In todayās issue, I announce my new column, so you always get that sweet sweet practical life-tactic nectar in every email, we delve into my earnings for April, and I give you the story of my GPS-tracked missing AirPods.
A doozy and a half, and itās still in progress.
Here we go.
šŗ Hereās Some Advice
Do not, I repeat, do not go to someoneās house if you suspect they have your shit and you want to confront them - why?
At 11 am on Sunday the 24th, I was fuming.
I was about to go for a walk down to the shops to pick up some groceries, and like any other chilled individual, I wanted to listen to some music, but my damn AirPods were nowhere to be found.
I then realized that Find My Phone on the iPhone could track these puppies down.
And where were they? Seven suburbs away, about half an hour, and thatās when the adventure began.
The discovery leads to a plot that keeps thickening like some never-ending thick shake and gives me a lesson that answers the question āWhy shouldnāt I go door-knocking?ā
The short version of it was about 1000 words, and I had other crap that I wanted to share with you, so I ended up taking it out of this email for space - and I published it as a self-contained article, enjoy my pain if you want to.
But before delving into that, do you like numbers?
Because here are my April š° numbers.
šø April Earnings Breakdown
Medium was piloting the rocket ship this month, again.
But here are a few facts before you go rushing to Medium to make a living online.
āš¼ Medium Facts
The revenue you earn can be as inconsistent as the 9/10 you matched with on Tinder (as weāll soon see).
It takes at least one year to establish yourself (read: Medium to give a shit) on the platform.
And unless youāre the 0.1%, you canāt rely on Medium alone - nearly all content platforms are like that.
Letās start with the inconsistency and luck - spot the odd one here:
As you can see, without the tail event of my top article ($2,842), my revenue would have been ~93% less for the month (from Medium) - and you just canāt predict whether or not youāll get a tail event (viral post).
The lesson here (even though Iām not quite there yet) is to diversify as a creator and business.
Donāt ājustā do YouTube, Medium, or Freelancing, have multiple sources; hell, Iām still getting there. I mean, at the speed of a sedated snail, but itās happening.
Iām coming up on 5,000 followers and will soon release my pre-publishing checklist along with an āeverything I know about Mediumā resource, so definitely stay tuned for that.
š Other Numbers
š§ This email got 20+ new subscribers, so welcome, guys and gals - weāre at 1020 now. I hope you enjoy this bad decision youāve all collectively made.
š„ I let the Tweeting slip this month, but Iām quickly realizing I donāt want to get into this weird circle-jerk of regurgitating bullshit, so Iām adjusting my content to be more of my own free-flowing thoughts; Iāll let you know how that goesā¦
š· My Gumroad sales of ~$106 came from about ~200 views, which is awesome; it means the revenue generated in the middle of my funnel has an RPM of ~$500.
$63 came from Clarity, a personal guide on how I live my life, and $43 came from my free (pay what you want) Productivity Database.
I eventually want my products and services to make up the bulk of my solo-creator revenue, and the strategy for that currently is āmake good shit.ā
And thatās the plan.
šŗ Armchair Advice (The New Column)
Itās a working title, ladies and gents, but this will be a question-time ask-me-anything type deal.
I get my fair share of questions ranging from very specific to very general all over Medium, Email, Twitter, and more.
In this section, Iām going to delve into those and answer them with as many failed attempts at comedy as you can take.
Emails and Substack comments get preference, and we can all get out the popcorn - hereās one I got recently.
Dan K. - When did you start making money on the internet?
Oh Dan, oh Danā¦
My brother and I set up a Blogger.com account back in 2009.
For those of you who donāt know, it was the easiest CMS/web builder to start on back in the day, and I had heard of this cool thing called Google Adsense.
Google did (and does) this wonderful thing where it gives you a share of the ad revenue you generate. Our income for our gaming blog was $36ā¦ 1 day after we launchedā¦ from 20 viewsā¦ with all ads meticulously clickedā¦ by usā¦
That was our first dollar, and we were immediately (and understandably) banned for it.
Got a question? Donāt be shy and hit reply.
š Linkilius Dumpius
ā A little write-up on the life, work, and happiness theory.
š Interesting infographic breaking down the dimensions of culture.
š Iām revisiting an old episode of Top Gear where they have a hilarious Vietnam adventure that, now Iām thinking about it, probably embedded the idea of traveling there years ago.
š A tweet I saw recently where I just had to laugh and sigh at the same time.
And thatās it for this one, guys and gals; chat to you in the next one!
Again, let me know if you like me sharing things like growth and earnings. Also, donāt forget to blast me with questions, or check out my getting robbed story š
Catch you,
āš¼ Sah