My Fourth Month’s Earnings on Mediavine Journey to End the Year [December 2024]
Well, that’s a wrap for the 2024 season of blogging. There were highs, there were lows, there were befuddlements, and there were lessons learned.
You can find the earnings reports for my previous three months on Mediavine Journey here:
Once again, I recommend checking out Part 1 (September) if you want a breakdown/easy explanation of the metrics and terms I use in every earnings report.
So, without further ado, here is exactly how much my travel blog earned in the month of December on Mediavine Journey.
December 2024 Mediavine Journey Earnings
I took a screenshot on January 1st so the total amount is missing one day, so the number you see is about $2 less than what my monthly earnings were.
That’s right. I earned $49.88 in December, roughly $5 less than the previous month’s earnings.
Overall, that’s not great.
My monthly sessions clocked in at a modest 9,000 per month while my pageviews increased to 10,700. That’s still over 40,000 sessions away from qualifying for Mediavine’s flagship ad management and network solution, which boasts far higher RPMs and earnings.
My monthly RPM dropped from just over $6.00 to $5.29 which is less than ideal.
That was a tad confusing as my general understanding of advertising is that RPMs are at some of their highest in Q4 due to companies making sure their entire ad budget is spent/used up by the end of the year.
Further, holidays like Christmas and Thanksgiving are prime spending holidays.
Reflections on Month 4
My RPM over the last 90 days is $5.51. My prediction of settling around $7 might have been too ambitious.
I’ve been publishing more than ever over the last several months so was hoping for a bit of a better outcome.
Things were progressing steadily, with session highs on my website in the first half of December. However, that was somewhat short-lived thanks to a dreaded Google Update on December 18th, which saw my traffic take a roughly 25% to 30% dive. Things have been recovering slowly since.
A part of me always feels grateful that my site wasn’t completely decimated during these updates as they really are quite arbitrary.
Pale Ale Travel: If you’re considering getting started blogging and want to know if you should use a comprehensive content management system like WordPress or a lite version like Beehiiv, make sure to check out my post ‘WordPress vs. Beehiiv for Blogging’.
But then again, that’s almost Stockholm Syndrome-esque. I’m not sure why I should be grateful to a monopolistic company that has made it clear over the years that authentic small to medium-sized publishers can go kick rocks.
I write authentic content. I don’t use AI. I use pictures I’ve taken myself. And I pour a lot of heart and soul into each post. This isn’t me feeling entitled to anything. Rather, it’s a reaffirmation that solely relying on being in Google’s good graces for website traffic is a recipe for disaster.
Starting my newsletter and continuing to diversify traffic sources (I’ve gone heavy on Pinterest as of late) give me some hope that there is a chance to unchain myself from this unhinged algorithmic beast.
I have a few things in store for 2025 that I’m optimistic about and will shed some light on those at a later date – hint: one of them is a restructuring of the website.
The 2025 Blogging Season Begins
Mediavine pays out on a Net65 basis, meaning that 65 days from the end of the month the money was earned, you’ll receive it in your account.
Being home in New Hampshire for a month has been fantastic and allowed me to reassess my priorities in life and I’m extremely thankful to have taken this time off with my mother and brother.
Unfortunately, it hasn’t been particularly conducive to the long writing sessions I’m used to in Hong Kong. But I’ll still take the trade-off of seeing loved ones over increased website traffic any day of the week.
I’m not entirely sure of the trajectory of the site but I know I’ll keep writing until I can’t write no’ mo’. It’s funny, as I am the most fulfilled and proud of what I’ve been working on even though it is earning pennies compared to past work (not like I was ballin’ before).
I guess the million-dollar question that we all ask ourselves is how to bridge the gap between what we love and how to earn enough money to sustain.
Until then, I’m sure I’ll have to start finding paid opportunities in the near future but that ain’t the worst thing in the world.
If you have any questions about launching or scaling a travel blog (or newsletter), please don’t hesitate to reach out to me at info@palealetravel.com.
Write well everyone,
Big Body
Big Body is a voracious lov…eater, a cowardly fighter, and a self-proclaimed curry goat BBQ-eating champion (don’t forget the donkey milk) who likes Stoicism, baseball, and writing in the third person. Having worked for himself for the last 7 years, he isn’t particularly successful but he does still drink ice-cold Sapporo draft beers with the best of them and knows his way around a Dai Pai Dong or two. He is based in Hong Kong but you can still find him in Saigon, Osaka, and Vienna for extended periods.