September 2012 Earnings & Spending Report

Aaah… back to normal. I earned $5150 in September and it’s great to eek in just above the five thousand mark. I was a little nervous last month, especially since these SEO people seem to be getting a lot pickier with the sites they’re choosing to advertise on. But, while $5000+ still isn’t great when compared with some of my recent months, it’s heading in the right direction after August’s lower earnings.

Earnings Breakdown:

  • Adsense — $390 – Higher than normal but not due to anything I’ve done.
  • Affiliate sales — $202 – A slight improvement but still nowhere near to what I used to earn. If I were ambitious in any way and interested at all in affiliate sales, I would put more effort into tracking what’s working and what isn’t. Plus update all of the affiliate programs I’m a member of that have ceased to exist. But I am not.
  • Advertising — $4906 – Almost all of my money came from ads and guest posts. I had a couple of minor renewals but nothing too major. September saw a lot of smallish deals that added up. I’ve seen a lot of new business in the form of guest post inquiries coming my way as a direct result of my recently purchased British travel blog site. This has worked as I had hoped by bringing me some new contacts who I then pitch the rest of my sites to. This new site has been a great help this month.
  • Ebook Sales — $42 – Six sales.

Spending Breakdown:
Spending in September was very minimal, coming in at only $359. Probably a good thing after almost spending as much as I earned last month. But I have a new site to show for it and it’s working well, so no regrets there! This month didn’t see any interesting purchases… just the basics, really. I don’t anticipate much spending in October, either. I might put another push on for new articles but nothing major.

I’ve been back in Kigali for a couple of weeks now and I’m super happy to be here and loving it at the moment. I’m getting involved in some interesting projects including kLab, an IT capacity building venture, The Office, a shared office space that I’ll be moving into shortly, and I’ll be doing some volunteer web designing too which is always fun and a great way to meet interesting people doing great things in this city. I’m plugging away at my Kigali life site which is getting more and more popular and I’m hoping to get started on my tourist map of the city which is a huge project I’ve had in mind for over a year.

I’m enjoying catching up with friends and meeting new ones. I met today with Tyler, my partner for our moving to Kampala website and had a great discussion on business in Africa, living in our chosen countries, opportunity, and lots of exciting things. I’m not the most ambitious person in the world but I really do love meeting up with people who are and hearing about their plans and experiences and he’s one of those people who are really inspiring to be around.

As for earnings, the first three days of October have been ridiculous. I’ve got $2,900 in deals already agreed, most with the work already done and just awaiting payment so hopefully everything goes smoothly. I’ve also got a lot of outstanding guest post inquiries… an unusual amount, actually. Not sure what’s up with this month but the SEO companies are on the hunt for guest posts and my sites seem like a popular choice.

So October is looking good so far, the sun is shining in Kigali and life is good!

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