November blog income resultsIf time flies when you’re having fun, I must be having a blast. It seems like just last week that I was figuring up the income for October but alas, the calendar doesn’t lie. Last month I made $595 and set a goal for this month of $1,000. So, did I make it?

Not quite.

For the month of November I made $556.50 from the following sources:

Affiliate Sales: $45.00

Private Advertising: $245.00

Sponsored Reviews: $266.50

What Went Wrong?

Early in the month I was on a frantic pace and was on track to exceed the $1k goal for this month. So what happened? As best I can tell, a couple of factors combined to bring the numbers back to earth. First and foremost, Google removed all of this site’s PageRank. Originally I wasn’t all that concerned about the effect that would have on my income. In fact, I wrote:

Obviously I won’t be able to use PageRank as a selling point for any advertising, but I think my Technorati and Alexa along with my traffic numbers should be enough to allow me to march on toward my goal of a full time income.

While it’s only been a couple of weeks, it certainly appears I underestimated the value advertisers place on income. While my private ad sales have not diminished (in fact, the 125 x 125 ad spots have sold out for the first time), the number of Sponsored Reviews has decreased noticeably. As I mentioned, it is still too early to tell for sure whether PageRank is the driving force behind the drop but let’s just say it’s my prime suspect so far.

The other most notable change has been the drop in my affiliate earnings. Last month I made $200.00 in affiliate commissions. A large chunk of that was through Text Link Ads’ affiliate program. And while I sent roughly 75% the traffic over to TLA as I did last month, according to their affiliate stats, not a single one of those referrals converted. A large part of that could also be due to Google’s war on paid links but I’ve also lost confidence in Text Link Ads’ affiliate program. As I mentioned last month, they had trouble accurately reporting the number of new clients and publishers I had referred. It was only after several emails to their support team that I finally saw numbers that I thought were accurate. Needless to say, the fact no referrals were reported for this month hasn’t done anything to help TLA’s standing in my eyes. As a result I’ve removed the affiliate button and will look for other programs to promote.

Also playing a large role in the drop in affiliate commissions is the fact that I didn’t promote affiliate products or services much in November. As discussed last week, I struggled managing the blog when pressed for time and unfortunately, affiliate promotions was one of the areas that suffered.

What Went Well?

Don’t get me wrong, despite the negatives I just covered, this blog still earned $556.50 in income for the month. That means some sources had to have performed well right? Absolutely.

Sponsored Reviews became the #1 source of income for the blog despite tailing off drastically over the last two weeks. They also launched their affiliate program this month which is one more possible source of income considering I’ve already earned 4 referrals over the first two weeks it’s been active. Also, direct or private advertising continued to perform well and looks to be picking up steam heading into December.

Where to from Here?

So where do I go from here? For the month of December I’m setting the same goal that I failed to meet this month. I’m shooting for $1,000 in income. As mentioned earlier, I’ve already sold more 125 x 125 ads than last month and starting next Friday, I’ll have another product to promote… BloggingExperiment’s very own custom theme! Hopefully that will help off set any income I might lose due to having no Google PageRank. While I have 7 months left, I’ll need to continued growth in terms of income if I’m going to achieve the goal of this experiment.

What about you? How did November’s income stack up? Did you notice any drop in your income as a result of the recent controversy surrounding Google Page Rank and the sale of links? Please share your thoughts and results in the comments below.

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