Traffic/Audience
10,072 page views (-1,657 from August)
1,894 iTunes downloads (-116 from August)
6,806 Youtube channel views (-74 from August)
56,183 minutes watched (+4,262 from August)
Aweber subscribers: 4,593 (-438 subscribers from August) I deleted people who weren’t opening emails
GetResponse subscribers: 254 (+254 subscribers from August)
Twitter followers: 5,676 (+176 followers from August)
Facebook Fans: 508 (+7 from August)
Expenses
Libsyn: $75 – I host my podcast with this so I can put it on iTunes
Aweber: $49 – This is my list building software that allows me to email everyone when there’s a new interview
GetResponse: $15 – This is the autoresponder I use for my buyer’s list and solo ads
Hello Bar: $5
Angie’s List: $6.40 (for a side project I was doing)
Skype: $10 for premium
Storm on Demand Liquid Web Hosting: $60
Safe Swaps: $29.99 – A place to do ad swaps without having to worry about getting ripped-off (to an extent)
Jing: $9.95
Fiverr: $140 – This is where I get a lot of my work done very inexpensively
eBay: $29.45 (fees for eBay arbitrage)
Vagex: $10 – A tool for increasing your Youtube video rankings
Facebook Ads: $6.99 – I did a couple of ads with Facebook
Solo ads: $60
Total expenses: $506.78 (-$1,083.38 compared to August)
Revenue
SEO Gladiators (CLOSED): $198.50 from interview with Dan Lew
FB Ads Cracked (CLOSED): $145 from interview with Don Wilson
Simple Novice Profits (CLOSED): $120.34 from interview with Vinny Boccalino
Arbitrage Underdog: $118 from interview with Tom E and review
Operation Solo: $89.85 from interview with Anthony Tilley
The Money Tree (CLOSED): $77.79 from interview with Russ Ruffino
Simple Facebook Profits (CLOSED): $77.63 from interview with AJ Montoya
Tube Illuminati (CLOSED): $72.45 from interview with Clive McGonigal
Easy List Building Machine course (CLOSED): $70.25 from interview with Mike Marin
Niche Supremacy (CLOSED): $69.08 from interview with Radu Hahaianu
Hollywood Sales System: $63.00 from interview with Marc Fienberg
Fast Cash Video Profits (CLOSED): $52.62 from interview with Johnnie Yost
Mini Affiliate Sites course (CLOSED): $44.75 from interview with David McGimpsey
Savage Siphon (CLOSED): $44.00 from interview with Brian Anderson
The Four Hour System (CLOSED): $43.84 from interview with Anton Kraly
Clickbank Atlas: $40.20 from interview with Wyatt Jozwowski
Instant Video Takeoff: $36.50 from interview with Josh Ratta
Slide 2 Video software: $36.48 from interview with Chris Dolan
Secret Millionaires Traffic Source: $34.81 from interview with Dave Gruber and Matt Bacak
Azon Autopilot Traffic: $31.28 from interview with Derek Doepker
Video Curation Pro: $31.02 from interview with Peter Drew
Generation plugin (CLOSED): $30.12 from interview with Sam Zadworny
List Frenzy (CLOSED): $23.50 from interview with Andre Stoelinga and Daryl Austman
WP Lead Magnet (CLOSED): $23.50 from interview with Travis Ketchum
Fiverr Euphoria: $20 from interview with Fergal Downes
Fast Free Traffic Formula: $19.94 from interview with Gary Glucas
Perfect Business Plan: $19.90 from interview with Nicola Cairncross
The Email Marketer’s Handbook (CLOSED): $16.11 from interview with Mark Thompson
Simple Video Spin System (CLOSED): $14.21 from interview with Rob Tierney
Tube Takeover: $7.48 from interview with Josh Zamora
Magnetic Marketing (CLOSED): $7.19 from interview with Amanda Craven
Total revenue from interviews: $1,679.34 (-$111.56 from August)
Quick and Easy Cash Blueprint method: $261.67 – These are earnings from using Simple Novice Profits.
Kindle earnings: $10
Text link ads: $21.60– I make this income from an old website of mine.
Whoosh Traffic (CLOSED): $17.90 – A keyword tracker for monitoring multiple keyword rankings
SocialAdr: $5.60 – A hands-off way of getting more likes and tweets for your posts
Quick and Easy Cash Blueprint: $72 – My new product that I’ve released to very few people
Consulting: $239.95
Total from OTHER streams of income: $648.72 (-$15.98 from August)
Total Revenue: $2,308.06 (-$147.54 from August)
Total Profit: $1,801.28 (+$935.84 from August)
September ended up being a half-way decent month with a total profit of $1,801.28…but why am I not satisfied? If it were $3,000 would I be satisfied? How about $6,000? $10,000?
What I’d really like to see is more consistent growth in my business. And the only way to do that is to reinvest my profits BACK INTO my business.
So what does that mean?
Spending.
I’ve calculated that I can increase my list from 5,000 to 10,000 subscribers for about $2,500 to $3,000. To do that I’ll need to buy A LOT of solo ads…but I think with the current funnel I have setup I’ll be able to do it in an intelligent way.
What does this mean for you?
In the next few months you’ll be seeing me taking a lot of action with my business. I’ll be launching a new product in early November about solo ads, running my own solo ad campaigns, and fully focusing on taking my business to the next level.
Would you like to come with me?
It’s funny that when I send out emails for my revenue reports they get the HIGHEST open rates than anything else I do….so it means that people LOVE to see how others are succeeding or failing…it’s why reality TV is so popular.
But WATCHING is different than PARTICIPATING.
My goal for doing all this publicly is to inspire YOU to also take action. I want you to learn from my mistakes and triumphs so that you can also create a business that allows you to live the way you’d like to live.
And therefore I’ll be starting to release mini-products and Kindle books about EXACTLY what I’m doing so that you can learn too.
Free Solo Ad Training Videos!
As part of my launch for my next solo ad interview product, I’ll be releasing a FREE training series to get you excited about entering the world of solo ads. I’ll be teaching the core basics of how solo ads work so that even if you’re not interested in buying the product you’ll still learn MORE from the free training than from most other half-baked products out there 🙂
So that’s it for this month. I expect profits to be minimal for the rest of the year, but overall revenue should increase. Stay tuned 😉
And here are some pictures from September 🙂
Pretty cool man, great job. Keep doing what you’re doing, but I’d love to see you keep expanding your business, as you say.
Solos will help, but the real game changer could be from affs on your next launch. Product Launch Confessions was a great product, just not one with a wide net of buyers. Solos/List building will be a topic that more affs should get behind, especially knowing your last product was quality.
Good luck dude!
Thanks for the support, Mike.
Yes, I think there should be more interest in the solo ad interviews…only stats will tell.
Loving the office Mike! Looks pretty cozy and a nice view too.
Thanks, Dan…I love it too…I have an island view.
Hey Mike. Interesting read. I loved PLC and as you know helped me enormously with my first launch.
I will be very interested in learning about Solo Ads. The only thing I know about them is that you can get burned quite badly from them or am I thinking of Adwords?
Look forward to hearing more about it.
Cheers, Mike and thanks.
Andy,
You’re right that you CAN get burned if you don’t know what you’re doing. My plan is to educate you so that you can do it the RIGHT way.
thanks, Mike. Look forward to it. 🙂
Ok. I have to make a comment on what you said about safe swaps. So you know that was my first wso we talked about and I had no affiliates or anything so someone suggested safe swaps as a way to get some traffic pretty fast. Well my very first experience… AND I got totally milked over lol. Luckily I tracked it so I can document the proof. Wrote a post about it here warriorforum.com/main-internet-marketing-discussion-forum/858540-buyer-beware-solo-ad-sellers-spamming-get-your-clicks-proof.html with youtube video proof here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZALrHm86UI
Do you have a backup for me? I looked at your list of Solo’s. But for a new guy, how do I know it’s a good one so something like this doesn’t happen to me again?
James,
The Warrior forum link you sent isn’t working, but I did get a chance to watch the Youtube video. Here’s what I noticed:
1. Usually solo ad sellers won’t send traffic directly to an affiliate offer. They send them to a squeeze page, and THEN you can redirect them to your offer. The willingness to do this would have set off a red flag for me.
2. Most solo ad sellers will adjust your swipe to fit their list. Some will send something completely different. Just make sure to ask them if they’ll be using your swipe or not. You can also ask to join their list. Most honest sellers won’t have any problem with that.
3. The biggest problem with this solo ad seller is the origin of all the traffic they’re sending. Most of it is coming from India, which is basically useless traffic when it comes to conversions. You want your traffic to be coming from the USA, UK, and Australia because these are the countries that are more likely to pull out their credit card and become a buyer.
4. I mentioned already that the seller didn’t send to a squeeze page. By sending them directly to your offer you’re only getting ONE chance to convert them to a buyer. If you get them subscribed onto an email list you can put them through an autoresponder sequence and have MULTIPLE chances to convert them. And if they don’t buy your offer then they might buy an offer through an affiliate link in the future.
I’d be VERY surprised if you got any sales from this solo ad. During my product launch I’ll be addressing these issues so that you don’t get scammed again.
Yeeeaaaaaaaahhhh sooooooo the reason you cannot find that thread… my account just got banned for that post! =-( Apparently you cannot specifically name people when you are asking for help. The thread already had like 40 comments with tons of people offering great help and tips on how to pic your solos! Wow. This WSO has truly been an… “experience” to say the least… sheesh
Contact Warrior moderator Paul Myers and explain what happened https://www.facebook.com/talkbiz
Niiice mike! Sometimes I feel like I’m still shooting in the dark, but this in inspires me to keep going. Keep learning. 🙂 thank you!
Megan,
We’re all shooting in the dark until we’ve ACTUALLY learned to do these things ourselves. How’s your show going?
It’s going, I’m experimenting and trying new things, trying to clarify my content and doing my best.
Any attempts at monetization yet?
Great to see someone telling it like it is and not what they wish it to be. Really looking forward. to the content on solo ads.
Keep up the good work.
Pamela,
Thanks for the support!
Mike,
Count me in for the solo ad training videos. I’ve been researching solo ads for a couple of weeks and about to buy my first solo ad deal. I’m hoping to grow my list and create some products too.
I really enjoy your interviews and website. I’d like to do something similar someday. Keep up the good work and thanks again for sharing your income report!
All the best,
JR Gautreaux
JR,
If you don’t know what you’re doing yet then it would be worth it to you to wait a bit until you understand solo ads a bit better. A big reason why people say “solo ads don’t work” is because they’re doing them the wrong way.
Mike,
Thanks for the reply to my comment. I have no problem waiting. I’ve sold a couple of WSO in the past and had a list of 80 or so buyers. Funny thing is I never actively mailed to them. This time around I plan to queue up the auto responder with at least 3 months worth of messages. I’ve read that you really need to try and engage with your list. I also heard it’s better to make the email more personal in such you are working with “me” or I want you to be part of my “team” and so on. I guess it’s human nature that people want to feel part of something.
JR,
One of the BIGGEST mistakes people make when building a list is mailing too INFREQUENTLY. You should be mailing them AT MINIMUM once per month…if not they’ll forget you and when you mail them they’ll unsubscribe or mark you as spam.
Yes, engaging with your list is important. Everyone has their own theory about this, but you want to write your mails as if you’re speaking to just one person and not your “list”.
The art of email writing is a whole other topic that I’ll address in another course, but for now I’ll strictly be addressing list building with solo ads and how to monetize that list.
Mike,
I watched you video interview with the creators of List Frenzy and purchased that product using your link. I’ve only gone through a couple of the videos so far, but I’m impressed with the information presented.
I also purchased your Quick Easy Cash Blueprint product and hope to get that up an running later this week. I had already picked up Vinnie’s product after watching that video interview. Some pretty interesting techniques for sure!
Thanks, JR…much appreciated.
I’ve personally gone through the List Frenzy course and it’s very well done. If you’re interested in learning about list building by swaping then it’s a great eye-opener on what works and what doesn’t.