Ups and Downs of My Life

Sorry it took me so long to get around to doing another post!

This entry will be about the ups and downs of my life now.

People hear what I do for a living and they immediately start gushing: “Omg you are so lucky” and “You have to teach me how to do that” and “I hate you!”  I have to admit that I am content with what I do and yes, wouldn’t trade it for anything else right now.  I absolutely hated working for other people, hated always having bosses breathing over my shoulder, and hated having to get up early in the morning.

However, there are ups and downs to this business.   We already know the ups: being my own boss; no set hours so I’m free to do what I want, when I want to; freedom; I can update my site in my underwear if I so choose; not having to go to a day job and get yelled at.

My ex boyfriend knows it’s not all roses, however.  (I used to complain to him).  Here are the downsides of being a freelance Web Entrepreneur:

• Waiting for Checks: Instead of being paid every week or every other Friday like I used to, I now have to wait for my checks/deposits.  I am now paid 5 or 6 times a month, mostly at the end.  My typical payment days are: the 15th, the 20th, the 25th, 28th, and 30th or 31st.  So, I am forced to learn how to budget my money.  And I’ll be quite frank: I suck at budgeting.  (But am getting better, slowly!)
• Not always getting paid on time: I recently went through a nightmare with a certain web advertising company who shall go nameless.  I ran their ads- over 3 million impressions, and they decided not to pay me.  I went back and forth with emails and phone calls and FINALLY got 2 months of earnings, which were also so low it was ridiculous.  I took their ads off my site a while ago, and am still waiting for Sept and Oct payments.  Sometimes, a company will just be late with payments.  You are stuck either waiting or being the bad guy and calling/emailing to find out what is going on.
• Up and down revenue: My site’s revenue hovered around $4,000 for July and August.  However, in Sept it dropped down to around $2,800.  October was a bit better around $3,400.  This month will be even better, thankfully.  But what is there to do when your revenue goes down?  Get a part time job?  Suffer in brokedom for the month or two?  (Which I did).

Basically, I’m still not complaining about my line of work, but there really are lots of ups and downs to consider.  I still don’t for one moment regret my decision to quit my job back in July, either.

So, update on other stuff: my main website received over 25,000 visitors last Wednesday.  It’s now averaging over 21,000 a day.  Sweet!  I also signed up with a new ad company.  I’m a little worried because they are new, and what if I get ripped off again?  But we shall see… it will mean an additional $800+ per month in revenue.