It is that time of the month again when I took a look back at how this blog has progressed over the previous month. This monthly review has proved popular with regular readers, however I have found that it really helps me too, as it allows me to evaluate my own position.
As I advised last month, July 2013 was going to be a very poor month for this blog due to my circumstances. There was a temptation to not do an income report this month because of this, however I do not feel that would be fair. It is important that give a representation of this blog every month; regardless of my changing circumstances.
An Unproductive Month
At the beginning of July, I was optimistic that I would get one or two new books written. It just was not possible due to me and my girlfriend’s return trip to Scotland after several months travelling South America and four months living in Colombia.
The first week of July was spent organising my girlfriends visa for the United Kingdom. I got a little work completed in the second week, writing about five or six chapters of my upcoming book. On the whole, however, I struggled to get any work completed. The last week or so was spent saying goodbye to family and friends at dinners and nights out.
We flew to Scotland from Colombia on 23 July and touched down on 24 July. My hope was that by returning to a good desk and chair, I would get more work done in Scotland. So far, that has not happened. We have been spending time catching up with my family, but I have struggled to work productively at home during my first two weeks back.
I cannot blame anyone for this but myself. Rather than sit upstairs in silence and get work done, I have been sitting in my living room watching TV with my laptop on my lap. I do not think I should be too hard on myself about this. For close to 11 months, we did long bus 10-24 hour bus journeys and stayed in hostels and hotel rooms; and in our last four months in Colombia, we stayed with my girlfriend’s family. So we are enjoying relaxing in my house with our feet up. I am sure that those of you who have travelled extensively will relate to this.
All in all, from a business point of view, July was an unproductive month in which I got very little done. I am not too disheartened about this as it was a temporary situation. I still have a very good work ethic and I strive to work hard every day. However, life is short, and it is clear that it was important for me to relax and spend time with my family.
Traffic Statistics
Traffic was growing steadily a few months ago, however a reduction in my posting frequency saw traffic decrease. Over the last few months, traffic has been fairly consistent, hovering around the 400-500 visitors per day mark.
As you can see, traffic was lower in July than in June. The average traffic to KevinMuldoon.com during July 2013 was 430 visits per day.:
- Visits – 13,348 (-1,285)
- Unique Visits – 11,702 (-1,178)
- Pageviews – 37,148 (-4,845)
* Difference in traffic from previous month shown in brackets.
I am still trying to get the balance right between writing posts for this blog, writing for others and writing books. It is sometimes a hard thing to balance correctly. I know that books can make me good money in the long term, however I always enjoy updating this blog and connecting with readers.
Ideally, I need to reduce the time I spend administering my other websites and increase the time I spend writing.
Last month my global Alexa rank was 82,232. It currently stands at 78,925.
Readership & Social Media
Apart from sending automatic updates to my social media profiles, I do not actively update them. I do still recognise the benefit of my social media following increasing as it means more people want to follow what I do online.
The drop in RSS readers is not a major problem as the Simple Feed Stats plugin I use gives erratic figures. It is not uncommon for it to report 1,300 RSS subscribers one day and 2,000 the next. I would need to use a dedicated RSS service to get a more reliable RSS subscriber figure, however after testing different solutions earlier this year, I feel it is better for me to use my default feed.
The number of email subscribers KevinMuldoon.com has is something I want to address. Before I switched to FeedBlitz, I was getting several new subscribers ever day. In July I only had a total of 12 new subscribers.
This is something I should really make priority. One way for me to address this is to add a pop up for visitors to encourage them to subscribe. I am not a huge fan of pop ups like that, however there is no denying the fact that they are highly effective. Perhaps a pop up is a small price to pay for increasing readership.
- RSS = 1,487 Subscribers (-136 Subscribers)
- Email Newsletter = 1,838 Subscribers (+12 subscribers)
- Facebook = 286 Followers (+15 Followers)
- Twitter = 1,981 Followers (-31 Followers)
- Google+ = 458 Followers (+8 Followers)
- YouTube= 26 Subscribers (+1 Subscriber)
* RSS stats are tracked by Simple Feed Stats.
Income Details
July is by far my worst month since recording my income. My digital book sales have not quite recovered since the book went down the rankings in Amazon following a free giveaway. Digital book sales for July were slightly higher than June; however, a decrease in print book sales means that my overall revenue from books was a few dollars less than last month.
Affiliate income also dropping a little and as I did not have time to write any articles for anyone else, there was no income from freelance blogging.
My total income for KevinMuldoon.com for July 2013 was $446.07.
It was generated through:
- Freelance Blogging = $0 (-$1,382.80 )
- My Books – $225.30 (-$6.45). This includes digital and printed book sales.
- Affiliate Income = $220.77 (-$43.38)
* Difference in income from previous month show in brackets.
In total, my overall income for KevinMuldoon.com was $1,432.63 less than June. I do not feel this is anything for me to be alarmed about. It is clear that freelance blogging makes up most of my income for this blog so a large drop in earnings is expected whenever I do not write for others.
Long term, my aim is to increase my income from book sales and affiliate income.
Overview
June was a month I experienced many problems with issues such as my hosting. July was simply a month where I struggled to find time to get work. I have no doubt that August 2013 will be more productive and more profitable. My aim is to complete my next book, add some new sections to KevinMuldoon.com and complete some more writing jobs for clients. Additionally, I hope to find time to enjoy myself during my time in Scotland.
I hope you have enjoyed this month’s income report. If so, I encourage you to check out the income reports of some of my friends:
Thanks for reading. If there is anything specific you would like to know about the blog, please do not hesitate to ask in the comments section.
Kevin