Bye-bye 2018 – Welcome 2019!
So, finally, 2018 is gone. Now comes a new and more awesome year filled with many targets, future goals, and happiness. I believe you too experienced how fast 2018 went off. And I equally expect 2019 to be faster than that!
Anyways, this post is about my income. Today I want to talk about what did I accomplished in 2018 and the progress I made both financially and mentally. If you are new here, have a look at my previous income report here.
Here comes another monthly blogging income report, and this is about how much I made in December 2018.
You can check the latest income report here.
Without further ado, lets hit the numbers
Traffic
In December BforBloggers got over 2500 new visitors and 2900+ sessions. Overall page views were 3800+ and the bounce rate was near 79%. That’s pretty well because if you look at my previous income report you’ll see we almost doubled our pageviews.
My goal is to get 10K monthly visitors by the end of this year.
I also notice how the average session duration increased from last time. I started to focus on content quality and SEO more than anything else.
82% of my traffic came from search engines and 9% of the traffic is direct traffic. 4% of traffic is a referral that can from content websites like Zest.is.
Close to 8% of my visitors came back, which is quite lower than 10% from the previous time.
Overall, traffic increased, but what is its effect on our overall earnings?
Income
Here’s a screenshot from my PayPal account:
In December I received all of the affiliate earnings, the monthly as well as the quarterly earnings. Here’s a breakdown:
Advanced Ads: $65
Affiliate earnings: $2130
Siteground: $100
Cleantalk: $77
Convertkit: $32
Buffer:$10
Total income: $2414 (about 1,70,000 INR)
Expenses
Nestify: $7.99
Gadgets: $1200
Hiring web designer: $250
Total Expenses: $1457.99 (about 1 lakh rupees)
Gadget Upgrade
After talking to a few blogger friends I decided to upgrade my system to blog more efficiently.
I upgraded to Mac. I was going to go iMac first but then my like for Laptops got in between. I bought a 13inch MacBook Pro.
Its fast, beautiful and very practical. I can now get every work done faster. Mac is more stable than Windows because Apple handles both hardware and software on its own making the configuration highly stable and keeps it more compatible with future updates too.
I would recommend you to get a Mac if you want to shift to professional blogging, it will be an ideal investment you will appreciate later. I mean I invested 70% of my money building the right setup.
I also upgraded my blog plugins, here’s everything that has been changed:
- Stopped using W3Total Cache, Started using WP Rocket
- Started using Yoast Premium
- Started using Thrive Leads & optinmonster
- Started using the Genesis framework
I also bought a few subscription-based tools and SaaS which include:
Using Crowdfire has been a pleasure. It is smart, easy to use and powerful as well. I was really surprised by looking at the integration and automation options inside the tool. If you are active on Pinterest or Instagram, take a look at Crowdfire.
I flew to Mumbai in August with my family, we had lots of fun and enjoyed every day of our trip. I love spending time on the beach, it is refreshing and you feel rejuvenated.
I also read crushing it! – And I immediately understood it’s not for me. To me, motivation doesn’t exist. Stories don’t help me so Gray Vee’s ideas are totally obsolete for me. If you’re beginning your entrepreneurial journey, consider reading more practical books such as Good to Better, Hardvard Business Review books, Seth Godin book series, Propaganda, and so on.
Refrain from reading motivation books, until you understand the market and the “influence” game.
I also learned how to handle money, using PayPal. When I received about $2200 at a time, PayPal deducted double digits as a transaction fee. I wish more brands start paying via wire transfer (it costs half of what PayPal charges) in larger transaction amounts.
So, that’s it. This was the BforBloggers income report. Let me know your income as well in the comments.
I enjoyed reading your income report, and I can especially relate to your efforts to guide readers on a journey through your content. I’m trying to do the same thing with my blog so I definitely agree that this is the way to go.
Meredith, Thats’s good to know.
Seeing your progress through is super motivating Aayush Bhaskar. Personally, though still in my third month, I’m still struggling with the niche thing. But, I’ll fix it before the month ends.
You’re a great example of a stick-to-it-ive person. Blogging is a profitable business model, even though success only comes to though who make it inevitable. You’ve uplifted my year’s resolution. Stay blessed!
Thank you James, god bless.