Best month ever! I earned $5604 this month which is a huge improvement from May last year when I made about $4000 less. May was also a month where I spent most of my time on the go, including two weeks volunteering in Haiti. I wasn’t working on new content or sites but I still had a lot of emails to answer about advertising.
Earnings Breakdown:
- Adsense – $477 - If I can keep this number close to $500 I’m happy. If I can eventually push it above $1000, I’ll be laughing.
- Affiliate sales – $1000 - I want this to be consistently at $1000 and above. My affiliate sales were spread pretty well across a variety of networks and products so that’s always encouraging.
- Advertising – $4064 - It was a month of a lot of key link renewals and some new sales and that’s what boosted me. My new agreement with some internet buddies to refer advertisers to each other also added a few sales. (Actually, I’ve got an advertiser looking for recommendations now so if you’ve got a high quality travel site or blog of PR3 or over and are happy with the deal, drop me a line).
- Ebook Sales – $63 - Nine sales.
Spending Breakdown:
This month I spent $676 which mostly focused on content for my Africa site and article outsourcing. I’ve been really happy so far with the work done on my Google Maps plugin (I outsourced this last month) and can see myself spending a lot in the future on custom programming like this.
- Content Outsourcing – $265 - I added another couple of Africa country guides and some transportation info.
- Link Building Services – $206 - These are the monthly fees for two link building sites I’m using Linkvana (14 day trial for $5 affiliate link/50 free outsourcing credits affiliate link) and Build My Rank.
- Article Outsourcing – $200 - I outsourced some articles to Linkvana.
- Ebook – $5 - Monthly cost to sell my ebook.
I’m back in Kigali and feeling recharged and ready to work which is what I was hoping would happen after a few months of feeling sluggish and uninspired. My first priority is getting my crazy bike ride website up and running. Then I want to update my Kigali life site as it’s been pretty neglected and I think it has a lot of potential. Then, as always, I’m plugging away at building content for my independent travel in Africa site. This is a slow process and I think I just need to sit down and get it done. The problem is that I have to finish the bike site first, so more delays.
I’m obviously pretty motivated by having my best month ever. For a moment I thought I was going to clear six grand for the first time but a deal didn’t end up going through. I’ve found lately that advertisers are bargaining a bit harder than they once did. I’m not sure if this will mean an overall trend leading to lower prices as more and more websites jump on the bandwagon or what. It’s meant having to say no to a few deals that just weren’t paying enough per site, but I’m ok with that.
I have a bad feeling about June due to not having many link renewals lined up but maybe it’ll surprise me!
Awesome!!! Just think what you might be doing in May 2012. I so happy for you.
Congrats, that’s awesome, thanks for your response to my question a couple of posts back about advertising. You do a great job of not making it feel like your site even has ads. The first time you mentioned it on your blog I was like, where are they?
Kirsty it sounds like good karma is coming back your way. That’s a great month, especially considering you were on the go. It is amazing how much you continue to make through advertising deals. I think your plan to refer advertisers to friends back and forth is a great idea. As for a potential drop in June earnings, that does happen all the time with online income. Just use it as motivation to do even better the next month.
wow , nice income . really great
Kristy, How many sites do you have that makes money off private advertising? Thank you for your time.
Jeff
Kirsty this is stunning! You’re a huge inspiration. I dread this post every month – for the next week, I’ll be hobbling and my shins and calves will blacken up where I’ve kicked myself for not beginning my own media empire sooner. It’s difficult to know which market to enter and easy to dither.
I wonder – how many of you commenters are doing similar things? Are there any of you like me who continuously consider it, but end up spectating through procrastination?
Or am I alone?
Thanks or posting, I always look forward to your monthly earnings updates. Time to give some info back:
I made a change to three of my small websites early last month: ditched the Adsense 468×60 banners mid page and medium rectangle (had text wrap around) at top of page, instead I placed a large rectangle at top of page directly below the h1 with the main text below it, rather than wrapped around. No other Google ads on pages.
April earnings were – £279
May earnings – £492
Visitors numbers have remained roughly the same. No drop in the performance of other non-Google ads/affs. Total number of pages accross my 3 sites is 160.
Just thought you might like to know.
Thanks for the update, this is very useful, as usual. I’m still surprised how much you make on advertising, but I guess that is the biggest way people make money on blogs.
I recently installed OIOPublisher to manage my ads and it has been a huge help in automating the advertiser sign up process. I only got one advertiser so far on my other blog, but working on getting more.
Wow that is really some great earnings. Goes to show how much someone can make when putting in some real effort. People should take note how diversified you are as well. You do not have all of your eggs in one basket. Congrats!
Kirsty, every month you continue to amaze me with your earnings report! I think my earnings for June are going to be lower since I am studying for the GMAT exam and will not be devoting as much time to my online ventures. Here’s to hoping that both our earnings are higher!
-Jean
Hey Kirsty,
I always in enjoy your break down for your earnings however I am curious to know if this is from a combination of all 20 of your web properties of just from nerdynomad?
Thanks
-Tony
Thanks everyone for the encouragement!
@laptop I’m juggling a couple of big deals already for June so we’ll see how they go. Could work out well.
@jeff I have about 11 sites I sell ads on but four of those are small ones without much interest yet.
@nigel Thanks! Now if I could only motivate you to get started… True, it’s hard work now but the payoff later was way too good for me to ignore so I put my head down and just worked. Lucky for me, I actually love the work.
@daniel Thanks for those tips. I always have my text wrapped around the Google ads… doesn’t it look strange otherwise?
@hugh, Thanks for the suggestion, I’ll check it out.
Congrats on a big month!
May 2011 was my best month on record as well, officially clearing $5,000 for the first time.
It was also probably my highest month in terms of expenses too — I got carried away with outsourcing content and SEO, plus paid a deposit on Go Backpacking’s new theme. That’s in addition to the regular mailing list and hosting fees. I’m going to try and tone it down in June.
Great job for the Month of April, if I could only get to a quarter of that amount I would be happy. I hope you don’t mind, I know you give an overview but to someone new to blogging not technology tell me how you do it?
Like a lot of people I guess, your monthly earnings & spending reports are a true inspiration for me.
I am always pumped up after seeing how well you are doing : thanks
!
Congrats to your amazing job.
Hey Kirsty,
Minutes ago I was reading a few old posts of yours.
I thought I would remind you that in your post “Gimmie $ Gimme $ Gimmie” written in Oct 20 2007, you were saying “Talk to me when I’m raking in $5000 a month though and if I’m not dancing jigs in streets all around the world then someone track me down and give me a massive kick in the arse!”.
So my question is :
!
Are you dancing the jigs ? and if you are can we have a little proof of it
Hey Kirsty thats a pretty impressive breakdown right there. I have really been targetting adsense and affiliate markting this month, although im not having a great deal of luck. I find it hard just to get that constant source of traffic to my website thats my biggest downfall but I will keep trying, reading posts like these motivate me. Do you have any advice in regards to facebook advertising and how useful it is? Anyway thanks.
@dave Nice job! I love it when you do well because it makes me push myself a little bit harder. I’d be curious to know what your expenses were and what sorts of things you spent them on if you don’t mind sharing that stuff in an email.
@david Thanks. How do I do what, exactly? That’s a tough question to answer. I’d say troll through my blog and come at me with some more specific questions and I’ll do my best to help out.
@fab Haha, nice find. I forgot about that! Well I’m not dancing in the streets but I am pretty happy with myself. The thing about me is that I’m not really all that into money… but the freedom and sense of security that comes with it is pretty amazing. So I guess that while I’m grateful to be making a good amount each month, I don’t really notice so much because I don’t buy anything… except flights! I’ll dance a little jig next time I head out.
@dentist My advice is always to stick with it for longer than you think you’ll need to. Or just make sites, do some SEO and then forget about them completely and go onto the next project while the early sites ‘age’. As for FB… I’m a total stranger to everything on FB except having my own personal page. I just started a fan page thing (I think that’s what it is) for my Kigali website but other than that, I’m sorry, I have no advice to give.
I am gobsmacked. I haven’t been by your site in awhile and each time I see one of these posts, I am in complete awe. We are patiently waiting for google to update it’s PR rank, and then hoping that our tides will start turning!
I just stopped back to look and I agree with Fab you should be dancing a few jigs.
It’s my first time here and although i’ve been blogging for quite some time now, I am thinking of focusing on my travel blog and monetizing it will surely bring me to places. I am still not so sure on how the affiliate marketing really works. Is it mostly on hotel booking websites? Maybe you can also refer me to your contacts on link advertising hehe
I’m also browsing through your Philippines entries. Hope you come back soon
Sweet month Kirsty, many congrats.
I guess when you make most of your money selling adspace privately things can go up and down a bit, but hopefully June wont see too much of a dip.
All the best, your blog continues to inspire me
Hi Kirsty,
Good work, rising incomes are a good carrot and stimulates better work on your 11 websites and proof that you are a good articles writer and have a done the SEO work right on the sides.
Your earning is truly sweet. Like you, if I have the chance to have this great earnings, I will likely to spend on travelling and do some volunteer jobs. You are truly talented writer and touching lives.
wow.. it is really super.. i want to tell my earning in Turkey web sites…,
adsense 900 usd
affiliates 150 usd
article writing 100 usd
is there anyone help me to increase my earning about adwirtisiment?
Impressive! Any advice on good guides for working with advertisers?