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Whew, October is now a memory and November is almost half over. It’s definitely past time to get this October income report published!
My goal while going to college is to make $1000-$1500 per month. But, I’m learning that there are always snafus in the life of a freelancer! For instance, I was expecting a $400 payment on October 30th. But, the company I wrote for didn’t actually get those posts approved in time for the final October payout. So now that money will be deposited tomorrow instead.
So now my November numbers will be high. That means my October ones are low.
How low?
Well, let’s look at the numbers.
October Income
In October, I had $830 in income enter my account. This money was all from writing.
If that $400 payment had come in when I expected it to, I would have been at $1230, right in the middle of my target zone.
So I didn’t technically make my goal, but I did do the amount of work that I needed to to get there. If that makes any sense at all!
In other words, I’m not too mad at myself for how the month turned out. And I’m pretty excited for next month’s numbers to roll in!
On the other hand, this experience made me realize that I need to do better at communicating with this particular client. I haven’t had any problems with any of my other ones. So a good lesson for me on being proactive.
October Expenses
I took a hard look at my expenses since I’ve purposefully cut down my freelancing. I reevaluated everything I was spending money on to decide if it was helping my bottom line in the end.
After evaluating, I dropped a mastermind group I had been participating in. It was a great group of people, but the format used didn’t really match what works for me.
That’ll save a bit of money going forward. October was my last monthly payment.
Otherwise, my expenses were for:
- My Google work email
- ConvertKit
- A batch of five images for my blog
- PayPal fees
Very reasonable–all together they came in at $152.2.
Plans for November
I know the month is halfway over, but it’s not too late to get my plans down in writing!
November will purposefully be another slower month for me.
Thankfully, by the end of the month I should be done with all of my college courses by the week after Thanksgiving. That’ll free up a lot of time, and more importantly, take away stress. It’ll be so nice to file paperwork to renew my teaching certificate and know I’m good for another five years!
Well, technically I can’t file that paperwork until my official transcript is available in December, but that’s okay. It’ll get done!
Otherwise, I’ll continue to pitch for jobs that are a good fit and leave room in my schedule for a few wins. I don’t want to go crazy pitching because of the little one we’re expecting. Once I have baby early next year, I’m looking forward to focusing on growing once again.
I also plan on building a buffer back into my own blogs. I used to have at least one post scheduled in advance on each. But during this past month that didn’t happen. Now I’m waiting until the last minute to write for myself, which I don’t like doing.
In anticipation of baby, I’m planning on getting three posts ahead on all three of my blogs. I’ll let you know how I’m progressing towards that goal in my income report next month!
An October Win to Share
I start training for a new position this week that I applied for way back in July and completed a sample for in late October. I’ll be providing content editing for an ELA curriculum. I think it’ll be a nice change of pace from strictly writing. Editing will also be a nice addition to my skill-set.
And it’s a gig that’ll last until summer. I love not recurring work that pays well!
Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
I hope all my US readers have a wonderful Thanksgiving! We were planning on a trip to see my husband’s mom, but then my husband found out he has to work on Friday. So no traveling for us this year.
How did your October go? Was it as productive as you planned?
Lisa Tanner is a former teacher turned homeschooling mom with 11 kids. She's also a successful freelance writer. Lisa enjoys helping other busy moms find time to start and grow a side hustle of their own.
