Michelle Schroeder-Gardner: How to Make $100,000 per Month Blogging and Travel Full-Time

Welcome to the Scaling Success Stories series!

If you’re new to this series, I ask online entrepreneurs questions regarding growing and scaling their business.

This is the series description:

You can get your fill of online business tips by reading the other interviews on the Scaling Success Stories page.

Interview with Michelle Schroeder-Gardner from Making Sense of Cents

It was my pleasure interviewing Michelle Schroeder-Gardner of Making Sense of Cents, a popular personal finance blog that teaches you how to be smart with your finances. Michelle originally started the blog to help her improve her finances, after being in $38,000 of student loan debt.

Now, she makes over $100,000/month on autopilot, primarily from affiliate marketing and online courses.

Check out what Michelle had to say to my questions!

1. Why did you start an online business and how does your passion still drive your business’ growth today?

I did not start my business knowing that I was starting one!

Several years ago, I started Making Sense of Cents with the hope of learning how to save money and talking about my personal finance situation after reading a magazine that featured a personal finance website in one of their articles. I didn’t start it to make money, to turn it into a business, or anything like that.

My blog was just a hobby, and I was even anonymous for about the first two years as well.

Eventually, I realized that I could earn a living from Making Sense of Cents, and turned it into my full-time career. I left my job as a financial analyst and have been blogging ever since. Blogging is still super enjoyable for me, and I am so very happy that I get to earn a living doing this.

2. At what point did you realize that your business was “taking off” and that you could really make money from it?

I earned my first $100 from my website about 6 months in. As I said, I wasn’t trying to make money, I actually just stumbled across it.

A blogging friend of mine connected me with an advertiser, and that’s how I earned my first $100 blogging. After that first $100, I became super interested in making money blogging.

I was already blogging, for free, for several hours each day, all because I loved it so much.

At this point, I still did not think that I would turn it into a full-time job — I just thought making some side income from it would be nice. About one year after I started my blog, I realized that I could possibly turn this side hustle into a full-time career.

So, I paid off my $40,000 in student loan debt, built an emergency fund, and decided to leave my day job in order to blog full-time.

It was extremely scary for me to leave my day job.

I have three college degrees, and none of them are in blogging, haha!

I was afraid to leave my stable job in order to blog full-time. I was afraid of the future, what people would think, what I thought, and more. However, I just had an extreme dislike for my analyst position, and I realized that I did not want to do that forever.

I knew that blogging was for me instead.

3.  At what point did you realize you were living the life you wanted to?

Pretty much right after I left my day job to blog full-time.

My husband left his job at the same time, and we started traveling pretty much immediately.

Being able to work while traveling was a great feeling, and we have been so happy doing this!

There are so many other positives as well. I was able to pay off my student loans, we love what we do, we have a flexible schedule, and we already have enough fully saved for retirement.

4. One of the biggest fears of outsourcing is trusting the people you hire to run your business the way you would. How did you overcome this and where did you find the right freelancers and employees to help you grow your business?

I don’t have a huge team, but I am happy with the setup that I have.

Making Sense of Cents runs fairly passively, and I built it this way on purpose.

I do have an editor, a virtual assistant, and I hire out various jobs such as graphic design, and technical work as well. By hiring out, I am able to focus on what I do best and what I enjoy most.

I definitely recommend that everyone outsource tasks that help them to improve their business as well as improve their own life.

5. A common myth is that as you grow and scale your business, you have to sell your soul to make money, especially when you venture into paid advertising. How do you debunk this myth in your business?

Since I started Making Sense of Cents entirely as a hobby, I never came across this 🙂

I didn’t start Making Sense of Cents as a way to make money so I have never had to sell my soul.

6. Why do you think most people fail to grow their businesses and what advice would you offer them to keep pushing, despite all the setbacks?

I think that when it comes to blogging, so many people think that it is easy — almost like it is a get rich quick scheme.

I’m not sure where this myth came from, but blogging is actually a ton of work! I think that if more people realized this, then more bloggers would see success.

Instead, many people quit after just blogging for 6 months, because they don’t realize how much work it is.

7. How important has niching down been (no matter how hard it hurts) to your business’ growth and profitability?

I have never niched down. I talk about pretty much everything on Making Sense of Cents, haha!

From basic personal finance to travel to early retirement to self-care, and more, I talk about all kinds of things on my blog.

8. What do you attribute your success to and how do you explain it? Do you think the same strategies will help you reach your next monetization goals? Why or why not?

Passion.

I have always loved blogging and I only write about subjects that I enjoy.

Due to that, I have seen success because it is a passion project for me. I enjoy waking up every day and working on my blog! Yes, passion is definitely a great motivator and helps me reach my goals.

9. To scale, you really need to have a systemized business. What steps have you taken to build those systems and how do you optimize them?

Affiliate marketing is my main form of income from my business, which has allowed me to build my income quite passively.

I highly recommend that all bloggers seek out affiliate income from their platform.

10.  If you could speak face-to-face with yourself when you first started your business, what pearls of wisdom would you impart?

Ha, I would tell myself to get off Blogspot, buy a domain, and take everything seriously from Day 1!

About Michelle Schroeder-Gardner

Michelle Schroeder-Gardner is the founder of Making Sense of Cents, a personal finance website that helps readers learn how to save more, earn money, and live more. She currently earns over $100,000 a month from her blogging business and shows no signs of slowing down. She currently travels full-time with her husband and two dogs via sailboat. You can learn how to start a blog here with her free course.

Interested in Learning From Michelle?

Michelle’s flagship course, Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing, teaches you how to build a passive income on your blog by recommending products you love. It’s the same strategy she’s taken to monetize a single post to more than $300,000!

If you don’t believe making money online can be done like this, just take a look at her income reports.

This course is designed for bloggers who want to diversify their revenue with affiliate marketing and haven’t begun implementing it yet in their businesses.

Before you think…

She makes a lot of money because she’s in the personal finance/make money online niche, understand that you can master affiliate marketing techniques for whatever niche you’re in.

If there are products you enjoy that have affiliate programs, you can take advantage of them!

I didn’t make money with affiliate marketing until I took her course.

It’s possible to make thousands of dollars per month passively on your site on autopilot.

And, as Michelle mentioned, affiliate marketing is what has enabled her to achieve massive success without requiring a huge team.

I’ve seen countless students in the Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing Facebook group achieve success through following these steps. 

Including some of my former interviewees:

• Jeff Proctor
• Kelan Kline
• Carly Campbell

And, some of my future ones as well!

This all-text course teaches you how to make money through affiliate marketing the right way, no matter what niche your blog is in.

Without Michelle, I wouldn’t have made my first dollars from my blog 🙂

Purchase Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing Today!

P.S. The Facebook group is worth the entire cost of the course!

Conclusion

Thanks for participating in my series, Michelle!

As you can tell, it’s NOT EASY growing and scaling an online business, but there are some things you can do to aid you in the process.

Inspired by Michelle Schroeder-Gardner?

Now, it’s your turn!

I assembled the Scaling Blueprint to show you how to…

• Outsource Effectively
• Systemize Your Business
• Shatter Your Revenue Goals

After working with six-figure and seven-figure clients, I know the difference between how they function.

Let me help you start scaling successfully.

Get My FREE Blueprint!

Cheers to future success!