Summary

Christina, an online content creator, has provided an update on her "Road to $5k Per Month Challenge," detailing her earnings, followers, and strategies from December to January, showing significant growth and expressing optimism for future success.

Abstract

In her January update, Christina reports a substantial increase in her monthly income, from $659.75 in December to$ 1,155.84 in January, moving closer to her goal of earning $5k per month by the end of 2024. Her income streams include writing on Medium, a mini newsletter, affiliate marketing, and the recent addition of digital products. Despite a slight decrease in new followers on Medium compared to the previous month, she remains positive, noting that growth is growth. Christina also highlights her successful experiment with creating and selling digital products, which contributed to her increased earnings. She plans to continue this momentum by setting ambitious goals for February, including increasing her Medium earnings, affiliate earnings, newsletter subscribers, and digital product sales.

Opinions

Christina is pleased with her progress, especially the increase in monthly income.
She values the growth of her Medium followers and newsletter subscribers, despite fluctuations.
Christina is enthusiastic about the potential of digital products as a new income stream.
She expresses a preference for the affiliate marketing community and educational platform, Wealthy Affiliate, which she has been a part of since 2009.
Christina is optimistic about her ability to reach her income goals, viewing the journey as a fun challenge.
She believes that her success is replicable, suggesting that anyone can achieve similar results with effort and persistence.

The Road to $5k Per Month Challenge — January Updates

Earnings, followers, and stats out the wazoo!

I promised to make monthly updates to my Road to $5k Month Challenge, and I can’t believe it’s already time for the first one!

As a recap, my goal is to make $5k per month by the end of 2024 and then to be consistent (or increase that amount) as we go into 2025.

I plan to do this in 4 ways:

Writing through blogging/Medium
My mini newsletter
Affiliate marketing
Digital products

(And I may add Amazon KDP at some point, but I don’t want to get too ahead of myself!)

Now let’s see how my first month went!

December’s Results

First, I’ll tell you my December results, so you have some comparison. (Here’s December’s full breakdown if you want more details.)

Writing through blogging/Medium: I had 1.3k followers and made $540.95, which was awesome!
My mini newsletter: I had 453 subscribers, but I ended up cleaning my list and it dropped down to about 350.
Affiliate sales: I was paid $118.50 in affiliate sales.
Digital products: N/A

Total monthly income in December = $659.75

January’s Results

I’ll take you through January’s results, similar to what I did in my December breakdown I linked above.

Reads & Views

Here are my reads and views for January (and December for comparison).

Just a bit more in January versus December, but pretty good! Growth is growth.

Followers

I gained 527 followers, which was less than last month’s 617, but I’m OK with it. I appreciate anyone who wants to read what I have to write! lol

Email subscribers went from 31 to 61, which was a nice jump from December.

Earnings

My Medium earnings last month were great, and I’m happy with them. I had a goal to beat last month’s earnings, and I did by $39.15. I’m happy with that! (November included for comparison.)

As mentioned, last month my newsletter subscribers were at 453, but I removed about 100 from my list because they were “cold” (I don’t remember the exact number).

Here’s where we’re at now:

Growth was stagnant for a little bit, but I started getting subscribers again recently, which is great.

I want to think about better ways to grow my newsletter, but I’m OK with how it’s going for now.

Opens and CTRs are pretty good. I’m not totally sure what I should be shooting for here, but I think this is fairly standard:

Overall, I’m happy with how the newsletter is coming along! Considering I can get it set up and sent out every day in about 10 minutes or less, any results I get with it are a win! lol

Affiliate sales

Last month I was paid out on an affiliate sale for $118.50. This month, I’ll get paid $428.00 in affiliate sales.

Most of this is from my favorite affiliate marketing community and educational platform. (aff. link)

(Note: $22.50 of these sales will come next month…)

I love this site, and not just because they pay me for referrals. lol I’ve been a member since 2009. It’s a large, vibrant community full of like-minded people. And they host all of my websites, which makes it super easy for me to manage.

Digital products

This is a new one for me! I set the intention to create a digital product as an experiment, and I completed it this past Monday!

I’ve made 9 sales so far for a net total of $198.

After fees and affiliate payouts, I’ll receive $147.74.

Total January earnings

My total December earnings: $659.75.

My total January earnings: $1,155.84.

That’s not quite double from December, but getting pretty close. I’ll take it! I just told my son a minute ago, “I’m finally profitable! For once in my life!”

Hey, you gotta take the wins when you can.

Income Goal Tracker Update

As a reminder, you can grab your own free Income Goal Tracker here. Have fun coloring your way to your goals!

Here’s where I am with mine currently:

Now I’m in hard-level mode where it goes up by $1,000 each time. Let’s see how long it takes to get to that final goal. This will be fun…!

What’s Next?

I still need to write up my February goals, but this is my rough plan:

Medium earnings: My goal will be to increase my earnings to at least $700. (Part of this is luck, but I’ll do what I can to reach this.)
Affiliate earnings: I’ll set a goal of $500. Might be tough, but that’s the fun of it, right? Easy goals are boring.
Newsletter: I’d love to get to 500 subscribers.
Digital sales: I’m going to shoot for $400. I also have plans to add another digital product this month.

Final Thoughts

I’m still pretty far from my goal of making $5,000 per month, but I am extremely happy with the growth from the past two months.

**January rocked!!** | Image created by the author in Midjourney.

I hope it’s helpful for you to have a peek behind the curtains and see what’s working (and what isn’t).

I have failed at this online thing for so long, so trust me when I tell you…

If I can have some success, anyone can!

About the Author

Hey! I’m Christina, an introverted book nerd on the outside, and a raging metalhead on the inside. 🤘 I’m a married mom to two teenagers (and 3 cats and a dog). I love Vegas 🎰, the band Chevelle 🎸, and murder mysteries 📖.

I also love creating short, daily lists of resources and ideas to help you boost your online income. 👈 Click that astonishingly long link to sign up for free.