My Monthly Review - October 2023
I have been publicly sharing my monthly business reviews since January 2022 (scroll to the bottom of this post to see my others).
This is a reset process I go through on the first of every month to review the month that has just been and to plan for the month ahead.
I highly encourage all of my clients and students to do a similar process each month as it helps keep you accountable and see what is working and isn’t working in your business.
If you want a free checklist to use you can grab that here:
If you aren’t regularly tracking what is happening in your business then it’s very difficult to assess what’s working, what isn’t working, what progress you are making (or not making!) and how you can improve.
My review process normally takes me about 20 minutes to complete each month and when I look back on my previous entries I’m so grateful that I have a record of what has been happening so I can look back on how far I have come!
A quick note before we start…
I share this information publicly because I’m a completely open book and want to encourage and inspire other women and mothers about what is possible with their businesses.
When I was starting my ow business I used to follow a few business owners who did something similar to this and I found it hugely inspiring and helpful as it showed me what was possible in my own business.
However, I’m aware that some people find the sharing of business results and revenue numbers triggering, so if that’s you then I suggest you skip this post and jump in to some of my other free content instead :)
Here’s my review from October 2023.
Looking back - review last month
Revenue
October revenue was $224,026.28
Expenses
Main expenses for October:
Paid advertising: $37,424
Virtual Assistant: $2,099
Software Subscriptions: $739
Metrics
Total student enrolments across all online courses and templates: 23,134
Email/newsletter subscribers: 61,628
Instagram - TLDC: 119,000
Instagram - OPOB: 476
Instagram - CLR: 11.1K
Instagram - SketchUp: 8,737
TikTok: 2,244
Threads: 9,693
Twitter: 195
YouTube - CLR: 11.7K
YouTube - SketchUp: 527
TLDC Facebook Page Follows: 28K
Facebook Group: 18.2K
Pinterest Follows: 11.87K
Pinterest monthly views: 1.06M
LinkedIn Follows Personal: 932
LinkedIn Follows Business: 225
TLDC Website visits: 42K
TLDC Bounce Rate: 78.23%
CLR Website visits: 626
CLR Bounce Rate: 64.83%
Top 3 Wins Last Month
Continued creating a lot of content
10 chin ups in a row for the first time!
House design and furniture plan fully completed
Just crossed $7 million in revenue in my online business in 4 years 🤯
Notes from Last Month
What went well, what didn’t go well…
Quite a few wins this month including another strong revenue month. Revenue is up quite a bit over last year at this stage.
Here’s what’s been happening this month:
BUSINESS:
This month I’ve crossed $7 million in revenue - and this has been done in just over 4 years (first course sale was August 2019). Absolutely crazy.
November is BFCM sales and last year this was a very high sales month with nearly $400K of revenue in November. Will be interesting to see what happens with the sales this year, but I’ve been doing quite a bit of planning for them and have some ideas for different strategies I can implement to make the sales successful. I am still working on the project plan for these tasks and strategies but the plan is to create a project plan for between now and the end of November to get things set up very strategically this year (normally we just run this all at the last minute! 🤦🏻♀️)
I’ve continued to run my content experiment this month but I have pulled off the content a little. This was for a few reasons - firstly I was finding that some of my reels weren’t having time to settle down if I posted again a few hours later, so I decided that for any content that was performing well with lots of engagement I would keep that running on it’s own for a bit before posting something else. The algorithm is preferring recent content at the moment so if I posted over the top of a post that was performing well I would run the risk of stopping performance on that post. However, overall I’ve kept up my 42 pieces of content a day across all the different platforms.
I have been VERY slack on my SketchUp tips Instagram page - this one was hard for me as it took more effort to put together the reels for this. I’ve now done a comprehensive brainstorming session about topics for this page so I am planning on getting back to it during November. I also struggle on TikTok as well - but I will get back to repurposing my SketchUp Instagram reels there as well in November.
I’ve launched a brand new Instagram page on top of everything else I was already doing. It’s called One Person Online Business (https://www.instagram.com/onepersononlinebusiness/) - the entire purpose of the page is to unpack everything I know about starting, growing and scaling an online business. I have decided to separate out this content from all my other pages so people can come and follow me there and know that it’s the only content they will be getting from me there. I was sharing too much personal content mixed in with my business content on my personal page and this was confusing both my community and the algorithm. So this page is a new experiment on separating out that brand. I do think this could become a second 7-figure brand for me if I give it enough time to build up - so this is going to be a big focus for me for 2024.
Urgh…the only thing I’m still holding back on is my YouTube channel. But I do think I’ve worked out what I need to do with that now. I think maybe I need to have a second YouTube channel to cover my online business content and then change the name of my existing page, which is heavily focused on design business content to match the branding of my design business (TLDC). It’s just a question of whether I really want to be creating content for two YouTube channels haha! Sounds like a lot! But I did used to really enjoy creating videos so I guess it’s possible with the right forward planning and strategy.
PERSONAL:
For the first time ever I did 10 unassisted chin ups in a row the other day! This has been a goal of mine for years now but every time I’ve got close in the past something has come up - e.g. my multiple brain surgeries over the past few years. So I’m thrilled to have finally ticked that goal off my list! Next goal related to that is to get to 10 unassisted pull ups (not chin ups).
My deadlifts are also improving at the moment as I’ve been consistently working with Kirsti from Pilates to You for a few months now. My back has always been my issue with deadlifts - as soon as they start to get on the heavy side my back snaps (not in a good way!). But I’m learning so much about core strength and building that foundation with my core that I am seeing quite a bit of progress with strength across many things I’ve had trouble with in the past - so this has been exciting!
I’ve also been really focusing on eating heaps more protein lately and I have noticed quite a difference in my strength and also how I look. I’m feeling like I’m on top of my health at the moment - all except for my sleep, which is a complete disaster. I’m only getting about 5 hours a night, which isn’t enough. But the problem is if I wake up anywhere from about 3am I start thinking about work (I am always excited to get going with my day) and so eventually I decide to stop lying there thinking and get up and get on with things. I’m also in a bad habit of scrolling my phone or watching Netflix series before sleeping - the worst thing I could be doing! Need to get on top of that.
I have continued to keep taping my mouth closed at night, which I started about 6 weeks ago. This has had an impact on my quality of sleep (for the few hours I’m getting!).
Our house build is going really well - I’ve finished all the design elements now, including selecting all the furniture. In November I need to start placing all our orders (expensive but exciting!). The plumbing has all been roughed in now and they are currently roughing in the electrical. Gyprock should start in the next few weeks - so lots of excitement onsite now!
So it’s been another really good and consistent month. I’ve worked hard, but not too hard, and mainly been very consistent with the core goals I have at the moment - which is my nutrition/health/fitness as well as my content creation. And the results from the effort and consistency I’ve been putting in on both these things are really starting to pay off.
So for November it’s just more of the same to keep consolidating the work I’ve been putting in - plus of course hopefully having a really successful BFCM weekend of sales.
I am also keen to give my new brand lots of attention and see what I can start to do with that as I absolutely LOVE talking about online business so I’m excited about where that all might lead!
Looking forward - plan this month
Focus this month:
👏🏻 Continue my content experiment
🟠 Grow my new One Person Online Business page
💪🏻 Get strong and lean
Projects this month:
✅ Black Friday sales (tasks to prepare, run sale etc)
✅ Set up OPOB site
✅ Create table with metrics data to track progress
✅ YouTube channel - content plan, new videos
✅ Get ahead with SketchUp Tips videos
✅ Place house furniture and lighting orders
Revenue goal this month:
💰$300K revenue
What would make this month amazing?
Continue my content creation experiment and see what this does for business results. Work really hard on the content on my One Person Online Business page. Continue being really careful with my nutrition to reach my goal of being stronger and leaner for summer.
If you would like to follow my business journey you can read my other monthly reviews via the links at the bottom of this page.
And if you would like to download my free Notion template to conduct your own monthly business review you can do that here:
Courses and Templates for Designers and Architects
DO YOU WANT TO….
Improve your professionalism?
Find more clients?
Bring in more revenue?
Create better systems and processes?
Then check out my business courses and templates for designers and architects.
These courses and templates leave you with work done - not just a long list of things you need to do next. We have a really strong focus on taking action and getting things created that improve your business.
Enjoy the rest of your day!
Clare x
Dr Clare Le Roy
