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Did you see that ?
That was February. It came, was, and over. The speed with which time passes seems to be a non-constant even on planet earth. Maybe Einstein was wrong after all and the absolute time follows the perceived time more than we understand. Here is the income report February 2020.
Beginning of February I started a cornerstone-blog post which I knew will take a few weeks to research and write up. What I did not appreciate however was how bad I am at estimating the effort involved with not only writing and researching content but also to promote the content. Creating multiple PINs to post to Pinterest is usually a two day effort for me, as can be seen here.
By the end of February I realized only three posts for the blog.
- Blog income report January 2020
- 12 unique ways to make extra money
- The 10 best podcast platforms in 2020
Setting goals
I have started in January to setup Monthly and weekly goals for the blog, and for myself. I am keeping track using an online desktop environment with a notepad so I can access it from any where and with any computer.
One feature which I
added to the environment was an alarm-clock. This now allows me to set an alarm for say 15 minutes in order to stay on-track. I found that very often working on a task, like creating a new PIN, I would estimate 30min and end up spending 90min on it.
With this in place, I filtered the weekly goals into daily goals and assigned it a priority to work off on.
Here is my goal-sheet for last week.
[code language="javascript"]
WEEK 09: FEBRUARY 2020
Week of February 23th
Focus this week:
- Exercise regularly
- Create my vision board
- Stay focused
- Revise yearly goals based on : What do I need to get done ?
Sunday: Feb 23th
o A/BB 60min Add PINs to empty Tailwind Queue 07:00-08:00
o A/BB 120min Finish initial write-up for Podcasts 08:00-10:00
o A/-- 60min P90X "Plyometrics" 11:30-12:30
Monday:
o A/BB 30min Past week in review 5:30-6:00
o A/BB 15min Organize Goals for this week 6:00-6:15
o A/BW 15min PIN some more PINs 6:30-6:45
o A/BW 90min P90X "Shoulder & Arms and ARX" 7:00-8:30
o B/DW 8hours Innovate and excel at work
Tuesday:
o A/BB 60min SEO research, signup with Yandex 5:00-6:00
o A/BB 5min Organize Goals. 6:10-6:15
o A/AW 90min P90X "Yoga X" 6:15-7:45
o A/AL 60min Create header image for blogpost
- B/DW 8hours Innovate and excel at work
Wednesday:
o B/AL 30min Move from SoundCloud to Anchor.fm 5:00-5:30
o A/BB 15min Signup for affiliate program 5:30-5:45
o A/BB 30min Organize Goals 5:45-6:15
o B/BW 90min P90X "Chest Shoulders and Tri + ARX" 6:30-8:00
o A/DW 8hours Innovate and excel at work
Thursday:
o A/BB 15min Organize Goals 4:30-4:45
o A/BB 5min Reach out for guest post 4:45-4:50
o A/BB 30min PINTEREST - pin some more pins 4:50-5:20
o B/AL 40min Screenshot embedded podcast player 5:30-6:10
o A/BW 60min P90X "Kempo X" 6:15-7:15
o A/BW 30min Get ready for work 7:30-8:00
o A/DW 8hours Innovate and excel at work
o A/AW 15min Yandex has some recommendations for the site
Friday:
o A/BB 15min Organize Goals 4:45-5:00
o A/BB 10min Pay VarioMedia domain fee 5:00-5:10
o B/BB 20min SEO for keyword research for podcast 5:10-5:30
o A/BW 240min Finalize blog text and release 5:30-8:30
o B/DW 8hours Innovate and excel at work
Saturday: ( TODAY )
o A/BB 15min Prioritize / Stretch == 5:15-5:30==
o A/BB 30min Rough out next week and month == 5:45-6:15==
o B/AL 60min Convert post to a podcast episode == 6:15-7:15==
o A/BW 90min P90X "Back and Bi + ARX" == 7:15-8:45==
o A/BB 30min PINTEREST PINNING PARTY == 9:30-10:00==
o A/BB 30min Webmaster Bing - research and work 13:30-14:00
- A/BB 30min Start Income report February 2020 14:30-15:00
- A/BB 30min Create PINs for the blog post 17:00-11:30
o A/BB 15min Reach out for guest posts - B/AW 60min Subscribe to more group boards
Roundout accomplishments for the week:
:) I did not miss any exercise
:( I found I am too tired after work to focus.
:) Tuesday decided to get up at 4:30am instead if 5:00am
:) Thursday decided to get up at 4:00am instead if 4:30am
Legend :
Priority: A=ImportantUrgent
B=ImportantNonUrgent
C=NotImportantUrgent
D=NotImportantNonUrgent
StartTimeRange: BB=BeforeBreakfast ( 5:00 - 7:00)
BW=BeforeWork ( 7:00 - 9:00)
BL=BeforeLunch ( 9:00 - 12:00)
LN=AtLunch (12:00 - 13:00)
AL=AfterLunch (13:00 - 17:00)
AW=AfterWork (17:00 - 22:00)
DW=DuringWork ( 9:00 - 17:00)
.
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Looking at the list above you can see that I separate the goals I have for my work from the goals I have for MakeMoneyOnlineForLife.
I started another round of P90X end of 2019, which I blame as one of the main reasons that I am just exhausted when I come home from work and unable to focus much on my blog.
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" align="center" title="P90X workout results" maxwidth="600" /]
The lack of progress on the blog was the main reason why I started waking up now at 4:00am instead of 5:00am. The additional hour in the morning allows me to work some more on the blog. This way I can workout in the morning before I go to work and still spend some good time on the blog.
Site Updates
There is not a lot that has changed on the site itself. I spend however some time to fix issues I had with the Hotspot analytics plugin. I want to continue to make some small changes and E.g. allow you to delete records from the database once you no longer need/wnat them.
This months list consists of only two notable plugins.
- 3D tag cloud. This will provide a 3D interactive Tag - cloud
- Hotspots Analytics. This plugin allows you to view where users click onto your pages.
3D tag cloud
This is a nicer 3D version of the default tag cloud provided as a default widget for and by WordPress. You should be able to see it on your right side.Hotspot analytics
This plugin allows you to see where your users click on one of your pages. While the basic functionality is working, tyhis plugin has a few drawbacks which am working out at the moment.You can download the plugin from github.
Traffic report
Here is the traffic graph for my income report February 2020. Just like January the growth rate is rather non-existing. I attribute this to not providing sufficient content and value for the month. Also the work I do-do on Pinterest is driving very few people to my blog.
Achievements
This February was 29 days long, I got one day more than most other Februarys however progress on the blog was rather slow. I created two blog posts which required some extensive research and that alone took time.
On Pinterest, I am now following 539 people and being followed by 214 people. This has clearly not been a focus for the blog in February. Likewise the number of impressions, and the clicks have almost remained identical to January. As I spend more focus and time on content creation I do not expect this to change dramatically in March either.
My plan is to let Pinterest go on as is until June or July. Using Tailwind is a real help here, as I only need to spend a few hours each week adding to the schedule and can spend the rest of my time with creating content.
Having a blog is a lot of work and does not end with writing a blog post. You can't simply look at the number of blog posts to measure progress. So whenever you think you did not get a lot accomplished, remember that you are one of the few who is progressing.
Remember : "Success is the progressive realization of a worthy goal or ideal." - Earl Nightingale
App side hustle
Using MoPub for my apps for the past 2.5 months has been both, eye opening and disappointing. However this is still the best alternative to AdMob that I know of. I have yet to complete the integration of the Facebook Audience Network into my AdMob account and into my apps. This may help boost the numbers a bit. The problem is like always time.
In January and February this side hustle has earned a total of $67.72 for 378,571 total impressions. I will not be able to claim this money until I have reached at least $100. Once this threshold is crossed I will still have to wait another 60days before it will eventually show up in my account. That means in other words that July is the earliest date at which I may see a reward for my hard work.
Blog income report February 2020
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The good news is that I was able to match my expenses for the blog with the income generated from the blog. The bad news is that both numbers are exactly $0.00-.
Overall I earned $5.53 through the sale of apps on the Play Store. While not a lot of money, it is however money which landed in my bank account and a positive token for all the hard work which went into my apps.
In March I want to see if I can generate some additional money on the side while writing about the process. This would allow me to boost my side income while at the same time have a new blog to post.
In summary
This income report had more than the usual amount of personal information in it. From exercise to schedule to wake up times. Whoever is reading this post should know that there is more to having a blog then simply writing. Life gets in your way, sometimes more sometimes less.
If you reach the point of exhaustion and you see little progress, just remember the other things you had to do. Eating, sleeping, and working zap away more than 2/3 of your time. Finding time to exercise and keep your health up is draining another 5-10 hours each week. Spending time with your spouse and kids if you are married with kids and you are left with way less time. some of you may have to watch out to not get into the negative.
So keep it up and think about your accomplishments instead.
Until next month then.