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Welcome!
Do you like rollercoasters?
My kiddo seems to think they are pretty cool so far, even though he’s only gone on the little ones at the pumpkin patch. But the tilt-o-whirl is about as crazy as I will go most days!
Apparently, the blog did NOT get that message this past month, September 2018. Whew…it was a *crazy* rollercoaster and I still have not caught my breath!
As you can see above, my blog stats from September 2018 prove how truly volatile blog traffic can be! And you really need to be prepared for anything!
I just take it as a reminder to hang on for the ride, never get complacent, and diversify!
The low points were even worse than that one-week exception back in June. It’s like the summer slump hit us late…but that wasn’t it.
So then what was it? Well – I have a theory, but most will probably say I’m crazy.
I’ve been busy cleaning up my Pinterest account. And I think that somewhat unusual activity flagged my account with Pinterest and thinned out my traffic for a while until they could figure out what I was doing.
On the flip side, I think those efforts may also be the delayed catalyst of the following boost in traffic that you see toward the end of the month.
Kind of like when you spring clean your home, it always looks worse before it gets better.
I’m curious what things will look like as we continue into fall and winter. I will be comfortable if things stay the way they’ve been over the last 2 weeks of September but would love to see traffic pick up a bit.
I’d love to start hitting 30,000 pageviews per month sooner than later. My search engine traffic seems to be picking up, which is really awesome!
Now on to the good stuff…let’s talk about money, honey!
Why Publish An Income Report?
Well, there are a number of reasons, including:
- It’s a great excuse for me to sit down each month to see what is working, what is not, and where I landed for the month.
- I love reading other people’s income reports. I find them fascinating, but they are getting harder to find. So why not make my own?
- It can be helpful for newer bloggers to see one example like this from a smaller blog.
- And it will be fun to see the change over time.
September 2018 Blogging Income Update
Before expenses, I earned $302.45 blogging in September 2018.
That’s down about $82.48 from last month. That is primarily because I did not work on any sponsored content this month.
Though I’d love to continue growing, I’m still okay with it because my ad income stayed relatively consistent despite a significant drop in pageviews.
$300 is really the baseline that I’m gauging success on these days, so I’m still on track.
I still cannot believe that it’s possible to make money like this from a blog. Can you? It’s just crazy to me!
Anyway, I’m very curious to see what the next few months hold income wise. I’m not yet able to get a good feel for how October is starting off quite yet because we’re only halfway through the second day.
September 2018 Online Income Breakdown – 302.45
- Affiliate Income – $82.05 total:
- Milkology Affiliate Income – $50.35
- Amazon Affiliate Income – $31.70
- Mediavine Display Advertising – $220.40
Total: $302.45
How Are Things Going at Frugal Nesting?
Frugal Nesting is trucking along! Through all of the ups and downs, things seem to level out for the most part.
I’m thankful for that because the extra income is really nice to have. And it makes me happy to see that people are enjoying the content that I so love creating!
Things on the personal front have calmed down somewhat. It’s been about 2 months since we lost my father and we’re learning how to move forward.
It’s helped to be as busy as we are. GQ started 3rd grade at the beginning of September and he just turned 9 this past Saturday.
So we’ve been super busy with back-to-school and birthday activities. And he starts another season of soccer today.
If you are on my mailing list, follow me on Instagram, or read the recent blog post then you likely saw our big announcement:
I’M PREGNANT!!!
We are expecting baby #3 in early 2019 and are over the moon about it. So that is another reason that things have been kinda nuts around here!
You can read more about that in the blog posts listed below.
Recent Updates
I haven’t changed much with the blog since the huge facelift back in May. I’ve done a little tweaking to increase the font to make it more mobile friendly for you guys.
I’ve also been adding more images to some of my most popular posts. I hope it looks okay.
I’ve been sending out my biweekly newsletter using MailerLite to my sweet subscribers so you guys always have the inside scoop on what’s going on behind the scenes.
And I continue to work my way through Elite Blog Academy (EBA) by Ruth Soukup. It’s truly THE best option for building a successful blog from the ground up. Get on the waiting list now if you’re not already!
For the most part, we’ve just been in maintenance mode for the past few months. Now I look forward to getting back on track as we head into Autumn.
Traffic
In September 2018 we had a total of 14,786 page views, which is significantly less than we had in August. I’m not thrilled with the trajectory as we went down from August, which was already down from July.
That’s the opposite of what I would have expected over the summer and heading into fall, but I’m just going to keep pushing and stay positive!
I like to include a year over year screenshot to show the progress. Progress is really the only metric that means anything, particularly for smaller blogs. And with the exception of that strange two-week stretch, I think we can call this progress.
Sessions and bounce rate definitely need some work, but overall trending well above last year for users and pageviews. Lookin’ decent!!
And if the traffic doesn’t do it, the increase in income helps too. I made $208.46 in September 2017, so I’m just about $100 ahead year over year!
Most Popular New Posts from September 2018
August 2018 Small Blog Income Report
Anatomy of a Viral Pregnancy Announcement
Proven Strategy For How To Get Pregnant Fast*
↑ This one really hit the ground running and has beaten my most popular post for the past 2 days, which has never happened before! Reached 602 pageviews yesterday (exactly 1 week after posting) and gaining on itself. So excited!!
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Don’t forget to check out all of my favorite things on my recommendations pages for the best things to make your life easier whether it’s parenting, budgeting, family living or blog related. Thanks again for visiting…I hope to see you again!!
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