How To Quit Your Job And Work From Home Full-Time In 6 Months Or Less

So, Matt and I did a thing recently….

We both quit our full-time jobs to work for ourselves, at home.

It was probably one of the most nerve-wracking and then instantly satisfying experiences of our lives. So, how’d we do it?

And how can you do it, too?

(Trust me, quitting your 9-5 feels AHMAZING…incredible….exhilarating…awesome.)

It’s a two step process to quit your 9-5 and both can begin happening, today.

Ready??!!!

Having the ability to quit your 9-5 (and essentially your steady and reliable flow of income) is a two step process.

Step 1:  Smart Budgeting

Step 2:  Starting A Blog

First, you’ll want to budget your money and decrease your monthly expenses so they are as low as possible. Then, you can start a blog to pay for your lowered cost of living. (Or simply work less hours at your job.)

When we accomplished step one, we were able to drastically lower the amount of hours we spent at work each week.  If you’re interested in learning how to work less, join our FREE mini email series to learn how to budget smart and work less!

Then, because we were working less, starting a blog was easier and ultimately led to us quitting our jobs to rely solely on this blog for income.  If you’re interested in starts a blog, grab our 10-step checklist, here!

Wanna know the best part? You can start budgeting your money and setting up your blog as soon as you finish reading this post.

Ready to quit your 9-5, ASAP?

The first step in the process towards quitting your day job is to budget smart so your money is working for you, not against you.

To begin budgeting smart you’ll need to:

1. Understand your monthly income and expenses

2. Decrease your monthly expenses by as much as possible

Having an accurate idea of how much money you earn and spend each month with give you great insight into how much you need to (or don’t need to) work to pay for your bills.

To budget smart, you have to understand your finances.

Such as, how much money do you make each month and how much money do you spend each month?

Take the time to calculate how much money you earn each month and how much money you spend each month.

Once you have an understanding of your monthly flow of income and expenses, you’ll be able to monitor your spending and decrease your expenses over time.

 

After you’ve calculated your monthly income and monthly expenses, you’re able to start actively decreasing how much money you spend each month.

If you haven’t already, make a list of all your monthly bills and of how much you spend on things like groceries and gas.

Then, go through your list and make a plan to decrease or get rid of each expense.

Want 30+ ideas on how to decrease your monthly expenses?  Sign up for our FREE 4-day Budget Boss eSeries To Working Less, here!

You’ll be able to quit your 9-5 far sooner if you have less monthly expenses to pay for rather than more….ya feel?

Debt can be huge contributor to your monthly expenses + can be even harder to pay off if you don’t have a ton of extra income.

With interest rates at an all-time high, people are finding it difficult to pay off their credit card debt in a reasonable amount of time.

So, instead of continuing to make minimum payments on your credit cards while wracking up thousands in interest, consider consolidating your debt into a personal loan.

Personal loans for debt consolidation are awesome because you will:

• save mad cash
• cut down your payback time
• increase your credit score (usually; everybody is different)

When I consolidated my debt with PersonalLoans.com, I saved over $3,000, paid back my debt in 2 years instead of 5, and increased my credit score by over 50 points.

PersonalLoans.com is an easy + 100% online loan company who can approve your application and fund your loan in as little as 1 business day.

This is something I highly recommend doing if you are serious about slashing your expenses so you can afford your best life.

Starting a blog is awesome for so many reasons, including:

• writing about and promoting something that you love every single day
• creating your own work schedule
• taking vacation time and sick time whenever you need to
• never changing out of your pajamas if you don’t want to
• having the ability to express yourself creatively every single day
• getting to be apart of a great community

I could go on and on, but I’m sure you get my point. Blogging is AWESOME. I recommend starting a blog as your avenue to self-employment instead of another traditional business for two reasons:

1.  It is inexpensive to start a blog

2.  There are little to no overhead costs

Now, there are many articles on the internet that will tell you that you can start a blog for free. And, while they aren’t lying, they forget to mention that you cannot start a PROFITABLE blog for free.

In other words, if you want to earn a living from your blog, you can’t create that said blog for free.

But, as I mentioned, the start-up costs to launch a blog are pretty cheap in comparison to the amount of money you could end up earning from your blog.

So, with that being said, I’d love to guide you through how to start a money-making blog for as cheap as possible, cuz, I feel you….spending money sucks.

But, putting your hard-earned cash towards creating your own blog is worth every dime.  Trust.  I mean, some bloggers make over $100,000 per month sooooooooo….

Alright, alright…Lets get into the 10-step process!

Before you can launch your blog, you’ll need a domain name.

Your domain name will be the name of your blog, such as www.whosayswhat.co.

Choosing a domain name for your blog seems like a huge decision, and it is, but don’t put too much pressure on yourself.  You could spend an endless amount of time trying to come up with the perfect name for your blog and still be contemplating ideas six months from now.

So, what I suggest is to make a list of 5-10 domain names that you like.

Maybe you name your blog something that relates to what you’ll be blogging about.  Or maybe you’re launching a lifestyle blog so your own name as the domain name could be perfect.

Once you’ve made your list, you’ll want to visit GoDaddy for two reasons:

1.  To see if your domain name is available

2. To register your domain name once you’ve chosen an available one that you like

Your domain name will run you about $5-$10 per year. Like I said, so worth it!

Register your domain name with GoDaddy for less than $10/month by clicking here.

Remember how I said you can’t start a profitable blog for free?  Purchasing web hosting for your WordPress blog is the main reason for this.

See, if you want to earn money from your blog you need ways to monetize your site.  And to monetize your blog, you need to use WordPress.org instead of the free version of WordPress – WordPress.com.  And, finally, in order to use WordPress.org, you need web hosting to become a self-hosted WordPress blog.

Web hosting is super important to the success of your blog because they will be managing all the technical aspects of your website, like site speed and up-time.

So, now that you understand why you need web hosting and what the heck it is, lets talk about how to get it for cheap.

I use TMDHosting for my blog and they have never, ever failed me.

TMDHosting’s prices are affordable and their customer and technical support teams are out of this world.

I highly, highly recommend TMDHosting for your blog because as you start this new blogging journey, I am willing to bet that you’ll run into an issue here or there.

And when you run into a technical issue with your blog, you want a team that has your back – and TMDHosting will always have your back, 24/7/365.

You can purchase WordPress hosting from TMDHosting for as low as $2.95 per month. See, super affordable, right?!

Score WordPress hosting for your blog for as low as $2.95/month with TMDHosting by clicking here.

RELATED READS: TMDHosting Review – The Most Reliable And Affordable Option For Your Blog  //  Bluehost Review – Is This WordPress Host Worth The Hype (The Secret’s Out, They Aren’t)

Remember how I said TMDHosting is awesome?  Well, you’re about to find out why.

Installing WordPress on your new self-hosted blog is super simple – because TMDHosting will do it for you.

All you have to do to have WordPress installed on your blog is:

1. Login to your user area with TMDHosting by clicking here

2. Put in a ticket with their technical support team asking them to install WordPress for you

Yep, it is THAT simple.

They will get back to you within the hour to update you on the status of your ticket and will have WordPress installed for you by the end of the day.

Yep, you could be designing your dream website in as little as a day when you have TMDHosting as your host.

Oh, and this part is free.  Double score.

Designing your website is super fun.  It might even be my favorite part of blogging.

But, before you start designing your website, I suggest creating a brand for your blogging business by creating:

• Logo(s)
• 1-3 brand colors
• 1-2 brand fonts
• A “slogan” that quickly describes the purpose of your blog that you can insert across social media sites

Creating a strong brand for your blog is super important because it will help you stand out from the crowd, allowing people to recognize your content instantly.

Here is an example of the branding on our website (designed with the Divi Theme):

Trust me when I say that there are hundreds, maybe even thousands, of other blogs on the internet.  So, how are you gonna stand out?   WITH YOUR KICK-ASS UNIQUE BRAND!

Once you’ve created a solid and unique brand for your business, it’s time to start designing your blogs website by purchasing and installing a WordPress theme.

You can get free WordPress themes, however, I do not recommend them because hundreds of other people are also using them and they don’t give you much – if any – control over the branding of your website.

To have complete design control over your blog, I suggest using the Divi Theme by Elegant Themes.

The Divi Theme is a drag-and-drop system that gives you 100% control over the look of your website and is super user friendly (requiring zero HTML).

The Divi Theme will cost you $89 per year or $249 for lifetime access.  Keep in mind, that when purchasing the Divi Theme you are purchasing a subscription to Elegant Themes so you’ll have access to additional WordPress tools like an email marketing plugin and a social sharing plugin that are great for growing your blog.

To learn more about the Divi Theme and start designing your blog, click here.

When I was talking about purchasing a subscription to Elegant Themes earlier, I mentioned gaining access to additional WordPress tools, such as plugins. But, what the heck is a plugin?!

Well, WordPress plugins allow you to further customize your website.  Or they can help you with things like site speed and SEO (search engine optimization).

It is best to not add too many plugins to your blog, though, because they can interfere with your theme or slow down your website.

Below is a list of all the plugins we use and love on our blog and what they are used for.

And, psssst, they’re all free!

• Akismet Anti-Spam: Protects your blog from spam
• Bloom: An email opt-in plugin that you’ll have access to with your subscription to Elegant Themes
• Cloudfare: Will speed up and protect your website
• Disqus for WordPress: Allows people to comment on your blog posts
• Google Analytics for WordPress by MonesterInsights: An easy way to track your blogs traffic
• Lazy Load:  Delays the loading of images until the user scrolls to them for faster overall page load times
• Monarch: Social Media plugin for social sharing and following that you’ll have access to with your subscription to Elegant Themes
• Smush: Reduces image file sizes to improve site performance and boost SEO
• SumoMe: Another popular social media plugin
• UpdraftPlus (Backup/Restore): Plugin that backs up your sites information
• WP Performance Score Booster: Speeds up page load times to improve SEO
• WP Revisions Control: Controls how many revisions are stored for each post to decrease storage space issues
• – WP Super Cache: A very fast caching plugin to increase site speed and SEO
• WP Super Minify: Improves page load times
• WP Optimize: #1 WordPress optimization plugin
• Yoast SEO: Search Engine Optimization solution for WordPress

Once you’ve designed your blog with the Divi theme and installed all of your plugins, you’ll be ready to start publishing blog posts and promoting your blog.

And, don’t forget…all the plugins I’ve mentioned are FREE.

So, you’ve launched your blog and began publishing blog posts regularly – Go you!  This is an awesome accomplishment!

But, how do you turn those blog posts into income? Great question and we’ll get into the specifics of earning a living from your blog in a few.

But, first,  you’re gonna wanna sign up for email marketing with MailChimp (for FREE) to start collecting and growing your email list ASAP.

MailChimp is very user-friendly and makes creating automated email campaigns simple.  They also have awesome resources for creating opt-in landing pages and signup boxes.

Growing your email list from the get-go is hella important because your email list will become your most reliable source of income once you start teaming up with affiliate programs and creating products.

So, how do you grow your email list?

1. OFFER FREEBIES to go along with your blog posts.  These could be:

– Planner Printables

– Worksheets/Workbooks

– Guides

– Checklists

– Templates

– Mini Email Series

2. Create email sales funnels (learn more about this, here)

Then, once you’ve created freebies that will entice people to sign up for your email list, you’ll need to place opt-in boxes on your blog where people can enter their email in exchange for your freebie.

An opt-in box looks like the one below and can be generated directly through MailChimp (see how, here), or through your Bloom plugin by Elegant Themes (learn how, here).

Make sure it is EASY for people to sign up for your email list because, like I mentioned, your email list will become invaluable for generating income from your blog.

Now, you’re ready to start promoting your blog and gathering emails, buds!

Get started with MailChimp (for FREE up to 1,500 subscribers) by clicking here.

Finally!  We’ve made it to the part you’ve all been waiting for – how to make some money from your blog so you can quit your job!

There are a lot of ways to earn an income from your blog, the four major streams of income coming from:

1. Ads

2. Affiliate Marketing

3. Physical Products

4. Digital Products

Firstly, ads.

I do not recommend starting with ads on your blog as your main source of income.  In order to make a significant income from ads, you need hundreds of thousands of pageviews per day….not worth your time.

The other three avenues to make money don’t require nearly as much traffic as ads would, so these are the ones I recommend putting your energy towards.

So, next, affiliate marketing.

Affiliate marketing is your fastest route to earning a living on your blog and the avenue I recommend you start with first.

Affiliate marketing is when you promote a product on your site and for every person who purchases something through your link, you get a portion of the sale.

You’ll want to find a few affiliate programs that are relevant to your blog and promote, promote, promote! 

Write blog posts about these products and offer freebies to gather emails.  Then, create eye-catching pins for Pinterest to lead people to sign up for your email sales funnel, further pitching them your affiliate.

To learn more about affiliate marketing, click here.

The final two ways to make money from your blog are pretty self explanatory – create physical or digital products and promote them the same way you would an affiliate program.

Products you could create to sell on your blog include:

• eBooks
• eCourses
• Apps
• Planners
• Merch

Get creative with what you have to sell on your blog!  The world is your oyster!

Don’t forget to continue publishing new blog posts weekly because this content will be the fastest way to grow your email list and sell your stuff.

In order to make money from your blog (from affiliate links and products), you need consistent traffic to your blog. You can get consistent traffic to your blog by using a combination of two tools:

1. Pinterest

2. Tailwind

I’m sure you know what Pinterest is – an awesome place to find new ideas and outfit inspo. But, maybe what you didn’t know is that Pinterest is actually a search engine and not a social media site.

Because Pinterest is a search engine, you need to make sure your blogs Pinterest profile is search engine optimized by:

• Using a branded profile photo
• Writing a keyword rich profile description
• Creating 10-20 boards with keyword rich descriptions
• Creating branded board covers (with Canva)
• Pinning relevant content to your boards

Here is an example of our SEO’d Pinterest profile:

After SEO’ing your Pinterest profile, you’ll want to get added to some Pinterest group boards by visiting PinGroupie and following these steps:

1. Search a keyword that relates to your blog

2. Visit Pinterest profiles from your search result

3. Follow the instructions in the group board bio to be added to the board (this usually consists of emailing or DM’ing the group board owner or it will state that the board is no longer accepting new contributors)

Don’t worry if you email 50 group boards and only get added to 5.  This is normal.  Just keep swimming.

Once you’ve been added to a few group boards (the more the better, so never stop applying), you’re ready to start automating your pinning with Tailwind.

You can get started with Tailwind for FREE by clicking here.

Here is a quick overview of how to begin automating your Pinterest pinning with Tailwind (and drive traffic to your blog). If you want a more in-depth explanation, visit this post on how we increased our traffic by 64% in 30 days.

First, after signing up for Tailwind, go to “publisher” –> “board lists.”  This is where you can group together similar boards to schedule pins to them quicker. (See below)

Next, click here to install your Tailwind browser extension to easily pin content from Pinterest to your Tailwind schedule.

To start scheduling your pins and other relevant pins to your Tailwind schedule, login to Pinterest and click on your browser extension button that you just installed (looks like a blue feather). 

Then, click on all the pins you want to schedule. Finally, choose which boards you want each of those pins to be pinned to and click “schedule all.’

Finally, while in Tailwind, go to “publisher” –> “scheduled pins” to see an overview of all the pins you have scheduled.  Don’t forget to hit “shuffle queue” and you’ll be good to go until your queue runs out.  At that point, just repeat the process.

Tailwind is great because it drives traffic to your site by strategically pinning your pins at optimized times for your viewers.

To lean more about using Tailwind to drive traffic to your blog, click here.

Using Pinterest and Tailwind to promote your blog will only cost you $15 per month (once your FREE trial runs out) and is worth every penny.

Tailwind is the quickest and cheapest way to drive traffic to your blog without spending hours manually pinning or paying hundreds of dollars for ads to promote your blog on Facebook and Instagram.

Once your blog is set up and operating regularly, you’ll want to monitor your site through targeted analytics to ensure that what you are doing is working.

Get started with a free trial of Tailwind by clicking here!

Once you’ve launched your blog, it is important to monitor its progress through targeted analytics.

This way, you can make sure that the content you are producing is working for your goal of earning an income.

I monitor my blogs progress with Google Analytics. Google Analytics makes it super simple to see what posts/pages are getting the most traffic, where that traffic is coming from, and how long users are staying on your site.

This is all super valuable information because you can begin targeting your content towards what people are interested in the most. You can also get an idea of what type of products people would be interested in buying from your site.

Another way to monitor your blogs progress is through MailChimps and Pinterests stats.

Now, without further ado….the moment you’ve all been waiting for….it’s time to QUIT YOUR JOB!

Woo!  We made it!  It is finally time time to quit your job!

After budgeting your money and cutting costs you launched a dope-ass blog to start earning an income.

Now, it’s time to continue pumping out content till your blog generates enough income for you to quit your job.

It took me and Matt 3 months of working on our blog full-time (we launched 2 years ago but hadn’t put in the time until now) to have the ability to quit our jobs.

Quitting our jobs was the best thing we ever did for our family because now we get to devote our time to the things we actually enjoy – instead of going through the motions that having a full-time job often entails.

Trust me, you won’t regret this decision to change your life for the better.

Till next time!

xx Michelle