One Year In

Map & Moleskine Notebook

It's the end of summer. A whirlwind of family trips, conferences, and barbequeues are coming to an end. And that reminds me of something.

I've been working for myself a whole yearย – where did the time go??

I've been doing this a year and I'd like to take in my surroundings. Poke my head up from my computer screen and see where I arrived after a year of work.

Cash

Let's start with the thing that keeps every business alive. Did I make money?

Well my revenue is about 92% of my previous salary. That's definitely enough to pay my bills but it's not great. No trips to Hawaii planned anytime soon.

However looking at one number is a bit misleading. Instead it's important to see how revenue has changed every month.

Month by Month Progress

The light blue line is the trend line. And it's going up and to the right.

It's also important to point out the huge variability in running your own business. Even with 2-3 steady clients I had a down month with very little income.

Which is why I wanted to focus on growing my courses and I did just that.

First Year in Business Monthly Growth

First four months vs last four months

I grew my course revenue substantially. And without too much effort I was able to grow my affiliate income as well. That makes me a less reliant on the whim of a single client.

My Own Project

I also really wanted to create me own thing this year without the help of a publisher like my book publisher or Lynda. And I did that with Lift Off Summit.

It didn't earn a ton of money but I'm happy enough with it to run it again next year. And it also gave me the opportunity to try my first partnership with BobWP.

And all things considered it went really well. There's not quite enough revenue to justify a 50/50 partnership and there will be changes coming next year. But fundamentally the partnership went well. Motivating multiple humans is hard work. Especially when you can't pay them a regular paycheck.

Consulting

I've learned quite a bit about consulting. It's hard and it's a constant challenge to set expectations with clients.

Since I'm always doing new things I'm constantly running into challenges. I can solve these challenges but they might create friction between me and the client.

And I found that a lot of clients want near instant communication and I tend to want to go into my cave and come back a month later with the results.

I'll probably scale consulting at the end of 2017 and focus more on my own projects.

Revenue vs Profit

I should point out that I don't pay myself all of that revenue. I set aside a fair amount for taxes & expenses. Since I need to pay for my conferences, travel, new computer, etc. I have to set aside a decent amount. So my goal for next year is to get my revenue significantly higher than my previous salary so I can pay myself what I used to make.

At that point I can save up for that vacation, an electric car, or maybe even another property.

7 thoughts on “One Year In

  1. Looks like great progress, Patrick. Congratulations on your anniversary and a successful year!

  2. Hi Patrick. Congratulations!

    Is revenue from the training improving? I remember you saying in a previous post that Lynda should produce more revenue over time.

    • Yep. As I add more courses that revenue continues to grow.

      At some point I’ll have to go back and update the courses to make sure they’re still relevant and the ongoing revenue really helps with that.

  3. Hi Patrick,
    Congratulations on your success so far!
    Lyse

  4. OMG, you left your camera without either a lens or the round cap which fits over the camera? So dust and dirt can get in your camera??? ARE YOU NUTS?

    Or is this a generic image, one you didn’t take?

    Oh PLEASE NEVER DO THAT. Never leave your camera exposed like that. Never use images showing a camera improperly sitting about.

    A Minolta? That’s the brand I took my most famous early punk photos, 1976-78.

    Ok, I haven’t finished reading your post. But my heart raced, my eyes popped open and my jaw is still on the ground when I saw that photo. Oh my!!

    Found you via your WooCommerce class on Lynda.com. I met her back in 1995. Was aware of her prior to meeting her. Sweet, smart, energetic, wonderful lady. Happy for her phenomenal success.

    PS Mazel tov on YOUR amazing year!!

    • Hah. I didn’t take the photo. I found this shot online. ๐Ÿ™‚

      Awesome I hope you got something out of the WooCommerce course! Did I miss anything? Any follow up course ideas? ๐Ÿ™‚

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