Halloween has been and gone, as has Bonfire Night in the UK. Before we know it we’ll be at US Thanksgiving, Black Friday and into the Christmas countdown! So it’s time for a look back at October, to see how my income and profit faired.
On a personal note, October is a month of birthday celebrations for our family. My Dad’s and my boyfriend’s birthdays both fall in October, as well as our anniversary.
The family all went out for a lovely meal together at our local Chef and Brewer restaurant to celebrate. Then on the day of my boyfriend’s birthday we enjoyed a delicious dinner at Marco Pierre White’s restaurant in Meriden (sadly we didn’t see Marco there!). We also went for a delightful afternoon tea at the peculiarly long-named Hallmark Hotel Stratford-upon-Avon The Welcombe (why not celebrate more than once eh?!)
As the end of the month swung round we enjoyed watching the Halloween Strictly Come Dancing Special at my sister’s house. My 7 year old niece absolutely loves the show, and is learning ballet and other forms of dance herself. On the evening of Halloween itself we welcomed over 140 trick or treaters to our front door (luckily we’d stocked up on sweets), catch a sneak peek into our evening if you haven’t already done so!
I ticked off another 2 items from my Autumn Bucket List in October - this is going well so far! Only 4 out of 10 things left to cross off the list. Here’s what I did during October:
- We visited Batsford Arboretum and I got some wonderful pictures in amongst the autumn coloured leaves
- We carved pumpkins for Halloween. My Disney obsession continues as I chose to carve Minnie Mouse, and my boyfriend carved Mickey. We also had one with a Star Wars rebel alliance starbird symbol, and another of a cat!
Here’s some of my favourite pictures from October…
pancakes I made this month (Disney obsessed!)
This is a recurring monthly post to track my goal of earning at least £4,000 profit from my Income Hustle ventures this year.
My goal breaks down across the months and weeks of the year as follows:
£4,000 per year or
£333.33 per month or
£76.92 per week
This means that my target profit for each month would ideally be in the region of £333.33.
In August & September I made enough profit to hit the monthly target of £333.33. September’s profit was particularly good at £465.18, which was £131.85 over my monthly target.
For my overall 2018 target of making £4,000 profit for the year, my running total was sitting at £2,096.70 at the end of September. So hitting my annual target was looking to be a push. Question is, how did I get on in October? Read on to find out…
INCOME REPORT
Here’s how my income is doing:
| Month | Income | Running Total |
|---|---|---|
| January | £377.45 | £377.45 |
| February | £156.62 | £534.07 |
| March | £120.29 | £654.36 |
| April | £305.67 | £960.03 |
| May | £217.61 | £1,099.51 |
| June | £281.89 | £1,381.40 |
| July | £311.20 | £1,770.73 |
| August | £496.84 | £2,267.57 |
| September | £762.16 | £3,029.73 |
| October | £732.34 | £3,762.07 |
| November | ||
| December |
At £732.34 that’s another strong month for income in October. I nearly matched the same income I pulled in for September (just £29.82 short). My running total income for the year is creeping closer to £4,000. Once my income is over £4,000 it means there’s a chance (albeit very small) that I might hit my £4,000 profit goal for the year.
Here’s a break-down of where my income came from in October:
Once again Kindle book sales were the clear winner for income production in October, coming in at £565.59. I had another decent month with blogging (£80), still reaping the benefits of the things I learned from Turn Your Dreams Into Money (affiliate link) and How To Smash Affiliate Marketing (affiliate link). Paperback sales were pretty strong this month compared to usual, bringing in £50.83 compared to £38.32 last month.
Behind the top 3 income streams, I made small amounts of money from doing surveys (affiliate link), selling my unwanted items on eBay, and from cashback sites Quidco (affiliate link) and TopCashback (affiliate link).
There is no entry for audiobook sales for October because although I did make some sales, I didn’t meet the minimum Amazon threshold for being paid. My royalties will be rolled forward to November, where hopefully I should have enough accrued to receive a payment.
EXPENSE REPORT
Here’s how my Side Hustle expenses panned out for October:
| Month | Expenses | Running Total Expenses |
|---|---|---|
| January | £145.20 | £145.20 |
| February | £18.62 | £163.82 |
| March | £17.84 | £181.66 |
| April | £93.05 | £274.71 |
| May | £54.86 | £329.57 |
| June | £28.83 | £358.40 |
| July | £121.26 | £479.66 |
| August | £156.39 | £636.05 |
| September | £296.98 | £933.03 |
| October | £134.39 | £1,067.42 |
| November | ||
| December |
It was a decent month for low expenses in October. At £134.39 costs were £162.59 less than the £296.98 I spent in September. There were two main reasons for this:
- I had less book marketing promotions and advertising expenses in October
- I decided to end the subscription membership that had been helping me with blogging, because I felt that I had learnt as much as I could from it for now
My annual expenses have now crossed the £1,000 threshold, at £1,067.42.
October’s expenses included book promotion costs, my zoom pro subscription for video calls that I’m using for my Publishin8 Course live training sessions (which I’m logging as a blogging expense for now until I create a new “product” category) and eBay/Paypal fees:
PROFIT PROGRESS
Here’s how my profit is looking at the end of October:
| Month | Target Profit | Actual Profit | Difference | Running Total Profit | Running Total Over / Under Target |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | £333.33 | £232.25 | -£101.08 | £232.25 | -£101.08 |
| February | £333.33 | £138.00 | -£195.33 | £370.25 | -£296.41 |
| March | £333.33 | £102.45 | -£230.88 | £472.70 | -£527.29 |
| April | £333.33 | £212.62 | -£120.71 | £685.32 | -£648.00 |
| May | £333.33 | £162.75 | -£170.58 | £848.07 | -£818.58 |
| June | £333.33 | £253.06 | -£80.27 | £1,101.13 | -£898.85 |
| July | £333.33 | £189.94 | -£143.39 | £1,291.07 | -£1,042.24 |
| August | £333.33 | £340.45 | +£7.12 | £1,631.52 | -£1,035.12 |
| September | £333.33 | £465.18 | +£131.85 | £2,096.70 | -£903.27 |
| October | £333.33 | £597.95 | +£264.62 | £2,694.65 | -£638.65 |
| November | £333.33 | ||||
| December | £333.33 |
As you can see, I made good profit again in October (£597.95) with a sizeable increase of £132.77 over the profit I made in September. This is impressive considering the fact that my income was actually less in October than September - it all comes down to my expenses being less.
In terms of my monthly profit target of £333.33, I easily achieved this with £264.62 to spare.
With October’s profit taken into consideration, my avergage monthly profit (across the last 12 months) is standing at £239.72. This is another improvement on last month, when the average was £200.63. Tracking the average profit gives me an indication of what I can consistently expect to earn from my income hustles, allowing me to plan for the future.
My overall profit for the year has gone up to £2,694.65, which is about £638.65 short of where it needs to be if I were on target to hit my £4,000 goal. With just 2 months left to go this year I’d need to achieve the following if I were to succeed in my annual goal:
- Profit target (per month): £333.33
- Total profit deficit to make up: £638.65
- Total profit deficit amount to make up per month: £319.33
- PROFIT I NEED TO MAKE PER MONTH: £652.66
Being completely real, I think it’s highly unlikely I’ll hit the £4,000 profit mark, unless something extremely unexpected happens between now and the end of the year! However, I shall continue to press on with my income hustles throughout the next 2 months to try to get as close to my goal as possible.
What Actions Worked/Didn’t Work From Last Month’s Plan
In last month’s income and profit report I listed the things I would do in October to help improve my profit.
Here’s a run down of how I got on:
Book Publishing
Purchase book promotions to run during October and November. With Black Friday in November I want to get ahead and pre-book my November promotions during October so that I can secure my preferred dates
- DONE I planned and booked all the promotions I intend to run during October and November
Set a launch date for my latest book and complete the necessary work to stick to this date! Including:
- Purchase stock images for my latest book (these are stock images I need to buy that are in addition to the illustrations I’ve had done)
- DONE I’ve finally completed this task which I’d been procrastinating on for a while. I think I’d been putting off doing this because I knew it would be a big/long job - and it was! So I’m really happy that I got this one done
- Complete the editing of my latest book so that it’s ready for formatting
- 50% DONE I made a good start but didn’t manage to finish this
- Work on the formatting of my latest book to prepare it for publication in both Kindle and Paperback formats
- NOT DONE I can’t start on the formatting of the book until the editing is complete
Blogging
Carry out any sponsored blog post opportunities which I receive during October
- DONE I completed around 4 opportunities during October
Publish at least 4 new blog posts
- DONE I published 4 new posts during October:
Grow my Life Designers email list from 10 to 12 subscribers
- NOT DONE I gained 1 subscriber, so my end of month total was 11
Increase the domain authority for inspiringlifedesign.com from 15 to 17
- DONE I’m so pleased with this one, I managed to get my site up to DA 17! This is important because when you look to work with companies, one of the first few things they will check is the domain authority of your blog. From what I can tell, initial opportunities start to kick in around DA 20 but get better the higher the DA. Ideally I want to be in the 30’s at least. So I’ve still a way to go, but this is great progress. The way to improve domain authority is to post regularly and collaborate with other sites with things like link swaps, guest posts and features
Courses
The trial run of the Publishin8 programme recommences in October after a short break. I will prepare and run 3 video classes as well as offering support to the participants for any questions they have
- DONE I ran 3 more classes during October, which were weeks 2, 3 & 4 of the 8 week program
YouTube
Create, edit and publish 1 new video on YouTube
- DONE I published my first ever vlog on YouTube!
Social Media
Grow Instagram following from 1,617 to 1,750
- NOT DONE At the end of October I had 1,625 Instagram followers
Grow Twitter following from 780 to 850
- DONE I just made this with 853 followers
Grow my Facebook Page follows from 24 to 25
- DONE I was up to 29 follows by the end of October
Grow my Facebook Group (open to anyone subscribed to my email list) from 7 to 8 members
- NOT DONE this one is proving difficult to increase, this remained at 7 throughout October
Grow my YouTube Channel subscribers from 10 to 11
- DONE I was actually at 12 subscribers by the end of the month
Grow my Pinterest followers from 32 to 37
- NOT DONE I got nearly half-way to this goal with 34 followers by the end of the month
Grow my Pinterest monthly unique views from 3.2K to 3.3K
- NOT DONE this had gone down to 1.2K by the end of October
Things I Will Try This Month To Help Improve Future Months’ Income And Profit
Book Publishing
- Purchase book promotions for the month of December. Now that I’ve got a month ahead with booking promotions, I’d like to stay at least a month ahead
- Finish the editing of my latest book, I’ve done about 50% of this already
- Work on the formatting of my latest book to prepare it for publication
Blogging
- Carry out any sponsored blog post opportunities which I receive during November
- Publish at least 4 new blog posts of my own
- Get ahead with my publishing content calendar so that I have either 5 blog posts done in advance, or an emergency collection of 5 posts for any weeks when I am at risk of missing a blog post deadline
- Grow my Life Designers email list from 11 to 12 subscribers
- Increase the domain authority for inspiringlifedesign.com from 17 to 18
Courses
- Gather half-way feedback from the participants of my Publishin8 program
- Complete the week 5 Publishin8 call preparation, run the call itself and upload supporting materials to Facebook Group afterward
- Reschedule remaining 3 Publishin8 classess for the new year (after requests from participants to take time-out for busy Christmas period)
YouTube
- Create, edit and publish at least 1 new video on YouTube
Social Media Growth
- Grow Instagram following from 1,625 to 1,700 (I’ve made this an easier goal this month because the rapid rate of instagram follower growth has slowed down a bit)
- Grow Twitter following from 853 to 1K
- Grow my Facebook Page follows from 29 to 30
- Grow my Facebook Group (open to anyone subscribed to my email list) from 7 to 8 members (given past experience this may be optimistic, but I will put it here so that I can try)
- Grow my YouTube Channel subscribers from 12 to 15
- Grow my Pinterest followers from 34 to 44
- Grow my Pinterest monthly unique views from 1.2K back to 3K
That’s October’s monthly report wrapped up! As always, if you have any thoughts on my progress, sugggestions for new things I can try to make money, or questions on anything in this post, then please leave a comment below, I love hearing from you.
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In my PREVIOUS post I wrote about my progress toward financial independence.
My NEXT post discusses a novel idea of a special advent calendar you can start anytime of the year.
You can find all my previous 2018 income and profit reports here.
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