How Bitesize Business School Is Generating Income In 2016

I’d like to share how I’m making money so far this year. I say so far because the goal is to change the current configuration. As an entrepreneur, I’m sure you’re eager to learn about how other entrepreneurs are bringing home the bacon.

Visual Perception

Before I jump into revenue, one of the biggest things I’ve done this year is on the branding front. I have lots of content and courses related to design and programming. Having this content on Bitesize Business School diluted the brand and weakened it. The obvious solution would be to build out two additional sites for design and programming and brand them well.

But therein lies the dilemma  Building out two additional sites may sound great on paper but its a huge undertaking. Once you move away from the nicely drawn out plans on the desk and out to the building site with your team holding hammers and see all of the lumber piled high, you realize you’re going to be here for a while.

With all of my client work and pipeline of upcoming products full, there was no way I wanted to undergo such a large project. Not to mention the ongoing upkeep of these sites (separate logins, domains, emails addresses, no sharing of templates between sites, and on and on).

The solution required some of the box thinking.

What I’ve come up with is to create two mini sites on Bitesize Business School and brand them. This way, it’s similar to having one site.

As for branding, they each have their own logo although all 3 logos (business, design, programming) share a common shape since they are all basically the same company.

Personal Accomplishments

Just a quick note on personal accomplishments. This year, I finally bought a house. I’ve been looking for like three years now. Things around here don’t stay on the market long. After finding something I really like, I decided to pull the trigger before it disappeared.

I’ve attached a photo of the studio, which is also part of the office and where all of the courses are recorded. You can see it here as well: https://www.bitesizebschool.com/services/.​​​​​​​

HomeStudio

New Client (You’ll Recognize The Name)

There have been a few great business accomplishments this year. But one of the top is that I’ve been working with Manning Publications on their course platform initiative. Certainly an excellent client to have on board. They are a large publisher of high quality technical books and well known in this space.

Manning is looking into possibly building out courses on their site.  It’s a lot of fun to be in the early stages of something like this and have input into how its shaped.

I’ll keep you posted as things progress to a final outcome.

Show Me The Money

I’m definitely a numbers guy.  So let’s jump into some revenue generation numbers for this year so far.  Here’s what growth looks like each month YTD compared to last year:

January: 228.72%

February: 198.39%

March: 169.97%

April: 241.45% (still in progress)

The next question is: How am I making money?  Here’s an as of April 23rd breakdown:

Revenue_Goals_numbers

2% – Advertising

1% – Affiliate

.33% – Audio Books

.03% – Books

31% – Courses – Client (contracted courses)

59% – Courses – Royalties (courses sold on marketplaces)

4% – Courses – BBS (courses sold directly from BBS)

1% – Writing (copywriting and content creation)

The goal going forward this year is to drastically change the slices in that pie. My biggest focus will be on increasing the share the “Courses – BSS” slice takes.

But why? That slice of the pie are courses I sell directly from the BBS website. They are exactly what my audience is looking for. This includes Bitesize Design School and Bitesize Programming School.

Selling courses on BBS means I have full control. There isn’t a chance some one can implement a policy and negatively impact the revenue I’m generating on BBS. There isn’t a chance BBS will suddenly fold and that revenue channel evaporates. That could happen, but I’ll know well in advance if something is brewing.

All customers purchasing products on BBS are 100% my customers. I control their experience, all the marketing and branding. This is important for building out a long-term growth vision.

Growing One Wedge Doesn’t Mean Revenue For Another Shrinks

Just to clarify one point, growing the “Courses – BBS” wedge doesn’t mean revenue for that wedge shrinks. For example (using fake numbers here to keep it simple), if “Course – Royalties” are at $20000 and shrink to 25% of the pie, while BBS increases to 50%, it doesn’t mean “Course – Royalties” are only making $5000 now.

To make this work, “Course – Royalties” needs to continue bringing in around the same level of income and ultimately increase as a revenue driver. While it will be at 25%, it will still bring in $20000.

Overall income of BBS will have increased, and that is why “Course – Royalties” can shrink in size relative to other wedges but not in revenue.​​​​​​​

Business Modeling Graphically

This kind of graphical business modeling is something I spend lots of time on. It’s easy for us to get caught up in the weeds when things are moving fast and clients have constant deadlines that you must meet. But it’s also important to consistently have time where you slow things down and focus on your goals. Then realize where the company is relative to those goes.

Have you checked to see if you’ve gone off track? Does something need to be dialed in more? You’ll never know without taking some time to focus on how the current picture relates to the future picture. But you need goals to have that future picture.

*** Want to follow along as I grow a profitable business? Get regular emails about my journey by signing up in the top right corner of this page. ***

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