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Ever wonder how much money bloggers make? We are sharing our latest online business income report to share with you how much income our blog made and how we did it!
Also see: 10 Tools Every Blogger Needs To Make More Money, A Day In The Life Of A Full-Time Professional Blogger, How Much Money Can You Make Blogging
How we made money blogging with our online business in 2019.
2019 was an amazing year in our lives and our business and we are excited to share how much money we made with our online business.
We accomplished some big things in 2019 in our business, but also fell short in a couple of areas too. I guess that’s life. Personally, I don’t like falling short in any area, but all I can do now is focus on the future!
If you’ve read any of our other income reports, you already have a good idea of what our business is all about and how we run our online business.
I’m the primary person responsible for marketing and coordinating the back end of our online course business, while Heather creates most of the content for the blog as well as our courses and social media platforms.
Please note: This post contains affiliate links. We will earn a commission from our affiliate partners when you click through one of our affiliate links and purchase a product or service from one of our partners. Please see our Disclosure Policy for details.
Our online business has 2 parts that earn income:
The Blog: You’re on it right now. We blog primarily about luxury family travel and also blogging tips and training.
Our online course business: We provide training for thousands of students a year helping them with their blogs and online businesses.
We have numerous Facebook groups as well as a new online forum community that are vital to our success online. Our focus is to provide as much value as we can in our communities and in turn our students trust us that we’ll be able to provide them with what they need to launch their own blogs or online businesses and ultimately live the types of lives they really want for themselves.
2019 has been very busy for me personally. So busy in fact that I have not done an income report since August 2019. I produced an extensive 4000+ word monthly income report every month from March 2017 through August 2019 (that is 2.5 years straight). While I loved doing it, it was also very time-consuming.
Related: See past blog and online business income reports here.
So, I’ve made a compromise with myself now and it is a more realistic schedule to adhere to. The solution?
I’ll be sharing a quarterly online business income report for our blog.
The first of these new quarterly income reports will be released in April 2020 that will include updates from January through March 2020. The format will be all new and I’m planning to add some more fun with a look behind the scenes of our online business and blog.
But first, there’s a little bit of unfinished business to take care of for 2019.
The perfect way for me to handle this was to create this 2019 Online Business Income Report 2019 Year in Review.
In this report I’ll be detailing the following (along with some other info):
- Our online course and training program sales figures for 2019
- A summary of all our currently available courses and training programs
- Our affiliate and sponsored post income figures for 2019
- Total Online Business and Blogging Income for 2019
- Our online ad expenses for 2019 (our biggest expense)
- The travel blogging trips we took in 2019
- Some links for you to get some extensive FREE training
- Some links to our communities where you can connect with us online
- Our business goals for 2020
That’s a lot to cover, so let’s jump right in!
Our online course sales figures for 2019
Our online courses and training programs are a huge part of our business. In fact, they’re roughly half of our business.
Our programs are all focused on blogging and/or online business.
We’re big believers in the online business lifestyle and earning potential and our focus for the last 3 years has been to show others exactly how we’re able to run a really profitable business and live an amazing lifestyle at the same time.
In the past, there were very limited options to have both of those things…
Now with a blog and online business, you can design the exact type of life you want to live. It’s simply a matter of following a proven model and putting in the focused work to make it happen.
Our online course and training program sales for 2019 were: $1,063,559
***This figure is after any fees and affiliate commissions were paid out.
Up until the 4th quarter of 2018, we used Teachable as our exclusive training and online course platform.
In October, we decided to try out Kajabi for our new training program.
Recently, we moved the instructional/learning component of our Challenges and course onto our very own platform, CourseGo.
CourseGo is the First Digital Course And Membership Platform Focused On Selling Your Program and we are thrilled to finally have a platform that is geared just to digital creators and learners.
Below are 2 different screenshots because of the separate platforms:
Teachable online course sales for 2019 – After all fees and affiliate commissions
Kajabi online course sales for 2019 – After all fees and affiliate commissions
A summary of all our currently available courses and training programs
Blogging Blastoff – Premium monthly training program designed to take you from blogging beginner to blogging expert. This course shows you how to make money with a blog, drive traffic to it, set your blog up like a real business, grow your social accounts, and much more. So far, over 4500 students have taken this flagship course! Each month we enroll a new class for the next month and enrollments are open for just 1 week. Read about Blogging Blastoff here.
Travel Blogging Blastoff – Premium training program that will show you exactly how to run a professional travel blog. Topics include pitching for comped stays, how to produce professional content, growing your travel blog, and much more. This is everything we’ve learned from years of trial and error and over 80 travel blogging trips. Read about the brand new version of Travel Blogging Blastoff here.
Blogging Mastermind Experience – This brand new program at the end of 2019 is a next-level training program from Blogging Blastoff. In this program, Heather and I host a weekly 1-hour live video call for our students and answer any blogging and business questions that they have. There is also a tight-knit mastermind group designed to increase collaboration between these blogging students of ours that are very dedicated to creating amazing blogging businesses. Blogging Mastermind Experience is only open for enrollments periodically. Blogging Mastermind Experience is currently closed to new students.
Sell That Course – The biggest problem that online course creators face is selling their course or training program. This training program solves that problem once and for all. It’s our exact system that shows you how we build our communities and leverage them to create trust which ultimately results in course sales. It’s a system based on providing value to our students for free, and being there for them when they are ready to go further. Sell That Course will be open again for a new group of students at the end of February. Read all about Sell That Course here.
WP Fast Launch – This course is designed to get you up to speed QUICKLY with WordPress and Bluehost. It’s a collection of short screen share videos that walk you through setting up your site and showing you exactly what you need to know to hit the ground running. It’s specifically designed to show you what you need and intentionally leaves out the minute detail that isn’t necessary for most WordPress users to bother with. Read all about WP Fast Launch here.
Motivate Your Mind – Your mind is your greatest asset and also can be your biggest enemy in your online business. That’s why we put together the Motivate Your Mind monthly challenge. Each month we work together in this highly motivational group on a business mindset challenge designed to give you actionable tools to elevate the way you think and result in the business success that you deserve. Read all about Motivate Your Mind here.
Let’s jump into our affiliate and sponsored post income
Affiliate sales are a big portion of our business as well.
These are commissions we receive for referring people from our website to products and services that we believe in and use ourselves!
Some of our favorite affiliate partners are:
Sponsored posts are when we are paid by a brand or company to create content around a particular campaign. While we still do some sponsored posts projects, we do a lot less of these than we used to.
In fact, Heather used to focus solely on sponsored posts and it really skyrocketed the blog income. She was making over $30,000 a month for years solely from sponsored posts, sponsored social posts, and some sponsored guest writing on the brand websites. This sometimes included long-term sponsorships with companies like Invisalign, Kia, and Johnson & Johnson.
We’ve also taken a lot of sponsored travel blogging trips in the past where we were paid to take vacations as a family. Pretty cool right?
Due to agreements with our affiliate partners and contractual arrangements with our sponsored post partners, we do not break down the specific revenue sources into great detail.
Our 2019 Affiliate and Sponsored Post Income totaled: $1,169,677.40
Total Online Business and Blogging Income for 2019
Now, it’s time to add up both the course sales for 2019 and the Affiliate and Sponsored Post Income.
Our online course and training program sales for 2019 totaled: $1,063,559
Our 2019 Affiliate and Sponsored Post Income totaled: $1,169,677.40
Total 2019 Online Business and Blogging Income total: $2,233,236.40
Not too bad!!
Remember at the beginning where I said we fell short a little bit in some areas? This income is great, but it did fall a little short of my goals.
There’s always 2020.
And… we’ve got some really big plans to scale things up.
Our online ad expenses for 2019 (our biggest expense)
A quick note: The income figure in this report is good, don’t get me wrong. But, we’ve got a lot of expenses too that have allowed us to get to this level. This is an income report which means we are not detailing all of our expenses (which are many). These expenses include but are not limited to: assistants and specialty contractors all over the world, professional services, software and tools, office and studio space, equipment, travel expenses, online advertising (our biggest expense), and much more.
For the purposes of this report, I feel it’s important to highlight our biggest expense which is online advertising.
In 2019, we spent $1,317,393.24 on online advertising! That’s a lot of money!! I thought Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and Youtube were free? Well, they are free unless you want to run ads to make sure your message gets out there. The biggest portion of our ad spend went to Facebook and Instagram. I’m still waiting for the invite to your place in Hawaii, Mark!
We also spent some of our ad budget on Pinterest and Youtube.
In 2020, I plan to diversify our ad spend considerably and find our ideal audience wherever they may be spending their time on the internet.
The travel blogging trips we took in 2019
One of the big focuses of our blog is Luxury Family Travel.
We’ve been traveling approximately 150 days a year with our travel blog since 2015. It’s taken us to amazing destinations around the world and we’ve now been on over 80 separate travel blogging trips, almost all of them as a family (all 5 of us).
2019 was no different!
Here’s a quick recap of our travels in 2019. I’ve added some links to posts and videos if you want to check out some of our travels.
Also, I’d love it if you follow me on Instagram and Heather too I guess… haha! When we’re traveling I really enjoy posting on my stories so you can see all of our adventures live there!
We’ve also got most of our travel videos (and blogger training too) on our YouTube channel here.
Here are the places we traveled to in 2019:
Riviera Maya – Cancun
The Grand at Moon Palace
Disney Creator Days – Orlando
Disney Wonder Cruise
Caribbean Cruise
Cayman Islands
Kauai, Hawaii
Kauai Beach Villas
Disneyland
Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge First Look
Las Vegas
Family Friendly Las Vegas
Victoria, BC Canada
Victoria Part 2
Reese Family Tour of Europe
Munich, Germany
Budapest, Hungary
Vienna, Austria
Berlin, Germany
Brussels, Belgium
Disney Transatlantic Cruise – Dover, England to New York
Walt Disney World
Walt Disney World Fall Trip
***Video will be released soon
Caribbean Cruise
St. Thomas
St. Marteen
Indian Wells, CA
Wow, did you make it this far? It’s February 2020 as I’m writing this, and I still feel like I’m recovering a little bit.
All the travel in 2019 was amazing and unforgettable (especially when you take so many videos and photos and write about everything… haha!)
I can’t wait to see where 2020 takes us on our travel blogging adventures!
Our extensive FREE blogging and online business training
Our philosophy with our business has always been to provide as much free help and value as we possibly can.
That has been true from the very beginning of when we started helping entrepreneurs. Our focus is on our students and to help others design the types of lives that they want to live.
That will never change.
One thing that has changed is that it is no longer necessary to go to college and get an expensive degree that you’ll be paying off for a long time to be happy and successful.
It’s a matter of finding something that you enjoy doing, and then put a plan in place to make money from it.
That’s why blogging and online businesses are so popular.
As you can see from this income report, lots of things are possible. In fact, we haven’t even scratched the surface of our potential.
We want to inspire you and help you down the road you want to go.
To do that we’ve developed some extensive FREE training resources to help you out tremendously.
These aren’t junk programs either. As you’ll see, it’s real-world actionable training that will help you get your own online business started.
For any of these programs, all you have to do is click the link, and then enter your name and email on the form, and then the training will automatically be sent to your email inbox.
Start A Blogging Business (formerly Start A Money Making Blog) – This 5-day foundational blogging course has been downloaded over 500,000 times. In the course, we show you exactly how to choose a niche, pick the perfect name, get your logo, how to set up the right hosting for your blog, and much more. Get the Start A Blogging Business course for free here.
How to Start A Travel Blog – This 5-day course covers all the necessary steps to take in order to start a professional travel blog. Everything from naming your blog, deciding on your niche, to choosing the correct platform to host your travel blog. Get the How To Start A Travel Blog course here for free.
Email Your Way To Comped Travel – If you have an interest in the world of travel blogging, then this hour-long video training is for you. We let you in on the techniques that professional travel bloggers use to arrange comped (free) travel to resorts, hotels, attractions, cities, countries, and more. It’s simply an exchange of content for free accommodations. Learn more about our free training: Pitch For Travel.
Course Creator Blueprint – Are you an expert in a topic? Or, do you have specialized knowledge that you can help others learn too? Then an online course business could be absolutely perfect for you. The Course Creator Blueprint will show you the exact steps you need to take to start your own online course business. Course Creator Blueprint is not currently available. Check out CourseGo.
10k Traffic Challenge – Getting traffic to your website is one of the most critical factors in your success as an online business owner. Having no traffic to your website is like owning a store where nobody ever walks inside. In that case, it’s impossible to sell anything. That’s why we spend 10 days out of every month running a free challenge called the 10k Traffic Challenge. It’s 10 days of learning, community, and networking with other bloggers and online business owners. We’d love to have you join us for the next challenge! Read all about the 10k Challenge here.
Bookmark this page because the free training above can truly change your life (it has for thousands of our students).
Some links to our communities where you can connect with us online
A big part of our success has been the communities that we’ve built. When I say “built”, I truly mean it.
We devote a considerable amount of resources both with our time, our money, and with our team to run our communities efficiently. We’re working hard every day to make sure our students are helped in the best way that we know how!
We’re going to show you where to connect with us in our communities so you can get the support you need.
But first, we have a special announcement!
For the past few years, we’ve been heavily invested in building our Facebook groups.
Our largest group has almost 200,000 members.
As the groups have grown, we’ve noticed the user experience isn’t at the level we would like it to be.
By nature, Facebook groups aren’t organized efficiently making it hard to search for answers and even to find posts/threads that you were involved with.
For these reasons, we knew we needed to find a solution and we’ve put together something AWESOME.
Our big announcement is that we are launching a brand new blogging and online business forum called BigBlogs.com
This is a traditional style forum with a modern look and upgraded functionality that we know you will love as much as we do!
Some of the really cool features of Big Blogs:
Ability to use a username (instead of your name if you like).
- Ability to add a link to your website in your signature. The more you comment, the more exposure your blog will get.
- Simple organization so your posts and comments won’t get lost in the Facebook feed.
- Subscribe to posts and forums and get emailed automatically when there is new activity.
- Works perfectly on both desktop and mobile.
- Many, many more great features.
As I write this, Big Blogs is almost ready to be launched.
Eventually, we’ll be gradually transitioning all of our groups onto the Big Blogs platforms.
Head over to BigBlogs.com now and register for your username while it is still available.
Above I mentioned our Facebook groups. You can still find us there daily helping out in every possible way. We have a great team of moderators that help us out as well.
Here are the links to our groups:
We also run numerous groups for the students of our paid courses.
If you’re on Instagram, follow us there:
Pete: @reesepeter
Heather: @itsalovelylife
Our business goals for 2020
It’s time to spell out our business goals for 2020:
1. We’re putting a HEAVY focus on video content related to blogging and online business. This plan is already in full swing and we’re not stopping!
2. We’ve spent the last few years focusing solely on paid ads. Now we’re committed to working on our organic traffic methods as a complement to our ads. This means a heavy emphasis on YouTube, Pinterest, and SEO.
3. Revenue: I don’t want to throw out a specific revenue number here, but I’ll just say the goal is far beyond what we did in 2019.
4. Be less dependent on platforms we do not own. This is directly related to our discussion about our Facebook groups above.
5. Build our team with some amazing people. A company is only as good as those that are working within it.
Well, this post turned out to be way longer than I thought it would be. That’s OK! I had fun writing it, and most importantly, I’m hoping that you enjoyed it and learned something.
I’d really like to know something…
Did this post inspire you to achieve something big with your online business?
I’d really like to know. Every time I publish an income report I get some amazing comments and emails. But, I also get some negative feedback every once in a while.
I do these income reports for these reasons:
- to keep me on track with my business goals
- to give you an insider look at this type of online business
- to get additional exposure for our communities, training programs, and our blog content
- to hopefully inspire someone that wants to accomplish some big things
So, let me know below. Do you like these reports? I want to provide what you need to help you build up your own online business blogs, so I want to know what helps you accomplish your goals.
Thanks for reading all this!
-Pete Reese
Wow! You all have so busy and have quite a team to make things look so effortless. Congratulations on your income which continues to grow! I don’t doubt you’ll meet your goals because of your positive and encouraging way of helping people. Best of luck in 2020.
Thank you Jeannette! I appreciate your kind words!!
My short answer is yes! This report inspired me! Having had the pleasure of meeting both you and Heather I have to say that you really put your heart into all that you do. I appreciate your honesty, and I believe you both approach your business with a ton of integrity. You do make it look easy, but I know it is NOT, and that you both work very hard. Thank you for sharing all that you do with the community you have created.
Wishing you the best of luck in 2020 and can’t wait for the next event! 🙂
Hi Char! It was so great getting to meet you in person at the event last month in Newport Beach. I really still feel like I’m on a high from it. Thank you so much for your support and the ultimate measure of success for us is seeing our students learn and grow. I’m looking for a big 2020 from you Char!!
This was so much valuable information! I purchased the Blogging Blastoff in the Fall of 2018, and quickly became overwhelmed. I picked it back up 2 weeks ago, and just finished it yesterday, taking copious notes all the way through. I guess it wasn’t a bad thing that I left it for a bit, because my blogging idea and direction changed completely. I uncovered a demographic that is not being serviced yet, CAN YOU EVEN BELIEVE THAT??? So I am super excited to say the least, and a bit scared I must say. Anyhoozle, I appreciate detailed reports/emails like this because it is insanely inspirational. Thank you for taking the time to put it together Pete, and of course for providing the freebies. Much appreciated!
You’re so welcome Lydia! It’s ok to feel that overwhelm. There is a lot to take in and your mindset needs to be in the right place in order to apply everything. I’m glad that you’ve identified a great niche and I can’t wait to see what you create! Putting these reports together is good for me too as it helps me focus and get really clear on what I need to do to move the business forward.
Yes I definitely feel inspired, and at the same time a bit lost. I have done a few of the free online courses you have offered, which are quality, and participated in a few of your traffic challenges, but am having a hard time getting my blog off the ground. I would love to be able to make an income from my blog so I can quit my other job and focus more on my three kids and my blog, which I love. I am starting to wonder if writing about our journey with my daughter who has autism isn’t the right niche for a money making blog. I am determined to try harder this year to see if I can meet some of my goals. I do feel hope when I see other good people making a living with their blog and helping others so thank you!
Hi Amanda! Great to hear you’re inspired reading all this. From reading your comment, it seems like you may need to really focus in on your monetization plan. If you get a good plan in place for your niche and really focus on making it happen, success will follow. Check out Blogging Blastoff the next time enrollments are open because that will help tremendously.
Congratulations on all of your successes! I enjoyed reading this and am inspired by all you and your family have accomplished. Keep it up!
Thanks so much Kristin! I definitely will keep up the reports. I am switching to quarterly though for 2020.
This is a great read! I appreciate not only being inspired by the income numbers but also reading about expenses. I think a lot of people forget about those things. Takes money to make big money! Congratulations on all your success- I’m looking forward to getting to know you all better as I nestle into your (not so) little community!
Thank you Stacie! Yes, unfortunately, expenses are part of the equation. I really wish they weren’t though…haha! Great to have you part of the community!!
I for one love reading your income reports. They are so inspirational for me. I know I’m many years away from this type of success, but I will keep going and get there one day.
Awesome Stacey! I’m glad you’re inspired. Like I mentioned in the post, I was inspired reading these reports before I came on full time with the blogging business. It helped me see what was possible and also the path to take to get there. I’m looking forward to following all YOUR success.
All I can say is WOW! You and Heather have accomplished so much and its really inspiring and I have to agree with other people that commented, very overwhelming. I am trying really hard to focus on one thing at a time to get my Travel Blog up and running and not feel like I should be doing what maybe other people are doing but doing what works for me. It is very inspiring to see where you started at and where you are today so Thank You!
Thank you so much, Amanda! You are doing the right thing by focusing on one thing at a time. Step-by-step you will get there and before too long you’ll be amazed and what you accomplish. Just keep building!
As I come to check this out after signing up for the 10K Blog Traffic Challenge, I wonder how things have gone with this COVID-19 challenge we are all encountering. Obviously travel has been halted. How have you pivoted through this time?
Hi Cate, I’ve been sharing some updates here, and also on Instagram. But this post has some answers for you! https://itsalovelylife.com/where-we-go-from-here-travel-blogging/
I really appreciate your sharing and breaking this down for us! It’s incredible to see what you can really do! I’m so excited to get started!