Do it On a Dime Blog

Time for a little transparency and honesty. I want to explain a little bit about how I run my “A Dime Saved- Do it on a Dime Blog”.

As you would know if you read my blog often, I have a fairly low-income. I live very frugally, partly because I am naturally frugal and mostly because I don’t really have a choice. I don’t choose to share my income and exact numbers with you because it’s not the point of my blog. It’s not about the numbers but about the actions and feelings and thoughts that drive the decisions that we make.

I am a mother in my 30’s. A few years ago, I lost my job. I had 1 child and one on the way. My husband is still a student and brings in very little money with some of his side jobs. That period was one of the worst in my life, but one of the greatest learning experiences. (More on that story later). We lived on nothing. We made it through on my husband’s part-time job and the money I made doing survey’s online (no it wasn’t a lot!) but we were determined not to go into major debt.

Since then I have (Thank g-d!) gotten a job. But we are still a family living on a pretty tight budget although we are lucky enough to have no debt (I got a scholarship for college and hacked the rest of my way to graduate debt-free– student loan debt is one of the biggest debts most people my age have to deal with).

When you spend time so focused on personal finance and being frugal you start to notice how much other people are messing up their finances and I realized how much I enjoy reading and learning about personal finances. This meant that I had so much to share on the topic. I quickly realized that I was boring my friends and family with my financial musings and advice so I decided to start this blog anonymously. It’s pretty much a secret from my family and friends- I try to stay anonymous as much as possible.

Thus “A Dime Saved” was born- I offer financial advice for the newly starting out on their financial journey and for those who are not in a position to save tons of money and who have to stretch their food budget every week. Since its my blog I also get to share my own advice and musings on personal finance and life. Above all, I share how I do it on a dime.

I do this blog as a hobby- to get my sanctimonious advice out of my system and to utilize my writing skills. If I make some money from this blog then I won’t complain! I will just dump it all into my 3-6 month emergency fund which is pretty slow in coming! I literally am going to be the poster child of creating an emergency fund dime by dime. I guess I really do it on a dime!

My Do it on a Dime Blog

But let’s talk about my blog. I do my blog on a dime. What does that mean? When I decided to create my blog I decided that the money spent on hosting fees would be well worth this “hobby” of mine. I don’t. I pay my hosting fees upfront and it usually comes to about $100 a year. Not that much money but certainly not negligible (at least for me).

I don’t spend a dime on anything else. I do it all on less than a dime. I don’t pay for plugins or schedulers or VA’s or apps or any “pro” anything. I do it all myself for free, even if it means taking a lot of time or restricting my growth. I have decided that I will not spend a dime on this blog, above hosting fees, unless I make that money from my blog. (Even though I desperately need a logo!)

So far in all the years that I have been writing, I have not reached that goal yet.

This year may be the first year that that happens. I am not writing this blog to make money, even though that would be certainly nice! I write this blog because I enjoy it and its fun for me.

But… I would love to be able to make some money- at least enough to pay for part of my hosting fees.

This “do it on a dime blog” needs ,000 dimes to keep it running. Therefore, I recently decided to put ads on my blog.

These ads pay even less than a dime but I am a firm believer that every dime counts! At least I practice what I preach! If I tell you to look to save a dime, then I better be grateful for every dime that comes my way! And I definitely am!

 

I know that ads can be super annoying. I am doing my best to keep the ads to a minimum and to be as unobtrusive as possible.

How this Blog Makes Money

How does this blog make money? Well, it hasn’t made a profit yet. It has barely made any money! But this is how it can potentially make money:

 

1. Ads. You see them. You sometimes click on them. We all know about ads.
2. Amazon affiliate links. Anytime you click on an Amazon link on this site and then make a purchase I make a small amount of money from that sale.
3. Other affiliate links. I am not in the habit of encouraging people to spend money so I am not encouraging people to buy things. I have two other affiliates on this site: Ebates/Rakuten and Capital One 360  as well as some other links. Those are two products that I personally use myself and I strongly recommend, so I feel comfortable encouraging others to sign up for them as well. If you do and use my links, then I get some money. I have other affiliate links that I recommend- none of these things are encouraging anyone to spend wasteful money so I feel ok with them on my site.

These three things are how I do this blog on a dime! I literally do it on a dime and then blog about it! Right now, I am looking for a dime from you. You don’t have to spend money on this! All you have to do is NOT use an ad blocker when reading my blog.

I wanted to be open and transparent with my readers about the money I spend on this blog. I want you to know that I do spend money on hosting fees. I don’t spend money on anything else- a true do it on a dime blog. And I do make a little bit of money from these revenue streams. For the purpose of full transparency: I haven’t even made $100 in three years of blogging.

I am not making the big bucks while talking about my low income. I literally have a low income. Every small savings tip that I share I have done at one point in my home. Not all at the same time- but at least once and I am sharing it with you in the hopes that one of these tips will help you do it on a dime.

I understand how hard it is to struggle with money. I struggle as well. That is why I feel like I can give you advice. I have lived it. I actually live it. And I am inviting you to join me on this journey. The very first step is to save $1,000 with the $1000 savings challenge. (hmmm. Do you think I can make $1,000 with this blog? Lol. My ads pay a few cents a month if I’m lucky.)

The point of my blog is teach you how to save money if you don’t know how. To share savings tips, to give you ways to save money, to help you with budgeting and groceries, help you with money saving tips, and how to get out debt, how to build an emergency fund and how to live frugally. I am chock-full of frugal tips because I practice it! I really do it on a dime in real life!

Well, there you go. Laying it all out on the table- I am “A Dime Saved”. I live my life on a dime. I do this blog on a dime. I do it all on a dime. Together, we will work to have many more dimes!