Monthly Update (Month 4)
By Bryan Clark on Oct 28, 2007 in Uncategorized
I’ve missed a few goals this month but a few other big things have happened for me as well. It’s been a whirlwind of activity, but this month I am going to focus, and make November my best month yet as a blogger. Watch me go…
Highlights
- I’m now a writer at Entrepreneurs-Journey.Com - Check me out in the blogging and business news section!
- I have a PageRank!
- I’ve set a new record for monthly traffic (although I still feel it should have been higher).
Goal Check
- $550 in income - Achieved!
Smooth sailing!
- Break the top 10k in Technorati - Technorati Ranking: 12,894
For the second month in a row I’ve missed this target. It’s pretty tough!
- Alexa Ranking of 40k - Achieved!
Alexa Ranking - 40,588
- 40k Pageviews
Just missed it. Next month it’s gonna happen!
Readers
My traffic was less consistent this month, but I had a few huge spikes that really drove it home. My biggest traffic spikes came from huge StumbleUpon traffic via my articles - 101 Wordpress Plugins, and What Everyone Ought to Know About StumbleUpon, and 51 Great Places to Find Wordpress Themes. Keep em commin’ StumbleUpon!
Pageloads - 33,410
Unique Visitors - 19,794
Sweet Revenue
Paid Posts - $144.55
Advertising - $105
Adsense - $7.84
Pixel Page - $240
Affiliate Revenue - $173.33
Total - $670.72
Income is still improving, although I’m disappointed it wasn’t a bit higher. I have some new monetization methods in place, and last month I had all but abandoned monetization methods about half-way through the month. I didn’t have the space to utilize them effectively (my sidebar looked terrible with all of the ads), so I thought I’d wait for the new theme. New theme is here, time for results! It’s not like the theme cost me money, just a personal choice to wait on the new theme before I dove head first into monetization.
Popularity: 4% [?]
11 Comment(s)
By Michael on Oct 28, 2007 | Reply
Looks like everything is going well with your web income. It is disappointing that revenue dropped but that is to be expected when dealing with income that isn’t always consistent.
By simon on Oct 29, 2007 | Reply
This month been tough for me too, not seen as much money as i wish too( but do we ever) , but on positive notes you had improvements thoughout the board which is always promising, just keep do what your doing and the money will follow.
By Jason on Oct 29, 2007 | Reply
Great work on this blog of yours, Bryan.
Even if you didn’t reach your income goals, you’re still one of those rare bloggers who burst into the spotlight. Great job on your traffic and everything.
By Ben on Oct 29, 2007 | Reply
Sorry about not meeting all of your goals, but I’m sure that you will make and exceed these next month. Making $500 a month is an ambitious goal in a new blog but you still nearly made it.
Keep up the good work!
By Kirsty on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
Good luck for next month but I think you need to be careful about counting on paid posts for too much of your revenue. They don’t (usually) add value to a site in my opinion unless the product being reviewed is of interest to the reader. I guess if you’re careful with what you choose to review it could go well. I’ve stopped reading John Chow altogether now because of his paid posting frenzy.
By Bryan on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
Kirsty - Your point is well understood. Whenever I do a paid post from PPP I usually put up another post right after it. This leaves the reader the option to skip it altogether. Paid posts are a good revenue generator, I’ll take as many as I can get. And readers… just skip over them if you’d like! I try to make this as user friendly as possible, but I still have to strive to achieve my goal…
By Ruchir on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
Hey Bryan, your traffic stats for StumbleUpon are just so awesome! How do you manage to attract so many SU visitors? Whats the secrets
By Bryan on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
Ruchir - StumbleUpon accounts for a lot of my traffic, but I’m beginning to see more and more organic traffic. I’m ranked highly for a few popular keywords or phrases, and on certain days it sends a lot of traffic.
The secret to StumbleUpon? Write good stuff!
By Michael on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
I assume with the new design your money earned will increase. Or atleast change. I will be making sure to check on my new design how my ads earn. Once I add them that is.
By nick on Oct 31, 2007 | Reply
I think Stumble Upon traffic is trash. I mean, what good is a visitor if they don’t come back? Stumble Upon adds awareness, but I personally value my returning visitors stats more than anything. Those are the ones that count to me because it means that I reached my audience. Uniques are nice, but I only use that as a way to judge how well my campaigns have worked. But I have no use for someone that clicks through to my site onetime and then never again. Like the Stumblers can really skew your stats, but with my stats software I can see the activitiy of each reader and for a while I was pushing on stumble upon big time, but a lot of that traffic was under 20 seconds. I don’t need them, or particularily want them, so i’ve placed my efforts elsewhere.
By nick on Oct 31, 2007 | Reply
I agree about pay per post, your whole thing is about making money I think you are fine. How is else is someone going to make an income without grinding for them dollars however you can?