Advertising Income Update #2: $4.68

I thought it was about time for another advertising income update. I am slowly crawling my way towards the symbolic milestone of $5 on my way to $100. I've managed to accumulate a whopping $4.68. 

My last update on Feb. 16th was $2.12. At that stage in the game, I was averaging about $2/month. As you can see here, its been slightly longer than a month, and my account balance has increased by $2.54. If I can sustain this pace, I should be hitting my mark within 40 months. Obviously, my hope is that I would continue to see an increase in my monthly advertising income, with the sky being the limit. The ultimate goal, would be financial independence through blog advertising income, but I am sure my employer doesn't want to hear that, and I don't want to get ahead of myself.  

One thing to note here. In monitoring my progress, it seems that the increase to my advertising income account is anything but steady. Some days I will notice large additions to the account (50 cents or more). On the other hand, I can go 10 days or more without seeing any increase. All this to say that I still don't really understand the Google Adsense Process for calculating my advertising income. 

For future statistical reference, I analyzed some of the traffic data on my blog. Some of you may find this stuff boring, but I am guessing my advertising income is heavily influenced by these numbers. It also give me an opportunity to use my college education and I kind of enjoy it. 

Some definitions for your reference. Mean is the average of all the numbers in the data set. Median is the middle number if you took all the numbers in the data set and arranged them in numerical order from smallest to largest. 

Visits (Per Day):

Mean (Average): 10.68 

Median (Middle Number): 9

Page Views (Per Day):

Mean (Average): 21.13

Median (Middle Number): 18

Note the following. Median is a good tool for correcting for outliers (number(s) that are numerically distant from the rest of the data set). In this data set, I had one day where I had 49 visitors. That is more than double the next highest day of 23, so I would consider that an outlier. The 49 would heavily influence my Mean (Average) upward, where it has little to no influence on my Median. If I removed 49 from the data set and then recalculated my Mean, it would be 9.4, more than one full visitor less a day. If I removed it from the data set and then identified my Median, it would still be 9 (I had several days where I had 9 visitors). Understand?

Now the real question is what did I do to attract those 49 visitors, and how do I replicate that? The day was Mar. 19th. I had one post on Mar. 18th about my sinuses. I had two posts on Mar. 19th, one on my training class, and the other on the snow trip. I can get some details about the source of the visits from SiteMeter, although it is not very conclusive. It looks like it may have been a combination of above average posting volume and luckily finding my way into Bloggers "Next Blog" Queue. 

The key now is to keep my posting volume up, and to secure those readers"passing through" by making it easy for them to subscribe. If you haven't subscribed yet, DO IT! There are two easy options on the right hand side. Old School and New School.