February 2017 Income Report

Although February was a short month it was a very busy one! We have a lot of projects on the go and have the feeling of momentum behind many of them.

Definitely sometimes struggling to ensure I give new projects enough of a push before I try and hand them off. I have a concept that I am still thinking through but essentially it takes a 10x increase in my effort to onboard/launch a new business vs maintain it so I only have a limited amount of energy I can invest in those growth projects. When I have too many in the critical phase it doesn’t go well… but the flip side is that once I correctly get on onboarded it takes limited effort. So, basically I need to limit the number of growth projects, give them 110% focus and then not move until it is above my imaginery “self-sustaining” line.

In February, I was also very appreciative of my key team members both in house and over-seas they have been able to continually take on more and more work but what is most impressive is how much they are continually invested in growing the business which is fun! Although the dream was to work from home initially working from an office with talented staff pushing in the same direction is fun!

This report covers the results of the business over the course of February.

The Business “Divisions” For My Online Business:

  1. Money Site Portfolio
  2. AuthorityWebsiteIncome Blog
  3. Services – Web Development, Content Marketing & Link Building:
  4. Amazon FBA Business
    • Brands 1-6 – All have specific targets for 2017
    • – Amazon FBA Hijacking and Suppression Monitoring
  5. Put Outside Capital to Work Efficiently in the Online Asset Space

Key Successes

  1. ContentRefined.com Customer Support – Maddie is going the extra mile including a few examples of getting a clients unique dog food sent to her so she could get photos with a dog
  2. BrandBuilders Deal – A deal was finalized in February that increased my % stake in BrandBuilders, provided a vehicle to look at bigger deals moving forward and setup the existing team to build the business even more.
  3. New Website Growth Strategy – Several of the sites I have been building have been having some great success out of the gate! I am looking to continue testing this out myself and then scaling and sharing it!
  4. FBA Deal – I am starting to purchase some small Amazon FBA deals and the first one is performing well. There are not very many outlets for people looking to sell Amazon FBA businesses making under $2k/month but they can be solid little businesses. I am working to setup systems to onboard these businesses efficiently. If you are interested in selling your FBA business let me know.

Key Failures

  1. Passive Income Portfolio – Both my time and a team members time I hired to help run the portfolio is getting pulled in other directions. The immediate payback is low but the long term payback is great so I need to figure out a way to put more effort in here. The solution I am looking at in March is a re-organization of my team to re-balance workload.
  2. FBA Brands – I still don’t quite feel like I have nailed the business model here, plenty of challenges with existing brands and lots of learnings again this month.

2017 Business Goals

Below is my businesses main goals for 2017…

Part 1 – Passive Authority & Niche Website Income Profit/Loss

3 Goals in 2016 for my Website Portfolio Business

  1. Everyone Win at the Mortgage Crushing Competition

Feb Update – The team is doing very well in the MortgageCrushingCompetition. Everyone struggles with the same issues of finding time to invest in this project but all sites are looking good!

  • Traffic = 1,199
  • Earnings = $2.64

2. Buy 1 Site Per Month

Feb Update – 1 larger site was purchased and a new business was spun up with a manager and investor. It is a unique dropshipping business that existed for 9 years and the deal had a substantial earnout component to it. So far it is performing on baseline for revenue with a lot of efficiencies already realized. We are looking at some nice growth opportunities moving forward.

  • GOAL = 1 New Website Purchased
  • ACTUAL = 1 New Website Purchased

If any readers are looking to sell their profitable site(s) VERY QUICKLY let me know by emailing me. I can let you know in 12hrs if I am interested and complete the purchase in 24-48hrs – Contact Me Here

I have found the right sellers are those…

  • Looking to sell FAST (under 24hrs has been accomplished!) (shorter time for due diligence on my end increases risk for me)
  • Not wanting to spend a lot of time on the sales process (analytics and income proof is all I need)
  • SEO done to the site can be questionable and that increased risk will be reflected in the sales price
  • Site being associated with a banned Amazon Associate is still possible to sell (but STEEP discount!)
  • Understand that the benefits of the bullet points above means the sales multiple will be lower than if you went a more traditional route

If you have a profitable website you are looking to sell fast please let me know

Amazon FBA, SAAS or Larger Websites I Can Close on Quickly As Well – Contact Me Here

3. Scalable New Site Creation Strategy adds $5k to Portfolio

Feb Update – Some great progress here! Several sites have started to perform well that were brand new builds using a unique strategy. The goal of this strategy is to add $5k/month to the portfolio.

  • Traffic – 37,281 uniques per month
  • Earnings – $177.24

PRIMARY GOAL – OVERALL INCOME FOR WEBSITE PORTFOLIO GROW TO $15k/MONTH CONSISTENTLY

Feb Update – With some  changes in how one site is being monetized I had a big drop in earnings but expect it to bounce back nicely next month. Overall the portfolio is performing well in terms of traffic but not getting the level of attention it deserves!

Part 2 – Authority Website Income Blog Profit/Loss

3 Goals in 2015 for AuthorityWebsiteIncome.com

  1. Post Once Per Week

Feb Update – Some big posts were published in February including my post and tool about how to calculate your drop in amazon affiliate program earnings.

  • Plan = 4
  • Actual = 4

2. Systematic Promotion of my Content and Building of my List

Feb Update – No progress – need to develop system to systematically promote posts. With my Amazon Affiliate Program earnings calculation tool I did a bunch of outreach to let people know I had a tool for them to easily calculate the change in their earnings and as a result received a large number of links back.

3. Increased Intelligence with Email Automation

Feb Update – Progress moving all customers and contacts into one database with established tagging practises so we will be able to take the next step of applying some intelligent automation.

PRIMARY GOAL – GROW TO 30k VISITORS PER MONTH

Feb Update – Lots of work to do this year to hit this target! I will continue pushing!

Part 3 – Services Business Profit/Loss

  1. Systems First Focus

Feb Update – Continued focus point during my meetings with each business manager. As businesses are growing we are continually finding ourselves outgrowing our systems and needing to adapt quickly.

  1. LightningRank.com – Quality and Efficiency Improvements

Feb Update – The tests are part of the new systematic money site creation strategy that resulted in 37k visitors within a couple months after starting a series of sites. The results we are seeing are fantastic and are looking forward to continuing to explore these strategies with more tests.

Visit LightningRank.com for Link Building Services!

  1. ContentRefined.com – 20k MRR by June & 40k MRR by End of Year

Feb Update – Another great month for this new and promising business. With happy customers, VERY low churn numbers we achieved the target growth rate. To hit our end of year goal it is clear we need to develop additional sales channels and branch into new markets. We expect some learning curves branching into additional markets but are looking forward to it! Maddie as mentioned above is doing a great job at taking care of all customers and growing the business.

  • Planned MRR = $12,000
  • Actual MRR = $12,989

Visit ContentRefined.com for Content Marketing Services!

4. BrandBuilders.io Structurally Well Setup & New Offering Launched

Feb Update – This goal I can now call complete for 2017! It is structurally well setup, new office for this business has been established and the team is growing. The TurnKey affiliate sites ready in 24hrs are fantastic and feedback has been great.

PRIMARY GOAL – SYSTEMATIC GROWTH!

Part 4 – Amazon FBA Business

  • Brand #1 – HG – Running Lean and Spinning off Cash
    • Feb Update – Running lean (don’t have the numbers for this business so not included in the income report)
  • Brand #2 – CF – Quarterly Dividends Ahead of Baseline
    • Feb Update – First loan repayments have been sent and the business is operating efficiently and ahead of baseline. Unfortunately for me as manager with a big hole to dig out of before I get any upside consideration it isn’t adding a lot to the monthly profit yet.
  • Brand #3 – NT – Path To Strong Market Position and Successful Pillar Product
    • Feb Update – This business might be on its way to be my first FBA flob… the product is great but the price point is simply too high to compete with the much cheaper competitors. We have a few more tricks up our sleeve to pull out to see the results.
  • Brand #4 – CF – Systematic Growth to $20k/month Profit
    • Feb Update – Still having issues with Amazon and needing to get our listing live again. Great product which had been doing great sales! We have $30k worth of inventory waiting to start selling again!
  • Brand #5 – PC – Successful launch and $5k/month Business
    • Feb Update – Had a few bumps in the road with the labels for the products. It took a while to get that sorted out now and Amazon will have the products in March.
  • Brand #6 – SE – 4X Value Expansion with Dream Team!
    • Feb Update – The investment needed for this project has started to make it look less attractive but coming up with some other strategies to validate the idea before launching.
  • LE – Hijack Monitoring Service
    • Feb Update – Continued slow growth.

Part 5 – Put Outside Capital to Work Efficiently

Overall Income Update

Original Monthly Net Income Target (original goal $15k/month reliable income by age 35)

  • (very old) Target Net Income = $10,575
  • Actual Net Income = $52,155
  • 2017 Average Net Income = $38,346.34

 

 

Gross revenue is a vanity number for my business and I do not share it.

Final Comments

 

Feb was a short month but definitely one where a lot of great progress was made. My disappointing performance with FBA is still a pain and I have some ways I am looking to solve it moving forward. In addition some great progress on setting up unique opportunities looking longer term, excited to keep the momentum going in March!

Hope your year is starting well!

 

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