Hey guys! You’re here because you’ve signed up to receive our monthly income & expenses reports.
The primary goal of these income reports is to give you an idea of how we manage our online endeavours, and to give you an indication of how much it costs to live and travel in the countries that we do. We figured they will also be a great motivator for us to keep striving towards bigger numbers in terms of income at the end of every month.
If you’re new to the blog, you’ll see that our main source of income is our content creation agency that we built-up from scratch back in late 2012. You can read more about how we make money online here.
Anyway, let’s get down to business…
The report below is a breakdown of our total income for the month of November 2015 as well as a rundown of our expenses and it also states the profit or loss figure after all is said and done.
If you’d like to see our past Income reports then head on over here to check them out!
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| INCOME | EURO € |
| Content Business | 15,566.03 |
| TOTAL INCOME | 15,566.03 |
| EXPENSES | EURO € |
| BUSINESS | |
| Writers | 9,961 |
| Online Software | 80 |
| Facebook Adverts | 18 |
| Website Upkeep | 245 |
| Skype Calls | 10.50 |
| TOTAL BUSINESS EXPENSES | 10,314.5 |
| MONTHLY BILLS | |
| Accommodation in hotels etc | 570 |
| Phone/Internet | 73 |
| Hostgator | 11.50 |
| Bluehost | 8.15 |
| Freshbooks Accounting subscription | 37.20 |
| Netflix | 7.99 |
| Google apps account | 12 |
| Crowdfire App subscription | 9 |
| Mailchimp | 9.10 |
| Dropbox Pro | 10 |
| Clicky Pro subscription | 9.10 |
| TOTAL MONTLY BILLS | 757.04 |
| FOOD/DRINK | |
| Eating Out | 399.60 |
| Groceries | 445.70 |
| Cafes | 36.60 |
| Snacks | 33.50 |
| TOTAL FOOD&DRINK EXPENSES | 915.4 |
| EVERYDAY EXPENSES | |
| Fuel for Car | 50 |
| Entertainment | 60.80 |
| Clothes | 34 |
| TOTAL EVERYDAY EXPENSES | 144.8 |
| TRAVEL EXPENSES | |
| Transport | 342.10 |
| TOTAL TRAVEL EXPENSES | 342.10 |
| MISC EXPENSES | |
| Nights out | 85 |
| Family gifts | 105 |
| Florence personal spending | 303.50 |
| Personal Care (Hair) | 68.3 |
| Gadgets/Tech | 831.56 |
| Birthdays | 45 |
| Family/Gifts | 105 |
| TOTAL MISC EXPENSES | 1,543.36 |
| TOTAL INCOME | 15,566.03 |
| TOTAL EXPENSES | -14,017.2 |
| Profit/Loss for the month of September | +€1,538.83 |
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Comments:
INCOME
€15,566.03 in total income for this month.
This is our best month to date and beats our previous record back in September by over €2,000
Another cracking month for us and not travelling as much over the past month as definitely allowed us to really focus on the business side of things
We managed to bag ourselves a really juicy client at the start of November which added a decent chunk to the months revenue stream. We negotiated a large two month bulk order contract with them worth about €3,000 per month.
Now, onto the negatives….
EXPENSES
We spent €14,017.2 in November.
Our biggest expense was our legendary writing team who we paid a combined €9,961 to in November.
We had a few low margin projects on our end that resulted in us paying a few writers more than the normal rate. This obviously resulted in a bigger expense on us, but it meant that the both the client and writers were satisfied – which is the most important thing for us.
We also had a long weekend business trip to London for a travel convention at the start of the month which chewed up a lot of money. London is crazy expensive as you know, but we were actually very surprised at how expensive it was in general.
Living in Thailand for a period of time really spoils you in that respect.
In addition to London, we also went to Italy for 8 days the following weekend to visit my dad who’s over there for a short break.
Here’s a few notes about some of the other expenses we incurred throughout the month:
- Online software: (Jake Olson Studio photography course )
- Website upkeep: (New business cards for NextStopWhoKnows, Blog redesign work and VA research)
- Facebook Advertisements: (Advertisement for our “Photo of India” book project
- Gadgets/Tech: Sigma 17-50mm F2.8 lens, La Cie rugged 2T rugged external hard drive, macbook case, 2 new chargers for our note 4 phones.
- Transport: (Included taxis, bus transfers and trains in London)
From the expense breakdown, you can see that we spent a fair bit just in the tech section alone.
Not all these expenses were necessary, but we are looking at taking our photography and video a little more seriously in 2016, so we’ve invested in a few things that will help out in that respect. (That’s my excuse anyways)
We also bought a second hand car in Italy and another one here in Ireland. These expenses didn’t go through yet, but they will in December.
Profitable Month
We’ve added another €1,538.83 to the bank account after all the expenses were looked after. Even though it was our biggest month revenue wise, we still spent a fair bit with outgoing expenses.
Six Figures 🙂
We’re also delighted to have blasted through the six-figure mark for the year in revenue. We’re also on course to end the year with our biggest month to date!
Our clients have already placed their orders well in advance for the Christmas period so we’re hoping to possibly hit the €18,000 figure mark for the month of December going by our predictions.
January is going to be completely dead month income wise due to businesses not starting up until the middle of the month. It’s the same each year, so we’ll enjoy the quiet period as it will allow us to concentrate on a few other things.
NextStopWhoKnows
After a loooong period of inactivity on Next Stop Who Knows, we’re back in action as of this Sunday! We finally got the backend issues fixed and a redesign on the front end completed. So, starting from this Sunday we’ll be back blogging with weekly blog posts. We’ve a ton of content from India alone to churn out, so keep an eye out for those.
What are your thoughts?
Think there’s something we can improve on with these reports? We’d love to hear from you with any suggestions.
To get in touch, you can send us an email to:
info@nextstopwhoknows.com
And finally…
We wouldn’t be able to do these reports without the very cool and easy to use YNAB software. Using YNAB and incorporating it into our everyday life has literally changed the way we budget, spend and save our money. For the full lowdown on just how great it is, you can read our full review here.
