September 2016 Traffic and Income Report

This couple blogs full time, and they share an income report each month that shows exactly what they make and how they make it! It's fascinating!
May 2015 Income Report | JustAGirlAndHerBlog.com

It’s income report time again! I just did a count, and I think this is our 32nd income report on this little blog of ours– that’s crazy to me! We had no idea when we first started them that Just a Girl and Her Blog would end up growing the way it has, and it’s fun to be able to look back at the past reports and see how things have changed.

So why income reports on a home decor site? Our hope is that by sharing what we make and how we make it that we will encourage other bloggers and online business owners that it can be done. I started this blog with no intention of becoming an entrepreneur. I was a stay at home mom who needed a project, and this was it. But then I became a bit obsessed, dragged my husband into it, we worked harder than we had ever worked at anything before, and here we are. Full time bloggers. Pinch me.

This is the kind of stuff I used to dream of. I used to think to myself, “If only I could find a way to support our family so Donnie could do something he loved rather than work at a corporate job that he feels ‘meh’ about…” And then we did. It seemed like a crazy dream at the time, but now it’s reality.

And I know I’m not the only one with crazy dreams like this.

There’s not anything particularly special about us. We didn’t study this stuff in school. We don’t have degrees in business or marketing. So let yourself dream, work as hard as you possibly can, learn and get better every day, and see what happens. It could be something incredible!

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On to the numbers! Here’s Donnie:

Donnie

September 2016 Blog Income

This post contains affiliate links. For more information, see my disclosures here.

We’ve been publishing monthly income reports since February of 2014. You can click here to see a running tally of past income reports. As you read this report, it’s important to remember that this income didn’t happen overnight. It’s been a long process and a lot of work! Our blog income our first year was very minimal, and we didn’t publish the first income report until we had been blogging for a little over a year. Abby blogged for many months before we earned our first dollar.

We strive to make these reports as accurate as possible, but our business accounting does not match these numbers exactly. These reports count income which was earned during the month, but not necessarily paid out to us within that month. With many affiliate programs there is sometimes a significant delay between earning a commission and actual payment to us. We hope you find the reports helpful!

Note: You may notice that we’re reporting our affiliate income as a total number rather than by line item this month. We decided to make this change in order to preserve the privacy of companies, brands, and individuals that we partner with who may not be completely comfortable with sharing exact numbers. You can still see a list of our affiliate partnerships beneath the total affiliate earnings number.

Total Income: $33,659

Expenses

  • Affiliate Payouts – $1,442
  • Paid Advertising – $1,353
  • Assistant – $1,097
  • ConvertKit – $559 –> Why We Switched from MailChimp to ConvertKit, The Best Email Marketing Services
  • Accounting / Legal – $500
  • Travel – $421
  • Stripe Transaction Fees – $228
  • Gumroad Transaction Fees – $200
  • PayPal Transaction Fees – $143
  • Training / Coaching – $97
  • Instapage – $69
  • Synthesis Hosting – $67
  • Adobe Creative Cloud – $53
  • Crowdcast.io – $49
  • Zapier – $49
  • Meet Edgar – $49
  • Flywheel Hosting – $40
  • Typeform – $35
  • Wistia – $25
  • SendOwl – $24
  • CloudFlare – $20
  • Board Booster – $20
  • Google Apps – $15
  • BackBlaze – $10
  • Motion Mail Timer – $10
  • Backupify – $3
  • Fizzle.co – $0 (usually $35)
Total Expenses: $6,418

September 2016 Net Profit: $27,241

just-a-girl-september-income

just-a-girl-september-traffic
just-a-girl-september-email-subscribers
just-a-girl-september-rpm

RPM is a metric to track revenue per thousand pageviews. This is a measure of the overall effectiveness of a blog and is a handy benchmark for comparing blogs even if they have vastly different traffic numbers.

New Posts from Just a Girl and Her Blog


Abby

So that was September! It was a bit of a crazy month personally because we moved into a new house and our kiddos started back to school, but what I love about blogging is that you can have systems in place that automate some of the most important tasks. So even when I can’t be at my computer as much as I normally am, things can still be going on behind the scenes to keep this little blog rolling, and that is a beautiful thing!

You can see our other income reports here:

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Thank you so much for following along with our crazy journey! I hope you have a wonderful week!

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This post contains affiliate links. For more information, see my disclosures here.

13 Comments

  1. suzi whitford | startamomblog.com says:

    Abby + Donnie, thank you so much for the income report update! I just started publishing mine and the feedback is great. It’s scary being so open, but as bloggers, we learn so much from each other when we are transparent with what works and what doesn’t.

    Is there a reason you’re not breaking down the affiliate income? I assume it’s just because you moved to a new house and life is a bit busy 🙂 Also, I look forward to seeing what happens with the increase in price with your course!

    I am currently running my course for $47 but many people have mentioned to push it up. I’d love to see what you learn from the increase in your price and look forward to your report next month!

    A huge congrats on your new home! Enjoy that ‘new house’ smell! 🙂

    1. Donnie Lawson says:

      As we’ve done more and more JV webinars we’ve realized that sometimes these partners may not want the financial details of the event public. So it’s mainly to protect the privacy of these relationships. Also, I’ve been negotiating commissions with several of our affiliate relationships and I don’t want them to know exactly what I’m earning from other programs. I know it’s less transparency but we felt like it was something we needed to do.

      Obviously there are no issues at all posting the exact breakdown from our own product sales!

  2. suzi whitford | startamomblog.com says:

    Ah, I completely understand Donnie! Thank you for giving such a great explanation!

  3. Sahvana Stapleton says:

    Hi Abby!
    I remember coming across your blog back in January (2016), and was inspired by your encouraging words, and income reports. I quickly purchased BAF, and got started. My goal is to also do something that allows my husband to quit his job where he travels A LOT, so he can be home to watch our kids grow up. I need a product… so I can see Book Boss is in my future. Lol. I have a few ideas, but don’t know where to start.

  4. Kecia | OnlineIncomeMom says:

    This is my favorite post to read from you guys each month! I am actually working through Book Boss right now to launch my first ebook.

    Did you decide to do away with ads? I noticed it’s not on your graph for August or September.

    1. Donnie Lawson says:

      We did! I’ll be talking more about this in the next income report.

  5. Katie Harp says:

    Congrats on an amazing month! Just letting you know I featured your blog on an income report roundup I did recently. 🙂

    1. justagirlabby says:

      Aw, thanks so much, Katie! I’ll have to check it out. Have a fabulous week!

      ~Abby =)

  6. Thank you for posting this info, Abby and Donnie. My husband and I have been reading your blog for several months already. We have just started our own blog in DIY, and your posts are so motivating. We are reading your BAF eBook now and learning tons of great information. Thank you very-very much! Congratulations on your new house! It is beautiful! :)))))))))))

    1. justagirlabby says:

      You are too sweet, Nadia! Thank you! So glad our posts and Building a Framework have been so helpful to you. LOVE to hear that! Have a wonderful week and happy blogging!

      ~Abby =)

  7. Karim | Grow.cheap says:

    Hello,
    Thanks for the amazing post. I’m so inspired by such posts from you guys. One thing: In the affiliate income, I’m wondering if you can link to the associated posts instead of linking to the affiliate URL. For example SiteGround, you may link it to the post you wrote about site ground review instead of linking it to the SG affiliate link.

    I’m saying this because I think this post is some sort of educational to other bloggers. Thus, they may be interested in getting more insights about what you did to earn this affiliate income.

    Thanks again for the inspiration dose.
    All the best..

  8. The Broke Dad says:

    Your mission has been accomplished, I am offiically encouraged by this post. My mind is blown to be honest. I can’t even fathom ever seeing numbers like you guys are seeing in just a few years. Amazing. My hat is off to you. I mean I have only been doing this a few months so I am just a newborn in the blogging world. I am still trying to figure out how to get my listbuilder to work let alone write my own book. I had 39 views the other day and I felt like I was on top of the world, lol, kind of feel silly now considering you see that many viewers in minutes if not seconds. Crazy to me but so very inspiring.
    Well I thank you for being so open with something most people would consider very private information. Seeing it has given me a very new perspective on how things can be if you really set your mind to it. Congrats to your success and thank you so much for sharing your ideas with the rest of us.
    The Broke Dad

    1. justagirlabby says:

      Thank you so much! I’m so glad it was helpful for you. And you should definitely be excited about your 39 views in a day… I was so doing a happy dance at that point! I honestly never thought anyone would read my blog and certainly never imagined it would become what it has in just a few years. Keep learning, keep posting, work crazy hard, and enjoy your blogging adventure! I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

      ~Abby =)

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