Welcome to my August Income Report! Each month I publish an income report to take you behind the scenes of my online business and reveal exactly how much money I make, how much I spend and lessons learned along the way!
If you want to learn step-by-step how to build a website so that you can start a side hustle and make money online, check out this blog post on how to get started!
View all of my income reports here!
Important Things That Happened in August
- I booked one new Done For You client.
- I participated in the Thrive Virtual Conference.
- I worked 12 hour days, 6 days a week.
- I came to the realization that I needed more help in the marketing/admin side of my business.
Notes I found to myself in my planner:
- “Take the first estimate that comes into your mind and double it. That’s how long it will really take!!!!”
- “ASK FOR HELP!!”
- “Today will be calm chaos.”
- “I need someone who can work 15 hours a week for me – maybe start with an intern?”
- “I own a web design agency instead of I am a web designer”
- “Hold your boundaries and guard your time like a bulldog, not a butterfly”
Review of my goals
My goal each month has been to generate $10,000 in revenue because my rough breakdown to replace my old paycheck, cover business expenses and pay taxes is:
- $5000 – Income to cover my old paycheck.
- $2500 – Expenses
- $2500 – Taxes
What I focused on in August
As I mentioned in my July income report, once my vacation was over in July, I jumped right back into the grind, working 12 hours a day 6 days a week in an attempt to do all the things.
I put a ton of time into my Pinterest scheduling. I didn’t have many guests scheduled for my podcast which meant I was writing every episode myself.
I had booked a new client who was very, very eager to get started, which is awesome, but on the flip-side when I’m already at capacity, it was challenging to fit the work into my schedule.
I felt like I was all over the place and not very focused at all in August. I was just trying to keep up with all of my commitments in August and not let any of the balls I agreed to hold on to drop.
That being said, here’s how much money I made in August 2018:
INCOME BREAKDOWN
PASSIVE INCOME:
- Affiliate Income – $1735.30
- 5 Day Challenge Upgrade – $319
- Serious Side Hustlers – $1111.00
- Individual Courses – $144
- Individual Serious Side Hustlers Workshops – $0
- Web Designer Academy – $197.00
- Websites That Make Money Beta – $594.00
- WordPress Protection Package – $419.38
PASSIVE INCOME TOTAL: $4519.68
TIME FOR MONEY INCOME
- Done For You Projects – $3090
- Consulting – $2500
TIME FOR MONEY TOTAL: $5590.00
TOTAL INCOME: $10109.68
EXPENSES BREAKDOWN
TOOLS
- 1Password for Teams – $43.16
- AccessAlly (Membership plugin for all of my courses) – $79.00
- Acuity Scheduling (Done For You Consultations) – $10.00
- Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, etc.) $54.73
- Amazon Web Services – $1.47 (no idea what this is for LOL!)
- Auphonic (audio optimization for podcast) – $45.00
- Bluehost – $0
- ContentSnare – $29
- Cookiebot (GDPR Compliance) – $24
- Dropbox (File Storage) – $19.99
- Flywheel – $110.00
- FreeConferenceCall.com (Coaching & Client Calls) – $3.00
- GSuite (wp-bff.com Email) – $10.76
- HelloSign (Contract Software) – $300
- Infusionsoft (email marketing, automation, e-commerce & customer management) – $321.34
- LibSyn (Podcast Hosting) – $30.00
- ManageWP (WordPress Site Management for Clients & WordPress Protection Package) – $98.60
- Smart Podcast Player – $12
- Soundup (Alexa Flash Briefing Hosting) – $9.99
- Zapier – $15.00
- Misc Plugins – $89.00
TOTAL: $1305.11
Marketing
- Bonjoro (Video Welcome Service) – $25.00
- CoSchedule (Social Media Scheduling) – $59.00
- HauteStock (Stock photos) – $99.00
- LinkTree Pro (Instagram Profile Links) $6.00
- Tailwind (Pinterest) $29.96
- Facebook Ads – 31.50
- Creative Market Templates, etc. – $0
TOTAL: $250.46
PROFESSIONAL SERVICES:
Bench Accounting – $135.00
TOTAL: $135.00
HELP:
Subcontractors
TOTAL: $1470.55
LEARNING/MENTORSHIP
Misc Audiobooks – $7.00
Courses – $97
TOTAL: $104.00
TRAVEL
$11.20 – Southwest Fees Girlboss Retreat in Austin in September
FEES
Credit Card Processing Fees: ~ $200
OFFICE SUPPLIES
$0
TOTAL EXPENSES: $3433.16
NET PROFIT: $6676.56
BIGGEST LESSONS LEARNED
As I review my numbers for August, I totally hit my revenue goal!! Which is super exciting, because that means that all my my hard work, hustle and 12 hour days resulted in me reaching my goal.
However.
That pace isn’t sustainable.
It cost me physically. I was exhausted. I got sick that first week in August. I wasn’t making time to walk Scarlett every day so I’m literally sitting at my desk or on my couch for 12 hours a day. That’s not healthy.
And while I have an awesome VA team, I really needed more time from them than I could afford at their current rates.
Which sucks, because I love them, but running a business is about making decisions that help me create a stable, sustainable business.
When led to the note in my planner about bringing someone on for 15 hours a week instead of the 15 hours a month I was currently getting.
I have to be strategic, and I have to look out for myself, and so you’ll see in September’s income report the changes that I made.
So this out of control, exhausted, overworking myself thing comes up for me from time to time in my business. It’s a conversation I’ve had several times with my business coach and that’s why I have the note “Guard your time like a bulldog, not a butterfly” written in my planner.
I have a tendency to say yes to everything, and then put my own wellbeing aside to make sure things happen for other people.
And it’s not a selfless thing. It’s actually very selfish, because I get a lot of validation from coming through for people. It makes me feel important. It’s 100% my ego at work.
I had a call with my business coach in August where we talked about how much I’m working, and she asked me a question that was really hard to hear:
Who is Shannon when she’s not working? What kinds of things does she like to do?
And I couldn’t answer her. It made me feel really sad that I couldn’t. Because what is all of this for? My why has always been freedom, flexibility and financial independence but for some reason I keep trapping myself.
So my homework has been to take Friday afternoons off and go do something by myself, in my city, that I like to do. Like, go be a tourist in Columbus, Ohio.
Because this is a totally awesome city, I’ve lived here all my life and there are so many things that I’d love to do that my friends aren’t into, my husband’s not into, but I never make time to do myself.
And so that’s what I’ve been doing. Exploring my city, taking time to do things by myself and just spending time not working.
I’m a work in progress. I know I’ll never have it all figured out, but the important thing is that I know how I want to feel, and how I don’t want to feel, and as long as I’m taking the time to reflect and make adjustments, I’ll be okay. Change doesn’t happen overnight, which is something I keep reminding myself.
Three years ago I dreamed of today. And then I made it happen. So if I can dream of the next iteration, and really focus on how I want it to feel and start putting a plan into motion, there’s no reason why I can’t work less and live more.
Today’s pep talk is brought to you by Bluehost. Go to www.shannonmattern.com/bluehost and get 36 months of web hosting for just $2.95 a month. That’s less than one trip to Starbucks a month – and if you’re anything like me, you’re at Starbucks more than that!
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