June 2017 Income Report

I went into June really optimistic, especially after my stellar May where I finally gained income traction with my blog, but unfortunately it just wasn’t a great month.

I have a feeling that my blog has started to plateau, because both my traffic and income have dipped. This is obviously not a good thing, and the worst part is, as a blogger, you don’t always know exactly why your traffic drops.

The only “positive” income I had for the month came from Amazon, as I finally implemented Native Shopping Ads into my blog theme. These are essentially advertisements that use retargeting to show consumers ads for items they have previously viewed. It’s a great way to earn money through Amazon because so many people view an item and don’t actually purchase it until later, so if your site is the one to “remind” them of the item, you make a commission!

Here’s how my income shaped up for the month:

June was my 9th month of blogging, and after a really intense 6 months of posting nearly every weekday, I started to feel the burnout. So, with some travel coming up during the month, I decided to take a break from blogging as intensely as I did. I really needed this break.

Because I’m obsessed with all things digital though, I didn’t step away from blogging entirely. I actually launched this very blog you’re reading in June! For now, my income reports will only focus on my interior design blog, as Blog Ambitious doesn’t yet make money and it’s more like a journal for now.

Expenses

My expenses are pretty much the same each month. I purchased my domain from Namecheap, my hosting from A2 (go with Bluehost), and I use a yearly Tailwind subscription.

Related: The exact steps I took to start my profitable Blog

Traffic

In June, I generated 25,277 pageviews.

Of those page views, only 34.6% came from a desktop. 53% came from mobile, and 12% came from a tablet. This is super interesting to me because you don’t really realize this when you first start a blog.

My inclination was to design my site from a desktop, and the fact that most of my pageviews are from a mobile device means I really missed the mark there. That being said, my theme is obviously mobile-friendly – but really I didn’t spend so much time designing for this device.

What’s also interesting to note, is that I’m pretty sure the majority of my income comes from desktop traffic, not mobile traffic.

This is because cookies – which are used to track my affiliate sales – don’t work on all mobile browsers, and even if they do, they are tied to that device. If someone clicks my affiliate link on their mobile browser, but doesn’t make a purchase until they are back on their desktop computer, I won’t get an affiliate commission for that sale since it can’t be tied back to me.

Cookies are device-specific, not individual-specific. This is a huge bummer, but also pretty interesting to see that the majority of my income likely came from just one-third of my traffic (8,743 pageviews).

Goals

For me, this is a big part of why blogging is a long-term game for me. I want my brand to be recognizable and loved enough that users may click my links from Pinterest on their phone a few times, and eventually love the website enough to visit it directly from their desktop browser.

My goal for July is to hit at least 1,000 pageviews on average per day – or 30,000 pageviews for the month in total.

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