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 quickly see that our main source of income is our content production business that we created 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 October 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 | 11,956.96 |
| Twitter advertising | 44 |
| Note 2 phone sale | 50 |
| TOTAL INCOME | 12,050.96 |
| EXPENSES | EURO € |
| BUSINESS | |
| Writers | 5611.5 |
| Online Software | 111 |
| ATM Fees* | 105 |
| Facebook Adverts | 25.67 |
| Website Upkeep | 43.83 |
| TOTAL BUSINESS EXPENSES | 5897 |
| MONTHLY BILLS | |
| Accommodation in hotels etc | 468.90 |
| Three mobile Internet* | 40 |
| Hostgator | 11.50 |
| Freshbooks Accounting subscription | 37.20 |
| Netflix | 7.99 |
| Hootsuite | 11.30 |
| Dropbox Pro | 10 |
| Mailchimp | 9.10 |
| Clicky Pro subscription | 9.10 |
| Crowdfire App subscription | 9 |
| Bluehost | 8.15 |
| Google apps account | 8 |
| TOTAL MONTLY BILLS | 630.24 |
| FOOD/DRINK | |
| Eating Out | 353.45 |
| Groceries | 127.60 |
| Cafes | 144.85 |
| Snacks | 76 |
| TOTAL FOOD&DRINK EXPENSES | 701.9 |
| EVERYDAY EXPENSES | |
| Fuel for Car | 30 |
| Entertainment | 43 |
| Clothes | 49.30 |
| Household goods | 3.60 |
| TOTAL EVERYDAY EXPENSES | 125.90 |
| TRAVEL EXPENSES | |
| Transport | 146.68 |
| Flights | 512.00 |
| Tours | 622.10 |
| TOTAL TRAVEL EXPENSES | 1280.78 |
| MISC EXPENSES | |
| Nights out | 80 |
| Family gifts | 45 |
| Florence personal spending | 412 |
| TOTAL MISC EXPENSES | 537 |
| TOTAL INCOME | 12,050.96 |
| TOTAL EXPENSES | - 9172.82 |
| Profit/Loss for the month of September | +€2878.14 |
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Comments:
INCOME
€12,050.96 in total income for this month.
This is about €1200 less than Septembers and it’s also the first month since February that we’ve experienced a decrease in income from the previous month.
Not that we’re complaining. We’re stoked that we were able to notch up three consecutive 10k+ months…all while travelling around India.
Last month we also informed you about our decision to let one of our long-term clients go. This was due to the amount of time involved working with this particular client. So that loss of €2,000 each month will hit us from November onwards.
We’re already working on replacing that client with a couple of others.
These past few months will balance themselves out over December/January/February – which will invariably be quite months for most online businesses like ours.
**We’re looking for more writers**
If you’re interested in getting paid to write for us (not on our blog – NextStopWhoKnows), then please hit reply to this email and we can take it from there. The work is straight forward and if we think you’d be a good match for what we’re looking for then it’s solid, regular work going forwards.
We got a great response from this last month and ended up adding 4 new writers to our team.
So, we’ve decided to run it for another month and see if we can get another few added. We’re always expanding our writer base to supply our clients with quality content, so if you’re a native English speaker and you’d like to write for us then please get in touch.
Now, onto the rotten expenses. Our BIGGEST month for expenses so far……
EXPENSES
€9172.82 we spent in October! Ouch!
Here’s a few notes about some of them:
- Online software: (appsumo – marketing stack bungle €23 + Serge Ramelli lightroom course €88)
- Website upkeep: (Namecheap domain renewals and some VA work)
- Facebook Advertisements: We advertised for new writers on a few occasions during October.
- Entertainment: (Cinema: The Walk 3D, Bridge of spies, Ebook)
- Transport: (includes taxis in India, 1 bus and 1 train journey in Ireland)
- Flights: (Flights include: Delhi to Jodhpur, Udaipur to Mumbai, Dublin to Rome, Knock to London)
- Tours: (Tours and tips in India)
Of course a lot of those expenses could have been reduced but we decided to fly the long distances in India rather than waste the time in trains/buses.
We’re currently in London for the World Travel Market show and we’re already making a dent in the expenses for November!
Next week will see us fly to Italy for eight days to catch up with my dad and also buy a second hand car. We’re thinking November could be a break even month if things pan out the way they’re shaping up to be already.
Profitable Month
We’ve added another €2878.14 to the bank account after all the expenses. So we’re delighted with that.
As we’ve said before, our goal is to make a profit of at least €1,000 each month. This helps to keep us on our toes and maintain focus on building up our business.
We’re very close to hitting six figures for the year which will be a massive milestone occasion for us. If you’d told us this time last year that we’d be in that sort of a position come the end of 2015, we wouldn’t have believed it.
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.
