While I may not be in the same league as Yaro, or Burt, I’m happy for every penny I get. After all, money for little/no work is not something to be sniffed at!

So why is this the best ever month? Because for the first time ever I’ve broken (or will break) the $100 barrier. Earnings over the last couple of months have taken a bit of an upturn compared to previous. The main reason for this is a steady uptake of links sold on TLA. While I’ve yet to sell any links through their feedvertising system, I have sold out my allocation of links a few times in the last couple of months. Two more links and I’ll be sold out again!

The other big earner I’ve got this month, is the money I earned for my Review Me review. While I don’t anticipate a flurry of paid-for reviews, it would be nice to receive one, maybe two a month.

Advertising revenue (read: Adsense) has always been pretty low for this site and has never contributed much. Going on last months figures, I’ll maybe get $5 if I’m lucky. I could no doubt spend time optimising Ad placement to improve click-throughs, but to be honest, I’m not that fussed.

So currently the income pie is divided up 65% from TLA, 30% from Review Me, and 5% from Adsense. That’s obviously not including anything else that might come up in the last 2 weeks of this month. These figures also doesn’t include the several hundred dollars I’m going to earn doing freelance web development this month.

Looking Forward.

Obviously I’d like to earn more money. Who wouldn’t? Up until now, however, I’ve been rather passive about the whole thing, and more than a little haphazard/slap-dash in how I approach things. More than once I’ve started something, only to forget about it or move on to the next idea before I’ve finished. It’s a definite character flaw which I’m trying to overcome.

There are a couple of project in the pipeline which are looking promising. The first of these is my first foray into “providing the shovels for the prospectors” - it’s a simple website builder for Article Underground users, called Metro. While it’s aimed at Article Underground users, it will have other applications and would be a good investment for anyone who wants to make a quick and very simple website. It’s a little while off until it’s ready, but it will be the first of hopefully a number of products designed to make the life of the Internet Entrepreneur that little bit easier! I’m targeting a mid-January/February release, but I’m trying my hardest to get it released earlier than that!

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Having the choice of whether I get up and trudge to an office or not is one of my big goals in life. I’d rather spend each day finding something new to push myself with; use each day to find new challenges, rather than work to pay some bills. That’s the idealized dream.

The thing is, and I was thinking about this today, would I really give up work if given the opportunity? Would I really spend each day working on new entrepreneurial ventures, just for the challenge? I tried thinking to myself - “if I won tonight’s lottery, what would I really do?” So what would I do with roughly £7,500,000?

There’s the usual stuff; pay the mortgage, buy a bigger and better home, a family holiday, pay all debts… nothing too exciting. Then I got to thinking the majority would be put into high-interest savings and live off the return. Even at a conservative rate of 10% there’s more than enough to live off. So what would I do about work?

It’s here I came unstuck. What would I do? I could give up work altogether, but I know I’d just get bored. I could spend all my time trying different business ventures, “for fun”. Something didn’t sit right with that idea either. So I thought and I thought, then thought some more. Eventually I reached the epiphany.

I’d probably not change a thing. I’d still work at my current employer. Maybe not 9-5, and maybe as an “associate” rather than staff, but I’d still work the job. The difference between now and this imaginary reality: knowing I had a choice on the matter. It’s this lack of choice that’s driving me towards financial freedom even now.

I once heard someone say “just because you can choose, doesn’t mean you always should“. If you had the choice, what would you choose?

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Rather than keep it confined to there, I’ve brought it here to give some clue as to what will be happening over the coming weeks. I’m more likely to pay attention to what I’ve said for myself if I post it on my own blog! (I’ve corrected a couple of spelling and grammar mistakes, and clarified a bit, but the gist is the same)

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Adsense revenue was down about 50% in July; less people about during the summer to keep random visitor traffic high. I also did no work to any of the three sites.

Affiliates and Referrals have been making up the lost Adsense revenue and then some! Text Link Ads (link), Article Underground (link, review) and Dreamhost (link to coupon) have all been good to me. TLA in particular - the ads only went on the site at the end of the month and I sold 3 by this morning.

Other than that, it’s been kinda quiet. I had a couple of health problems, a holiday, and my iBook got trashed - all stopped me from getting as much done as I might normally. To top it off, Stargate started up again this month! I didn’t do too bad though. Even with “distractions” and “interruptions”, I think I averaged about $1.20 a day - nearly half way to my short-term target of $3 a day.

August should be good though. I’m putting together a small writing team for some monetized blogs I’ve got in the pipeline. I’m also looking for a graphics/web design guy and maybe also a coder for when I don’t have enough time to do any coding myself. My plan is to eventually get other people to do the “heavy lifting” while I project manage and profit.

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My main aim for August is to build a team of freelancers I can call upon to work for me as I need. July proved to me just how little time I have to build my own product ideas into any shape of reality. I believe could be earning quite a bit if I could get a few ideas realized. As they say, you have to spend money to make money, and all that…

The very thought of what I’m wanting to do is giving me ideas for more opportunities. My holiday obviously did me more good than I thought - I feel fresh, recharged, creative and optimistic again!

Here’s to reaching that $3 a day target this month!

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Why $1000? Because it works out around £500, which would make a nice difference to our finances - my wife would potentially have to option of not working if she wanted to. Alternatively it would let us look for a larger house in a nice area.

$1000p/m is my new goal - what’s yours and why?

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Pixel Meadow was a blog I ran for the last couple of years. I always meant for it to be my web development business blog-cum-portfolio, but between this, than and the next thing, it ended up being just a personal blog. Now and again I’d post something reasonably decent and the site somehow managed to gain a pagerank 5. Pixel Meadow is on its way back, definitely as a business entity, but with a web design/development blog.

Also in the works is my personal blog, but that’s not even remotely interesting to any of you, so I’ll skip over that one (for now)…

There’s a lot more happening than those two, but they’re all I’m going to divulge just now.

Money-Making Progress

It’s about a month since I started seriously looking at making money online, so I guess now is a good time to post an update to how I’m doing.

1. Adsense revenue was up a lot. In May I made about $0.5. In July I’ve made $14. That’s across 4 sites, including this one, where most of the revenue comes from. Here’s hoping this keeps on rising. Over the next few weeks I’ll be experimenting with other types of ads to see which pay best.
2. Most of my adsense sites are indexed with Google. I need to update them with more content, but that’s not urgent.
3. Text-Link-Ads have been a success. You can read more of my thoughts here, on Yaro’s Forums.
4. England’s World Cup Glory was the big launch for this month. It broke even within 2 days so I decided to use it as an experiment in promotion. Things have been steady, even though I haven’t been updating the site as much as I should. There’s definitely a pattern to sales (i.e. a small boost just after every England game!). The numbers aren’t huge, but I’m more interested in the lessons to be learnt just now.

So there you have it - what I’m doing and what I’ve been up to. Look out for more information on upcoming ventures and launches soon!

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