expenses.

The thing I love about online business is that it can be done incredibly lean. This month I paid $15 for my email autoresponder/marketing automation platform and the only other expense is my WA membership. I was on the $49/month plan, however, I elected to jump on the Black Friday special (read why I decided to do that here) so my membership expense for this month was higher than usual - $302 to be exact.

In subsequent months, I'm not going to have a membership expense to worry about so, with the saving achieved from the Black Friday special, I should be able to increase profit margins in the future.

My total expenses came to $314 for November 2018.

Profit

Profit is simply income minus expenses, so for November, my profit is $180.45 - $314... which gives me a -$133.55.

Great... my first income report is negative... well I guess it can only get better from here ;)

To be honest, I'm not fazed at all my the negative profit for November. The reality is I've made some money from a brand new site which is just a month old. Also, if it wasn't for the switch to annual membership, I would have been in the black.

My thoughts on November...

November definitely provided some lessons for me. First, I now realize the power of Black Friday and the fact that there are so many hungry consumers willing to part with their money for something of value. Next year, I'm going to be much more prepared for Black Friday.

My goal for December is to increase my revenue by 25% while keeping my expenses low. I'm aiming for one long-form post (10,000 word ultimate guide) and 3 or 4 or piece of content of the lower word-count variety.

Overall I'm happy with November and would definitely classify the month as a (small) success that has laid the foundations for more growth over the coming months.

Well, I think that's it for my first income report. I'm sure I'll think of stuff to add to future reports but for now I just want to get started and continue to improve.

I'd be keen to know - how was your November?