{"id":3445,"date":"2015-09-06T18:40:36","date_gmt":"2015-09-06T17:40:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.danielebesana.com\/blog\/?p=3445"},"modified":"2015-09-06T18:46:04","modified_gmt":"2015-09-06T17:46:04","slug":"online-income-report-august-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/danielebesana.com\/blog\/online-income-report\/online-income-report-august-2015","title":{"rendered":"Online Income Report – August 2015"},"content":{"rendered":"

I spent August in Amsterdam, enjoying the legendary unstable\u00a0Dutch summer. No travel except a weekend in Dusseldorf!<\/p>\n

I was expecting a quiet month, both online&offline, but here in Netherlands the summer holidays don’t put business to a halt (in Italy pretty much everything shut down in August) and I had a full agenda.<\/p>\n

Last month I introduced a new format for this Online Income Reports, including a ‘Tool of the Month’ section. I didn’t get any reaction so not sure what to do with it, but I’ll stick to this for a while before making\u00a0conclusions \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

Let’s get into the report of the activities & the finances.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

<\/h2>\n

What’s Going On<\/h2>\n

Focus and Execute: the Truth<\/h3>\n

In May I spectacularly declared<\/a> that I was going to reduce client work and focus on two online projects: an\u00a0Amazon affiliate website about drones, and a blog about IT networking.<\/p>\n

But when your favorite customer calls you for few well paid days of WordPress consultancy, you go there and deliver few well paid days of WordPress consultancy.<\/p>\n

I started using Toggl<\/a>\u00a0few months ago and I’m getting better and better at tracking how I spend my\u00a0time… so here is the report of the client activity<\/strong>\u00a0in August:<\/p>\n

\"Summary<\/a><\/p>\n

I logged almost 62 hours<\/strong>\u00a0spent on clients projects.<\/p>\n

I wish I could say that everything was billed with my\u00a0hourly rate of \u20ac70 but that’s not the case. Anyway this report is about\u00a0online income<\/strong>\u00a0and not my WordPress consultancies \ud83d\ude09<\/p>\n

The reason why I show\u00a0this is because I’m pretty close to that 50-50 share<\/strong> between client work and working on my own projects, assuming a 40h\/week total.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

First Earnings from WP-OK!<\/h3>\n

\"WP-OK<\/a>In May\u00a0I started testing a new idea: WP-OK<\/a>. WP-OK is a WordPress support & maintenance service focus on\u00a0the Italian market.<\/p>\n

I’ve been providing\u00a0this to my existing clients for a long time now, but\u00a0this is the first time I’m trying to sell it as a stand-alone\u00a0service.<\/p>\n

The idea with\u00a0WP-OK is simple: entrepreneurs should not spend\u00a0their time fixing WordPress, but working on their business.<\/p>\n

In August I tuned the landing page using the amazing Hotjar<\/a> tool. The session recording feature is really useful to understand how visitors interact with the pages and the user experience.<\/p>\n

Here you can see a visitor clicking on a text saying “Solve a Problem”. As there was no link there, the visitor got confused and left the page even before reaching the offer:<\/p>\n

https:\/\/insights.hotjar.com\/p?site=46839&recording=43153634&token=513160ecd95e54231a0985c1c845d05c<\/p>\n

In September I’ll have a marketing action to promote WP-OK in the Italian market… let’s see how it goes!<\/p>\n

<\/h3>\n

Negotiating a Direct Advertising Campaign<\/h3>\n

One of the projects I’m focusing on is RouterFreak, a blog for network engineers. I’ve been a network engineers for 12+ years so I can relate with that audience.<\/p>\n

For the third month in a raw I got asked\u00a0for a sponsored product review<\/strong>. But this time the product wasn’t a simple software tool, but rather a complex solution for high-end networks (at high-end price)… so I had to negotiate the price accordingly.<\/p>\n

I brought up the subject in my\u00a0mastermind\u00a0group<\/strong> and got very good feedback:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Choose the price based on how much value the campaign provides\u00a0to the advertiser;<\/li>\n
  2. Always give 2-3 options;<\/li>\n
  3. Try to maximize the profit offering volume discount;<\/li>\n
  4. Try to use their language.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    So I produced an offer justifying the price with the\u00a0resource allocation for the project <\/strong>(typical in the IT world) rather than time<\/strong>\u00a0required by the writer<\/b>\u00a0or even worse\u00a0price per word<\/strong> (typical of the writing world).<\/p>\n

    I stressed that we provide a certified senior network engineer<\/strong>\u00a0writing the review of such a technical product, and offered 20% on the immediate order of three reviews<\/strong>\u00a0for three months (volume discount).<\/p>\n

    How did that go? While they refused the more pricey option and the volume-discount, we closed the deal for $1200 USD!\u00a0<\/strong>That’s the highest sponsorship I ever got, very happy about it.<\/p>\n

    \r\n
    I didn’t include the $1200 in the income of this month, because I didn’t received the payment\u00a0yet. While I totally trust that company, I think is more correct and easier to include it in next report.<\/b><\/center>\r\n<\/div>\n

     <\/p>\n

    Another House Sold<\/h3>\n

    The most visited\u00a0articles in this blog danielebesana.com\u00a0<\/em>are about how-to buy an house in Amsterdam.<\/p>\n

    \"Blog<\/a><\/p>\n

    It’s enjoying stable traffic and I use it as lead generator for a trustworthy local house agent. It’s a win-win situation because I know the guy is great and very helpful, and that’s what buyers are paying for.<\/p>\n

    I was pretty happy to receive an email informing me\u00a0that another house was sold, with a nice commission fee awaiting me.<\/p>\n

    While it doesn’t happen often, it’s a pretty passive revenue stream<\/strong>. It\u00a0remembers me of the importance to address markets where the\u00a0money are<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

    Let me explain: I wrote many practical posts about living in Amsterdam.\u00a0I wrote about how-to move here and got plenty of questions from jobless people. I wrote about buying an house and got few questions from rich people.<\/p>\n

    While I tried to help both, the smaller audience generated $ while the larger audience generates traffic.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    WPtube: time for an update?<\/h3>\n

    In July 2014 I launched the Premium version of the WordPress theme WPtube. It generated almost $6000 USD so far, but the earnings decreased in the last months.\u00a0At peak I sold $663 in a month, but August was the second month in a raw totaling $195.<\/p>\n

    I admit that I haven’t put any time in this project<\/strong>,\u00a0and this has surely taken a tool in\u00a0the bottom line sales.\u00a0I plan to release an updated version of the theme in September and see how it goes.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    The Numbers<\/h2>\n

    Income Breakdown<\/h3>\n

    Let’s get down with the numbers!<\/p>\n