Blog Traffic and Income report for December 2017

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Recently I decided to do something different with my monthly goals post and my income and blog traffic reports. I was feeling like these two posts each month were feeling pretty stale and I wasn’t excited to write them as much. At the same time, I love setting monthly goals and find it helpful to share my reports and goals each month.

It was just time to shake things up and make these posts more fun and interesting to write so that they are more enjoyable for you to read. I can’t believe that we are now in December and 2017 is almost finished.

Blogging has been such a positive experience for me. Even after doing it for years I still enjoy it and love the lessons I’ve learned from it and the people I’ve met. It’s also so amazing to be able to earn some extra money doing something I enjoy while at home. If you are looking to begin Making Money blogging here is what helped me have a major breakthrough and begin earning money with my blog and I know it can help you too. 

 

Why do I share these monthly reports? I have a few reasons

• I have loved reading other bloggers reports and still do. I learn so much from them and hope to offer the same to other bloggers. I enjoy reading reports from bloggers bigger and smaller than me. I have learned a lot from bigger and smaller blogs.
• It holds me accountable to my blog and continuing to grow my business. Even on months where my growth is smaller I still feel accountable to share
• I also want to show that even as a long time blogger I am just starting to learn to grow my income. This way I can share this journey of blog growth and my making money from the early stages. 

 

December’s Income:

 December was another pretty good month for my blog income. I made a little less than I had in November but it was one of my top months with my blogging income. A lot of my income comes from ads. I have my ads through Mediavine. To be accepted to Mediavine you need to be getting 30 thousand sessions/page views a month I believe. Before I reached that number I was using Google Adsense. If you have the traffic I recommend applying to Mediavine I’ve had no problems with them so far. 

 

If you are a blogger I would love for you to check out my new e-book Boost your Pinterest Presence.  In this book, I walk you through how to use Pinterest to grow your blog and create pins that get shared. 

December’s Income

Mediavine: $410

Sponsored posts: $100

affiliate income: $217

Boost your Pinterest Presence: $0

Total income: $727

Expenses:

Convertkit $29 

Ivory mix: $10- this is the best price I’ve found for good photos. I use these images in blog posts, landing and sales pages, social media and more)

SmarterQueue $20

Blogger’s Guide to Membership Site -$20- This is a great membership site. I’m a big fan of Terra from Uncork your Dork so when she put together a membership site with all her challenges and pieces of training I knew I wanted to check it out. I’ve done a few of the pieces of training in the membership site and next I want to go through the SEO training. There is so much valuable information in this membership that the monthly cost is worth it because I need to keep learning to grow my traffic and income.

$0 Tailwind  I pay for this annually. Tailwind is the scheduler I use when I do all my pinning on Pinterest. It’s my favorite scheduler I use for myself and cover a lot of why I love it and how to use it in my ebook.

Total Expenses: $79

 

Looking back:

Now that I’ve been doing income reports for more than a year! Which is crazy it feels like I just started sharing them I want to see how I’m growing. 

December 2016-$565

My Blog Traffic in December

My blog traffic was down in December. I also took a week and a half off for the holiday and to go out of town. This is part of the reason that my traffic may have been lower. I still had things scheduled in Tailwind to pin but I didn’t do much else to promote posts or create anything new during that time. 

What worked for my blog in December

1.  Making a plan for 2018. I’m so excited for projects I have planned for this year. This year is going to be a lot of work but I’m ready for the challenge.  

2.  I spent time working more on Instagram. I would love for you to follow me on my Instagram account.  It’s a platform I really enjoy and I think I will meet new followers and grow my community there. I also did a couple Instagram Stories which I wanted to try. Still, a lot to learn there about making them work. 

3. 

What didn’t work for my blog in December

planning going out of town: I  usually work when I go out of town and during the holidays but this year I decided to step back from the blog which was good for me to do but I didn’t set up enough to do automatically and my traffic took a hit. I’m planning to take more time off in 2018 so I will be learning and trying new ways to keep my blog running smoothly without being constantly working. 

updating images and sales pages: I was busy with my challenge and this just didn’t get worked on in December. I’m going to save it till the New year because December was a busy month

Here are my top blog goals and priorities for January 2018:

• Finish putting together and launch a decluttering product that I know will really help my readers.  
• to work on my blogging education more. I have lots of courses and ebooks to work through. It’s just a matter of spending time on them. I’ve put myself on a freeze of buying more courses until I make it through more of what I already have. 
• My 20 Days of less challenge is really awesome and I’ve heard good responses to it. I also have had people say that it’s too long so I’m going to put out a mini 3 or 5-day version. 

To help you grow your own blogs and start making your own income I wanted to include some resources. The best way to grow your blog is to be constantly willing to learn through reading and growing your knowledge.

Amazing Books on blogging that will help you take your blog to the next level:

• Building A Framework ( check out more about this here.)
• Blog, Inc.
• How To Blog For Profit Without Selling Your Soul
• #GirlBoss
• You are a Badass 

Other posts you might like:

• How to Make Money Blogging 
• More Ways to make money Blogging
• Should you do posts for free
• How I finally started making money blogging

Grab a copy of my new book to help you learn Pinterest to grow your blog traffic. This book will help you finally understand Pinterest and start growing your blog on this amazing platform!