I'm going to be honest with you about month one because that's the whole point of this blog.
The numbers are small. Some of them are zero. And I'm publishing them anyway because every blogger you follow who's making real money from their site published their month one numbers when they were embarrassing too. The transparency is the content.
Here's everything.
The numbers
Is 156 views good for month one?
Honestly? Yes. I think so.
I went looking for context on this and most sources suggest new blogs with zero existing audience and zero paid promotion see somewhere between 0 and 50 views in month one. 156 views from 58 real people finding a brand new site through organic search in the first few weeks of existence means the content is being found and the SEO is working.
It's not going viral. It's not impressive to say at a dinner party. But 58 real humans found this site without me paying for a single click, and that means the foundation is there.
The temptation in month one is to look at the numbers and feel like nothing is working. But 58 people found a blog that didn't exist a few weeks ago. That's not nothing. That's a start.
What I published
Four posts went live in month one:
Selling coloring books on Etsy — my real numbers from EquanimityPrints including local Asheville store sales and international orders.
I tried Young Living, Younique, and Doterra — three MLMs, the combined numbers, the BBB complaint, and the -$530 net loss. All of it.
I built exam prep apps as a side hustle — the origin story behind Unlimited Practice Guide, why I started it, and the tools I used.
Amazon KDP royalties — the math behind publishing the same coloring book as a physical book on Amazon KDP with zero inventory.
The coloring book and exam prep posts are driving the most traffic so far. Not surprising — those are the posts with the most specific, searchable content.
What I'm not counting
Zero email subscribers means zero people have signed up for the email list yet. This is not a disaster — the subscribe form is live and working, the starter kit is available, and email list growth in month one for a new blog with no social media following is typically zero to single digits anyway.
What I'm watching more carefully is whether the traffic turns into subscribers over month two. That's the metric that matters more than raw views.
The one win — Amazon Associates approved
I applied for the Amazon Associates affiliate program and got approved. My own coloring book — Appalachian Folklore on Amazon — now has an affiliate link, which means every time someone buys it through the blog I earn a commission on top of my KDP royalty.
That's the most natural affiliate placement I could have. I wrote the book. I published it. I documented the whole process here. The link earns on both ends.
The other affiliate applications (Canva, Etsy via Awin, Fiverr, ConvertKit) are still pending. I'll report back when they come through.
What's actually going on behind the scenes
The blog is the visible part of what I'm building. The bigger project is the exam prep apps — three sites live, one ready to launch, eight more in development.
Unlimited Practice Guide for pharmacy technicians, MPJE Unlimited Practice Guide for pharmacists, and NCLEX Unlimited Practice Guide for nursing students are all live and generating revenue. That's twelve total sites in the pipeline built by a stay-at-home parent using Replit and Claude with no formal coding background.
The blog documents all of it. The exam prep apps are where the real money is growing. Both things are true at the same time.
What month two looks like
My goals for month two are modest and specific:
- Get to 10 email subscribers
- Publish 8 more posts following the content calendar
- Get at least one more affiliate program approved and add links to existing posts
- Hit 500 total views
None of those numbers are impressive. That's intentional. Month two of a new blog is still early. The work is to show up consistently, keep publishing honest content, and let the SEO compound.
The blogs that make it through the quiet early months are the ones that win. I plan to be one of them.
I'll report back in month two with whatever the numbers actually are — good, bad, or embarrassingly small.
Are you building something right now that's in the quiet early months? Hit reply or drop a comment — I'd genuinely love to hear where you are.
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