Approaching my 5-year mark...clearing $10K per month is relatively normal

24 replies
Hey guys, I'm not selling anything here on this forum. Although I have been strongly considering starting up a coaching business in the MMO niche down the road, my current story has nothing to do with selling "make money online" stuff...

About 5 years ago I decided to get serious in starting an online business teaching music. I wasn't sure how I was going to make money, but I knew that I wanted to deal in digital products and set it up so that I could get paid "passively" (work hours separate from income).

Here is a brief summary of the milestones that I have reached. Use this as inspiration if you are still new.

- For the first year I struggled to force myself to keep going, but I pushed through

- By the 2nd year I had been making some sporadic sales on my course that I made and steadily growing my audience. My monthly income was steadily growing, but still not exceeding $1K per month.

- In my 3rd year I found out that I was having a kid. I had $10K to my name, and I either had to go back to working a full time job again or go "all in" with the internet business. I decided to take a chance, so I paid a coach $5K for 30 days of internet marketing training.

- The coach taught me the importance of building the email list. At that point I had already been collecting emails in a half-assed manner, and I really didn't understand the value in "the list", but I listened and did it anyway. Collecting emails, setting up an auto-responder sequence and learning about the "one page, one goal" mantra took me to the point where I was clearing at least $1K per month on a regular basis. Sales started to become a regular thing.

- Towards the middle and end of year 3, I was making around $2K to $3K per month

- By year 4 I had internalized everything that I was taught by the coach, and I had refined my skills. I reached several milestones in this year, including the $10K in one month milestone...I had a successful YouTube video (amongst the hundreds of others that I had previously made) that seemed to propel me to the next level. After making that video, I cleared $10K for 3 months in a row

- At the end of year 4 and into year 5, the income dropped a bit, but it stabilized around the $5K per month point. Clearing $5K per month had become a regular occurrence (my initial goal when starting out was just to hit $3K per month consistently!)

- In year 5 I had decided to finally turn on monetization of my YouTube channel. I had a nice subscriber base of around 60K, which was steadily growing. In the first month I made a couple hundred bucks in ad revenue (on top of the steady sales of my course)

- By year 5 I had also learned that people LOVE sales. I had a buyers list and a prospect list. On holidays I would run sales where I offered a 20% discount...this would predictably result in tons of sales. Making $2K in a day or 2 was fairly normal while a sale was running.

- In the middle of year 5, my YouTube ad revenue had gotten to the point where it was clearing $2K per month. I had also raised the price of my product from $59 to $69. This small price increase had caused sales to go UP.

- For the last 3 months, I have been making about 6 sales per day on average ($69 x 6 sales per day isn't too bad!). My YouTube ad revenue also continues to increase as long as I keep putting out new content. Last month I cleared $15K for the first time

- Just today I released my first new product, which I was scared to promote to my audience. My concern was that they would be mad at me for trying to sell to them AGAIN. They love the fact that I offer so much value for such a low cost, so I was afraid to try and resell to them. I decided to try anyway. Well, in just 1 day I had made around $1K in sales of my new $49 course

- I currently have 2 digital courses, priced at $49 and $69 which have both proven to sell very well. I also have 2 eBooks priced at $19 each, which also sell. I then have the YouTube ad revenue which is steadily increasing each month. $10K per month does not seem like a big deal to me anymore.

I've dabbled with paid advertising, but I haven't had much success with it. Therefore 99% of what I have done so far has been through "free" traffic sources.

The first 2 years were the toughest. I was doing a ton of work for little money, but I pushed through. I'm glad that I did!

Plans for the near future:

- Start a patreon page so I can get a recurring revenue stream into the business. Sure I could do this on my own site, but people seem more inclined to take on recurring payments when it's on patreon.

- Start a 2nd business where I coach people to do what I do. I will charge around $2K to $3K per month at first.

My favorite blogger Steve Pavlina always said to stick with a business idea for at least 5 years because that is when you will really start to see the fruits of your labor. He was 100% right!

I just figured that I'd share my story with you all since this forum has been so helpful to me along the way!!

Thank you
#$10k #5year #approaching #markclearing #month #normal
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  • Profile picture of the author spartan14
    wow such a nice story man
    Can you please give up some advices or some tips to help us along our journey .Thanks
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    • Profile picture of the author DWolfe
      Originally Posted by spartan14 View Post

      wow such a nice story man
      Can you please give up some advices or some tips to help us along our journey .Thanks
      You can learn a lot just by going to his profile - https://www.warriorforum.com/members/bkelly301.html and reading all the threads he posted the past few years. You can see his questions, the members here who helped him with their answers, and what he did.
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    • Profile picture of the author Bkelly301
      Originally Posted by spartan14 View Post

      wow such a nice story man
      Can you please give up some advices or some tips to help us along our journey .Thanks
      I have found that the most important thing is to relentlessly work towards succeeding. Expect that there will be a long period where you are working a lot but not getting paid in the beginning. This period may last a few months to a year even.

      Aside from that the practical steps are simple:

      1.) Have a digital product to sell that is very high quality.
      2.) Have your own website where you can sell this digital product from.
      3.) Have great free content to give away, but don't give it away until they give their email.
      4.) Have a series of maybe 4 emails setup to promote the product. Make sure every email gives value so they want to open your email.
      5.) Once you have that system setup, promote the s*** out of your website. I make a ton of YouTube videos, upload content to reddit, have a Facebook group, etc. In order to promote my site.
      6.) I also have just recently started to make it a habit to send out valuable emails once per week to my email list.

      That's all there is to it. Just stick with it for 5 years, and you'll probably succeed!
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    • Profile picture of the author Ian Jackson
      Originally Posted by spartan14 View Post

      wow such a nice story man
      Can you please give up some advices or some tips to help us along our journey .Thanks
      Maybe delete your sig ...? "I make $100 daily"
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  • Profile picture of the author Medon
    It is an exciting and inspiring story. It is true that the first two years are trcky. Start up business will either grow or shut up. How I wish a got a chance to look at your products.
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  • Profile picture of the author DURABLEOILCOM
    Everyone thinks Internet Marketing is simple - wrong! It takes blood, sweat and tears to succeed. First you have to grind hard before you start winning. There are no short cuts or get rich quick schemes.
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  • Profile picture of the author King Manu
    Great story man!
    I recognize your avatar and I know I've seen plenty of great advice from you on this forum.

    Keep up the good work.
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  • Profile picture of the author JPs copy
    That's awesome! Thanks for posting your milestones and your challenges
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  • Profile picture of the author discrat
    This Thread and its Creator is one reason why I keep sticking my big nose back in here every once in awhile.

    Good stuff
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  • Profile picture of the author Ben Scott Jr
    That is a very inspiring story. Thanks for sharing and breaking down the hard work you have done to get there.
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  • Profile picture of the author talfighel
    Good story man. Very inspiring.

    No results for your first 2 years but you kept at it and never gave up.

    Way to go.
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  • Profile picture of the author Kay King
    Happy for you!


    What I see is someone who isn't afraid to ask questions - and who actually takes advice and acts on it. For a long time on this forum you have focused on learning how to improve every aspect of your online business.


    It worked! Who would have thunk it?
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    Saving one dog will not change the world - but the world changes forever for that one dog
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  • Profile picture of the author laurencewins
    The opening post does a lot of things that most people would never even consider doing. You have shared not only your goals, but the hard work and dedication you have needed to achieve regular, reliable, consistent success and income, while helping lots of other people achieve success for themselves. Thank you!
    Signature

    Cheers, Laurence.
    Writer/Editor/Proofreader.

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  • Profile picture of the author Jonathan S
    Good story! Clear goal and Implementation are they keys.
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  • Profile picture of the author daillyprofits
    This post really by bkelly301 is a rare realistic longterm roadmap to success in whatever area you choose to focus on. I've personally bookmarked this page, so i can reread this post to keep me on the right path. Massive kudos for sharing
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  • You inspire me brother!
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  • Profile picture of the author getknow trading
    @Bkelly301

    This is a great story I am happy you have succeded.
    I am learning from your steps and I alreday get some ideas what to improve.

    I am working on my site for 2 years and there is improvement, but I see that I am making some mistakes that all beginners do and I see that I am missing some knowledge that would speed the whole process.

    One of the problems is that I have one hour per day to work on this idea so that takes time to build and to get the results.

    (Deleted by moderator)
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  • Profile picture of the author tomkos1234xx
    Very nice post mate. Your story is an inspiration.
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    The Best Quality SEO Service For All Kinds Of Web developers and App creators. Give us chance on http://seoreapers.com/

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  • Profile picture of the author Nadia Pond
    hi please to make your acquaintance, I am very happy for your success and thanks for posting such great stuff, if i had a mentor like you i bet i would do just awesome. Much blessings to you.
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  • Profile picture of the author IMBizPro
    What a positive inspirational story of perseverance, hard work, and a little luck throw in to boot. Wishing you even greater milestones and success in the future.
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  • Profile picture of the author mrcasestudy
    I love seeing these inspiring stories, thanks for sharing. Successful people always have sustained action over a period of time. Your system is very consistent with other successful people as well, those evergreen internet marketing strategies have passed the test of time!
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  • Profile picture of the author Eagle07
    I like that sticking for 5 years and truly working on it... I'll try 5 weeks on my new venture then 5 months then 5 years... let's see how it goes Thanks for the inspiration
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  • Originally Posted by Bkelly301 View Post



    Therefore 99% of what I have done so far has been through "free" traffic sources.

    Would you care to share your "free" traffic sources that brings you $10k in online sales per month?
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