Early Exit #3: June Finances (Mid Month)

A mid-month update on my June finances. Am I profitable yet?

You’re reading Early Exit Club — a newsletter about leaving the 9-5 workforce to build a $20k/month solo business by Nick Lafferty.

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Can I be honest with you?

I was going to send a different email this week.

It’s a great email about the risks of playing it safe in your life and career.

But then I woke up today (it’s Monday, hello from the past!) and thought that y’all might prefer a finance update this week.

So that email will have to wait until next week.

I’m also revising my posting schedule to something like:

• Finance updates (2x/month)

• Learnings + Project Updates (2x/month)

👀 One more thing: there’s a sneak peak of some physical merch at the end of this email.

Onto the numbers.

June Finances

First the total picture, now in pretty graph form thanks to Graphy.

This graph compares total revenue and cost in May to the partial numbers in June.

Revenue: 🟢 Up 42% ($4,583 → $6,538)

• Halfway through June I’ve already made more revenue than all of last month.

• We’re profitable (so far)!

Cost: 🟡 Down 18% ($5,645 → $4,587)

• This includes everything: our mortgage, utilities, groceries, and business expenses like software.

• Our HVAC broke this month and led to a $2k repair bill 😢

  • This is exactly what an emergency fund is for, and despite that bill we’re still trending under last month’s cost.

Revenue Breakdown

Many of you asked for more details on the revenue side after my last update, so this is how it breaks down.

More detail on each channel below, starting with website traffic.

Website Traffic

🟢 Up 6% (25.6k → 27.2k )

Not a huge increase, about 2,000 more unique visitors halfway through the month.

The summer months are seasonally low for my website based on past years so anytime I can buck seasonality is good.

I’m starting to see the results from my content work over the last 4 weeks materialize into more traffic (more on this later on).

Consulting

🟢 Up 93% ($1,484.54 → $2,870.40)

Consulting income is up because I worked more hours in May than I did in April and I bill after the month is over.

I did a whole newsletter about consulting which you can read below if you missed it.

Early Exit #2: Consulting

Affiliate Income

🟢 Up 17% ($3,099.43 → $3,628.57)

This is the most variable bucket because I get paid on wildly different schedules.

One provider sends me a bulk payment the first week of the month.

Another one pays me weekly and others pay me twice a month.

I’m expecting 3 more affiliate payments through the end of the month so this number should break $4k.

Banner Ads

🟢 Up ♾️ ($0 → $39.25)

Banner ads are back on the board!

I made a whopping $39 running banner ads for an entire day on March 31st.

This will go up significantly next month when I get paid for the entire month of April ads 😭

Net 65 billing is a real pain in the ass, y’all.

Project Updates

Here’s what I’ve done this month:

• Worked on my affiliate course: I’m building a course called Affiliate Academy to teach you how to do affiliate marketing for Notion templates. I’ve sold $80k+ of them so far and I’m excited to help other people jump into this.

  • Expect more info about this in a few weeks when I’m ready to launch.

• Consulting: Started work with a new client, this revenue will show up next month.

• Website: Wrote 9 new blog posts (with a little help from AI).

• Podcast: Recorded one podcast (with another scheduled this Wednesday).

  • I run a Notion podcast where I interview creators making thousands of dollars selling Notion templates.

• Newsletter: This is my third one this month with a fourth already written and scheduled.

• Social Media: I’m testing Pinterest as a new channel for my affiliate business and the results so far aren’t good. It definitely needs more time but I will likely pivot into TikTok next month.

Merch Sneak Peak

At the end of every email I include a picture of myself to help build a more personal connection with y’all.

But I’m missing a golden opportunity to push my own merch!

So I spent my Saturday morning playing with designs and landed on the options you see above.

Hopefully next email I’ll be sporting one of these bad boys and give you the ability to buy one.

Wait, before you go

If you made it this far, thank you!

I have one favor to ask: are you pursuing the same goals I am?

I’m batting around a few ideas for how to take this newsletter to the next level and I want to get some feedback.

If you’re consulting, building a solo business, or even just thinking about quitting your job then I want to talk with you.

Hit reply and I’ll do the hard work of finding time for us to chat.

Thanks so much, it really means a lot to me that you’re here.

Nick