How I Made $4,212 as a Full-Time Blogger Last Month

Welcome to my July blog income report where I share my earnings, expenses and current projects as a full-time blogger here at Let’s Reach Success.

I spent most of my working hours last month updating and publishing content on the blog, doing email marketing, completing my new course $1K Blogger, updating my signature program Financial Freedom Through Blogging, and learning more about branding as well as creating a vision for the new direction of my blogging business.

Let’s start with the blog revenue for last month and traffic and email list growth. Here are the numbers:

Blog Income Report

I earned a total of $4,212 in July 2020 from my blogging business.

Please keep in mind that’s gross income. A lot of it goes for fees I pay to other platforms, transaction fees, paying my own taxes (close to 30% of my income), insurance and pension. You can see all income reports here.

Proof of Income

Here are some screenshots showing some of the revenue:

Course sales

Affiliate income from Teachable

ShareaSale affiliate earnings

Earnings from each income stream:

Sponsorships

Blogging Expenses

WPX Hosting – $0 (paid yearly)
Teachable – $0 (paid yearly)
ConvertKit – $0 (paid yearly)
ProveSource – $207 (paid yearly)
Accountant – €181,50 (paid quarterly)
Mobile Plan – €27
Health Insurance – €118,50
Transaction fees – $94

Blog Traffic

Pageviews: 67,127
Sessions: 56,742
Users: 49,781

Email Subscribers Update

New Subscribers: 437
Cancellations: 75
Net new subscribers: 362

The report you see is from ConvertKit – the email marketing tool I use and recommend.

Blog Updates

Course Updates

Let’s start with the product updates as that’s the biggest project I’m working on right now.

All lectures for the first 5 modules of Financial Freedom Through Blogging have been updated, recorded and published. I’m now working on Module 6.

The Bonus section isn’t at the end of the course anymore but each bonus (checklist, cheat sheet, guide, workbook, or else) is added to the module it belongs to for easier navigation.

The last section of the course is now called ‘What’s Next?’ and includes a certificate of completion (it was fun to design it and add it to the course), a survey (to gather feedback and allow students to get featured somewhere on my platforms with a testimonial), information for affiliates and promo materials, and one last bonus (blog coaching).

This feels like the perfect way to end the course and the experience it provides, give a little something (certificate), hear from students (feedback), give them a new way to earn money (by being affiliates of the course), and chat more about where their blogging biz is headed (through blog coaching).

At the same time, I’m releasing lessons for my new course $1K Blogger, which is still not completed (but is available for students with an early bird price).

I plan to have it completed in a few weeks as I’ve already arranged a partnership (to be a contributor for a bundle and add this course to it).

I’m organizing content, preparing presentations and visuals, recording lectures and making new PDFs and bonuses for both courses almost every day. Digital product creation is definitely a time-consuming project, but I enjoy it.

Branding

One weekend I took a quick branding course (by personal branding and growth strategist Brittany Krystle whom I’m a big fan of now). She’s worked for people like Gary Vee and has an amazing podcast you might want to check out – Beyond Influential.

This course was part of a bundle I purchased some time ago, and there are more on the topic of branding in it, so I can’t wait to go through them too.

Working on my online presence has been on my list of tasks for a long time now and I knew there was a lot I was missing out on.

I learned more about personal branding, finding clarity and positioning yourself online in the way you want to be seen by your ideal student.

Thanks to a workbook that goes together with the course, I narrowed down what success means in my business now, how my personal brand currently looks like and where I see it in 6 months, a year and 3 years.

I did some searches and saw plenty of things appearing about me online which aren’t relevant anymore (such as profiles in freelance websites and my books on personal development).

These 2 are things I don’t want to be associated with as now I’m a full-time blogger (although being a freelancer first will forever be part of my brand story) and course creator. All my content on the blog, in the emails and in my courses is for those who want to earn an income on the side, be financially free and start a business to provide value and live their best life.

I narrowed down my ideal audience and I want to create content only for that person. It’s the one who is looking for a way to make money online, is willing to follow steps and invest in a program to help them get there, willing to give a side hustle like blogging a try so they can start earning an income from their laptop and turn it into a business.

Usually, they don’t know where to start, how to make money online, or how a blog can be turned into a business. They think they need capital, experience, or that they don’t have time.

They are currently frustrated, desperate to find a quick solution to their problem (wanting to quit their job and work for themselves), eager to see quick results. And that’s where I can help with the free and paid content I create on those topics.

So I updated my bios on different channels, added new photos too (you can see them on the About Me page) and am planning to make more professional ones soon and put myself out there more.

It was fun to see what comes first in the search results for my name and the blog name. It’s what should be there, but still some things need to be removed and others need more of my attention. For example, I realized I will probably never write a guest post for another site again, but I enjoy doing interviews (I did a few recently and am currently waiting on 2 to be published).

These help spread my message and people hear about my story, which is the most genuine way to build a brand and let other audiences know what I’m all about.

Just like I feature bloggers and extraordinary people on my blog all the time and know how inspiring this content is, so should I pitch other sites more often to feature me (instead of waiting for them to find and email me, like it was till now).

All these are examples of what you too can be doing to grow your personal brand. There’s a lot more that goes into it, of course, but this is a good start.

Work With Me Page

I created a Work With Me Page, which is now one of my most important pages on the site. I removed ’Courses’ from the menu and added this one instead. Even added a bit of html code to make it stand out next to the other menu tabs.

There I share the possible ways people can collaborate with me, which is through my courses, interviews, and affiliate program.

New Content

Here’s some of best the content published (or republished) on Let’s Reach Success last month.

Start with the 2 previous blog income reports:

I published 2 fantastic interviews.

Krista was first a blog coach and Pinterest Manager. In 2016 she launched her first course and since then, 12 more. Some of her launches have earned her 5 figures in revenue.

This year, she pivoted her business to focus solely on teaching other entrepreneurs how to create and sell online courses, and she’s never felt happier or more fulfilled!

In the interview, she shares:

about the first online program she created and how it went
how her online sales strategies are different from those of other entrepreneurs
how she had a 5-figure launch without even a sales page ?
how much she’s earning now and in what ways
what most people get wrong about email marketing
the first steps to creating a high-converting email sales funnel

and more.

Read the whole interview here.

The next interview is with Dafina Sharpe.

She once had a 6-figure worth of non-mortgage debt (credit card and medical bills mostly), has a genetic blood disorder due to which she was hospitalized at least once a year, and experienced the wealth gap in the US firsthand.

Instead of bringing her down, all this showed her how important it is to prioritize her health and get her finances in order.

So she set onto a journey to financial freedom which led to paying off her debt, saving $300K in 4 years, buying her first home, starting her own law firm, and now having the chance to be a personal finance coach and help women struggling financially.

Read Dafina’s interview here.

My Plan for Next Month

In August, I’ll keep updating Financial Freedom Through Blogging and publishing more modules for $1K Blogger.

I’ll pitch website owners for interviews.

I’ll do some personal branding work based on what I learned in the course. That will include removing accounts on websites I don’t want to be associated with, updating my bio and photos to resonate with the new direction I’m headed, and making more changes to the About Me page.

I’ll keep going through the email marketing course I’m taking, The Hot List, and taking notes and action after each lesson.

New to Blogging? Check Out These Resources

Start a Blog

What is a Blog and How Does Blogging Work?
How to Start a Blog That Makes $1000/Month: A Beginner’s Guide
How Much Does It Cost to Build a Blog (+ My Blogging Expenses)

Grow Your Blog

8 Ways to Boost Your Blog Traffic
How I Got 103, 231 Page Views and Made $4,305 from My Blog in 1 Month
Pinterest Traffic Avalanche: A Solution for Beginner Bloggers to Drive 10,000 – 100,000+ FREE Monthly Visitors to Your Blog – on Autopilot!

Make More Money Blogging

How to Make Money Blogging
How Many Page Views Do You Need to Make Money Blogging?
How to Make $50,000/Year Blogging from Home
Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing (The Ultimate Affiliate Marketing Course for Beginners, Created by Michelle from Making Sense of Cents Who Earns $100K/Month Blogging)

How I Made $4,212 as a Full-Time Blogger Last Month