My friend Michelle is currently traveling across the country as she runs a personal finance and lifestyle blog at MakingSenseofCents.com. I found her blog after Michelle left a thoughtful comment she left on a guest post I did a year ago on gonewiththewynns.com.

Michelle mentioned in the comment that she was looking for an RV and that our guest post had been really helpful for her. After clicking over to her blog I remember being mesmerized for quite some time as I read through post after post on her blog. Her website was amazing! She had paid off $38,000 of student loans in 7 months and was making a LOT of money from blogging. More than anything, I just felt like she was a really good person– someone I could trust and who I would happily take advice from.

It was really encouraging and insightful to read through Michelle’s blog, learning about how she was making money online from blogging and other things. I’m so excited to share this interview I did with her about how she’s able to make $25,000/month from running her personal finance blog.

(This interview has been updated. Michelle makes over $100,000/month from her blog)

Brief snapshot of what Michelle has done in her online business

• [Updated]: Average income of $100,000+/month from her blog
• She receives around 300k page views per month (don’t worry, I’m going to ask how)
• Just 10 months after starting her blog she was already generating over $600/month from her website
• She’s been featured in Forbes, Lifehacker, Business Insider, US News, and more.

**Advance warning before reading this post: 

Michelle has been super candid about all of the hard work it took to help her blog reach this level. When getting started, she worked 100-hour weeks (with a full-time job + blogging) and barely generated much revenue in the first two years.

Just like launching a business or any other major venture, growing a massive audience is not easy. This interview will NOT provide any get-rich-quick type secrets to helping you launch a successful blog. However, if you’re committed to the long term growth of your online business, then Michelle’s wisdom will surely help the learning curve that it takes to achieve the kind of success she’s had.

Make Money RVing Interview with Michelle

Heath: Michelle, what was the inciting incident for you and your newlywed husband to hit the road in an RV? Did you ever think you’d be living and traveling the country by RV?

Michelle: We thought about buying an RV for awhile. It crossed our mind nearly every day. My husband was more on board than I was, so he had to convince me for awhile, sadly enough. For us, we were on the road around 90% of the time going on trips, visiting friends and family, and more, so it just made sense for us to have an RV.

I never thought I would be living and traveling the country by RV. Now, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I love it a lot!

How has travel impacted your marriage, business, and lifestyle?

Since we were already on the road a lot, not much has changed. If anything, being in an RV has made things easier because we have our “home” with us and can bring it everywhere.

It is interesting being in such a small space with my husband and our two dogs. We try to be as active as we can so that we can all get out of the RV occasionally. This way we don’t get on each other’s nerves as well. 

If someone wants to launch a successful blog & travel, would you recommend they do this before they start traveling? Or is it okay to start after you begin traveling?

I think that if you want to make a living from your blog, then starting it beforehand can help you greatly. This is because you can get the hang of it before you leave, iron out all the kinks, and decide if you even like blogging. Many people go into blogging thinking they will love it, but you really don’t know until you try it!

How many hours a week do you work on your business while traveling? How does this compare to when you first started your blog?

I probably spend somewhere around 40 hours a week on my blog currently. When I first left my day job for blogging, though, I was spending around 100 hours a week on it. I had poor time management skills then but I have since learned how to use my time better.

How to Start a Successful Blog

One of the first things I feel when looking at your blog is extreme intimidation. Your website is crisp, you have a strong brand, hundreds of comments on your blog, and you make it look like it’s the most natural thing in the world. You are where so many bloggers aspire to be (as in, you’re making money from your blog), but I know you also started at stage one just like the rest of us. How did you get over that initial fear of starting your blog?

Michelle: Oh, I completely get where you’re coming from! I still feel the same way as you do whenever I look at blogs. To get over that feeling, you seriously just need to start a blog and go with the flow. Looking at other blogs as a source of inspiration is a great way to get over the initial fear.

Of all the careers you could have pursued, you originally decided to start a blog to document your journey to paying off student debt. Why did you see blogging as something you wanted to try out?

I decided to try out blogging because I thought it would be a great way to keep me on track with my student loans. Turns out, it was! 

I first came across blogging after reading about a personal finance website in a women’s magazine. Then, I noticed tons of comments on that website from other personal finance bloggers. I quickly became hooked in the community and I knew that starting a blog of my own could be a lot of fun.

You kept your job for two years while you were building up your blog, how did you find the time to do both?

It was very hard. I would wake up early in the morning to work on my blog, I used lunch breaks for my blog, and I would spend time after work on my blog. I also cut out or lowered the amount of time I wasted, such as on social media and watching TV. Doing all of those things helped me find a lot of time to work on my blog.

I noticed when you first started your blog you published blogs once, sometimes twice per day. Can you talk about the importance of consistently publishing content when you first launch a blog?

Publishing consistently is important, especially in the beginning. Readers want to know that you are actually there and that they can count on you for content. I published too many times in the beginning though. A new blog is usually good if they just post a few times a week.

If you could rank the following skills/actions based on the level of importance for building a blog– how would you rank them?

• Having a nice looking website
• Guest posting on successful sites
• Social media
• Focusing on growing email list
• Consistently posting content
• Trust with your readers
• Providing value for readers
• Knowing your niche
• Connecting with other like-minded bloggers

Michelle: With #1 being the most important, I ranked them below. They are all VERY important, so it was hard to rank them.

1. Providing value for readers
2. Trust with your readers
3. Connecting with other like-minded bloggers
4. Knowing your niche
5. Having a nice looking website
6. Social media
7. Guest posting on successful sites
8. Focusing on growing email list
9. Consistently posting content

Based on the numbers you show on your website it took you around a year to reach $2,000/month revenue from your blog. This is the minimum monthly revenue I recommend anyone hit the road makes. What’s your recommendation for the quickest and best route to start making at least $2k/month blogging? Affiliates? Guest blogging? Social media?

The quickest route would be freelancing for others, such as by becoming a staff writer, a virtual assistant, and so on. This is because affiliate income usually takes awhile to build up due to a person having to build their blog first. By freelancing for others, you can earn a set amount of income almost right away.

To learn from Michelle how exactly to start making money through affiliate marketing, check out her course, Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing.

How many blogs did you start before you launched makingsenseofcents.com? What did you learn in the process of launching those other sites that helped you make it successful?

Making Sense of Cents was the very first blog that I started. I learned as I went and I think that worked out well for me.

Your website received 300,000 hits last month. Would you say the majority of that traffic has come from guest posting/being interviewed on larger sites? How many guest posts did you do during your first year of blogging? How many would you recommend to post per month?

I’ve hardly ever guest post. I do take part in many interviews through HARO (which I highly recommend) and that has helped get my name out there.

The majority of my traffic actually comes from repeat readers and from those on Pinterest.

Guest posting is very helpful, though, especially for a new blogger. I would recommend bloggers guest post at least once a month.

You’ve done a ton of interviews in successful online publications. Did all of those reach out to you for an interview? Or did you reach out and pitch some of them as well. Any advice for doing this effectively?

Around half were done from them contacting me directly. The other half were from me pitching interview requests on HARO. I highly recommend this post on CarefulCents about HARO – http://www.carefulcents.com/free-publicity-get-published-haro/

[Updated]: It’s taken you five years to hit $100,000/month in revenue. For most people, this can seem like a far-off, nearly impossible goal. What are a few things people can start doing right now in order to make baby steps towards achieving monthly blog revenue like this?

I know it can seem impossible, but this is exactly how I used to feel about other bloggers. I have had many people tell me through my monthly income reports that they used to think it was impossible too, until they made an attempt at it and found out that it was very possible for others to do the same.

Steps that a person can make include starting a blog ASAP would be creating high quality content, connecting with other bloggers, attending blogging conferences, and more.

Hope you enjoyed this interview with Michelle. She is a huge source of knowledge and just through reading her blog I have learned SO much.

UPDATE: Michelle launched a brand-new course on how to get started affiliate marketing where she breaks down how you can make money recommending products you already use. You can check it out here.