February 2014 Income At-A-Glance
Gross Income for February: $189,884
Total Expenses for February: $23,600
Total Net Profit for February: $166,284
Difference b/t Feb. & Jan.: Jan = + $27,677
What’s This Monthly Income Report All About Anyway?
John and I are both strong believers in transparency. We’re real people who work very hard to serve you 24/7, 365, and a big part of that is sharing openly how we make it happen.
By sharing our income reports with you every month, we’re able to give you a behind the scenes peek at what it’s really like to run a business. We even created a post that covers our first 365 days in business so that you can see what it took to build our platform, which now helps us net over $100k every single month.
We work hard to learn and grow as business owners, and we couldn’t be more excited to share it all with you.
What’s great about our monthly income reports is that we don’t focus on the pretty, fluffy stuff. Instead, we’ll dive right into the raw struggles and failures we encounter each month so that you can learn from our mistakes, and we’ll also include our wins so that you know what’s possible (and how it’s possible).
We really want you to feel what we experience day-to-day, week-by-week, month-after-month, with our overall goal being to make your journey as unobstructed as possible.
That’s not to say you won’t encounter roadblocks. Believe us – we know that no one can escape those no matter how much reading or studying you do. Just keep in mind that every roadblock is a building block towards your future success.
In summation, our monthly income report is all about helping you navigate your entrepreneurial journey in a more efficient and effective way.
Ready? Let’s go!
**We’ll receive a commission on the affiliate links below. If you click on my affiliate link and sign up for the products and services I trust and recommend, then I will earn a commission.
What Went Down In February
We moved!
The EntrepreneurOnFire studio is new, improved and radiating with hotness :)
Most of you know that John and I are a team in business and in life. From the day I came on board (May 1, 2013) until just last month (February 1, 2014), we were living in a quaint 1 bedroom apartment with the EOF studio in our living room.
On February 4, 2014 we upgraded and are now living in a 2 bedroom apartment with a breathtaking view of Sail Bay and the Pacific Ocean. Plus, I have my own office, which helps keep both John and I laser focused throughout the day.
Now, every night we get to chill out on our balcony and watch this:
The EOFire Team gets bigger
Our team of 3 just got bigger!
We were rockin’ and rollin’ with the EOF trifecta for quite some time, but the search has ended and we could not be more excited to welcome the newest member of the EntrepreneurOnFire team, Jess.
Jess joins us from the Philippines thanks to Chris Ducker’s Virtual Staff Finder service, and she will be helping the EOFire team by providing support to our two communities, Fire Nation Elite and Podcasters’ Paradise, in addition to helping us out with other daily tasks in Infusionsoft.
If you’re a member of Fire Nation Elite or Podcasters’ Paradise, give Jess a warm Fire Nation welcome next time you see her in the community!
Our live Podcast Workshops
February brought us continued success with our weekly, live Podcast Workshops, to the tune of $124,000 in sales for Podcasters’ Paradise (over 86% of which can be attributed directly to webinar sales).
During the Podcast Workshop John discusses in detail the explosion podcasting is experiencing and why this is such an exciting time to start a podcast. He also reviews the entire podcasting workflow so you can see it in action, plus he shares two great podcasting hacks: 1) ranking in iTunes and 2) appearing in not just 1 – but 3 – categories in iTunes.
If you’d like to join us on our next live Podcast Workshop, just click here to register!
Paradise, meet Facebook
It’s official! In February we launched our Private Facebook group for Podcasters’ Paradise, and let me tell you, the questions, advice and recommendations being shared within are priceless.
A big thanks goes out to our Paradisers for adding so much incredible value!
Gumroad: A work in progress
Switching merchant accounts is a lot of work and requires testing, tweaking and at times – some guessing.
You know how sometimes you think of a great idea, and you’re ready to just do it, and then as you start to make the changes you realize it’s not just a simple push of a button?… Yes, I know you know what I’m talking about.
Even though we talked about transitioning over to Gumroad in our last income report, it’s still a work in progress. Not in a bad way, just in a “we kind of have a lot going on” way.
I will say from the work we have done thus far, Gumroad is pretty incredible. We set up 5 different product forms in a matter of minutes – super easy! Then, in order to integrate the product forms with Infusionsoft, we set up a couple of rules in Zapier (action sets so that when someone purchases, Infusionsoft knows it needs to do something).
Now, on to testing!
RescueTime summary
While we did have a lot going on in February with our move and me attending a conference for 5 days towards the end of the month, we didn’t let that stop us from putting in some solid hours on the computer.
This month we decided to include not only our total hours for the month, (big thanks to our RescueTime app for helping us keep track!), but also the top 3 sites we each spent the most time on.
Kate’s February: 178 hours total
Kate’s top 3 sites for the month (in order):
1. Gmail
2. CustomerHub (community management)
3. EntrepreneurOnFire.com (includes backend time)
John’s February: 257 hours total
John’s top 3 sites for the month (in order):
1. Adobe Audition
2. Gmail
3. Skype
Ready for the bare bones?
February 2014 Breakdown
Income
Fire Nation Elite Mastermind: $11,440
Sponsorship Income: $35,580
Podcast Launch (eBook on Amazon): $421
Podcast Launch (Audiobook on Audible): $180
Podcasters’ Paradise (invoice total): $124,000
Total Launch Package: $6,000
1-on-1 Mentoring: $7,395
Affiliate Income: $4,868
*Affiliate links below – if you click on my affiliate link and sign up for the products and services I trust and recommend, then I will earn a commission.
- BlueHost: $1,950 Step-by-step guide and 23 WordPress tutorials included! Disclaimer: This is my affiliate link and I will receive a commission if you sign up through my link
- Amazon: $418
- Studio 1 Design (website designer): $400
- Ramit Sethi: $972
- Fizzle: $47
- LeadPages: $1,000
- AWeber: $81
Total Gross Income in February: $189,884
Expenses
- Advertising: $5,595
- Design & Branding: $135
- Education: $33
- Entertainment: $1,635
- LibSyn: $235
- Other Business Expenses: $3,500
- Paradise Affiliate Commissions: $2,464
- Promotional: $715
- Taxes & Licenses (for our LLC): $155
- TheMidRoll (Sponsorships): $4,000
- Total Launch Package Fees: $400
- Travel: $775
- Virtual Assistant Fees: $1,100
- Website Fees: $85
Recurring, subscription-based payments: $2,773
- Adobe Creative Cloud*: $49.99
- Authorize.net*: $91.10
- Cell Phone*: $171
- eVoice*: $9.95
- Infusionsoft CRM*: $209
- Insurance*: $172
- Mentor*: $2,000
- Quickbooks Online*: $25
- ScheduleOnce*: $42.19
- Skype*: $2.99
Total Expenses in February: $23,600
Total Net Profit for February 2014: $166,284
Things We Learned In February
Live Webinars are the BEST way to sell your product or service
Yes, I said the BEST! How do we know? Because 86% of Podcasters’ Paradise sales happen during our live webinars.
John and I have worked incredibly hard to perfect this process, and the most exciting thing about it is once you have the tools to make it happen, like LeadPages and Aweber (or other CRM), everything else is FREE!
This realization along with a TON of inbound questions about how we pull off a weekly webinar brought us to another exciting realization: We need to create a product that walks Entrepreneurs through this entire process step-by-step.
Enter: WebinarOnFire! This course will show you every step you need to take in order to create a Webinar that will have the sales of your product and/or service IGNITING the world!
Click here to join our interest list, where we’ll not only keep you updated on the course, but also offer you the exclusive early bird special once WebinarOnFire is live!
Writing A LOT really does work
Something we’ve been working really hard on for the past several months is continuing to improve our weekly newsletter content.
This is the email that we send out once a week to our list of now over 10,000 subscribers. You might have read our first and second email newsletter diary: a recap of what our newsletters used to be, and where they’re headed now thanks to YOUR input (seriously, thank you!)
The third diary is coming out soon, which will wrap up what we’ve done to take our email newsletters to the next level.
But I mention it here because the biggest thing we’ve taken away from our experience in writing these weekly newsletters in February is that the more often we practice our writing, the easier they are to write and the better the content becomes.
You might sit down and wonder, “What on earth am I going to write about?” That’s perfect – write anyway!
Just start typing.
Set aside a specific time each day to do it, and don’t let yourself down by making excuses like “I don’t know what to write.”
Email marketing takes practice – and time
We have two big email marketing campaigns that we’re really focused on right now set up in Infusionsoft, which is our Client Relationship Management system. Thanks to feedback from others in the industry who specialize in email marketing, this month opened our eyes a lot and gave a whole new meaning to those campaigns.
The first, which is called The Fire Path, is an exclusive email series Where Your Passion and Our Guidance Unite! The second is our Podcasters’ Paradise Nurture Campaign, which is built specifically for those who are interested in Paradise, but who haven’t purchased a lifetime membership to the community yet.
What did the experts say?
First off, we’ve received some amazing feedback from our exclusive email series subscribers about The Fire Path. But one thing they’re all asking us for?… A Table of Contents, or linked document that will help them easily refer back to previous emails in the series.
You might be thinking right now, “Hey! Your subscribers aren’t the experts!”
Oh yes they are!
We had originally planned to wait until the series was complete and then create an eBook from the material, which we still plan on doing; however, the overwhelming response and multiple requests for a “compilation” of the content has convinced us this is something we need to (and will) create.
If you’re already on The Fire Path, stay tuned for an email announcement once the reference is complete!
Second, with the success we’ve seen in converting Podcast Workshop attendees to actual Podcasters’ Paradise members, we started receiving questions from mentors and trusted partners like, “What happens after someone registers for the Podcast Workshop?“, and “Do you have a nurture campaign for warm Paradise leads?“, and “What does your follow-up sequence look like after the Workshop is over?”
After answering each of these questions, we got to thinking about how we could improve each of these sequences. We knew the answers to all of these questions, but whether or not our nurture campaign was set up well with intriguing and valuable content targeted towards someone who has been on one of our webinars – or whether or not our follow-up sequence included reminders and additional offers to encourage a purchase – is what we really started to focus on.
Just within the past week we’ve really upped our campaign sequences for Paradise thanks to the help of our trusted friends, so a big Thank You! goes out to them!
It’s okay to ask for help
February reminded me of how lucky we are to be able to reach out to our trusted friends and advisors and ask for help, especially when it comes to systems and software that we’re not entirely familiar with.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m a big proponent of learning things on your own, especially when you’re first starting out, because it helps you better understand how to delegate those items when the time is right. But when we find ourselves spending an overwhelming amount of time trying to figure out one single part of something and never actually “getting anywhere”, we’re all about reaching out to the experts for help.
Because they continue to be there for us month after month – delivering top-notch service and knowledge every single time we touch base – I wanted to give a shout out to Insightful Automation. Not only do they ensure that everything having to do with our Infusionsoft and CustomerHub accounts are working the way they should, they also take the time to get to know us and know our business.
You can’t do EVERYTHING on your own; remember: it’s okay to ask for help – especially from those who you know, like and trust!
Smart money
Speaking of thanks… Thanks to our Certified Personal Accountant, Josh Bauerle of CPA On Fire, we invested the max of $51,000 into in a Keogh 401k plan for 2013 (and we have already maxed out 2014’s as well!)
This is likely something we wouldn’t have even known about if it weren’t for Josh, which is why (in additional to so many other reasons) we highly recommend that you hire a CPA to help manage your money.
There’s no huge rush, especially if you’re not monetizing just yet, but it’s definitely something to keep in mind!
Alright Fire Nation, that’s a wrap!
Until next month,
~ Kate & John
