Happy Sunday everyone! I have a special post to share with you this fine day. As all of you know, I make a nice side income from this blog and have loved every minute of it. With success, a loss of drive or initiative can happen. I’ll be honest, I haven”t been the inspired self that I once was when I first started.

While I was on cruise control, I had no one to push me to the next level. This is where Derek from Life and my Finances comes in. He has launched a growth centered blog called Online Money Bloggers and invited me to be part of it. The goal is to make at least $30,000 in extra income through online endeavors. Talk about inspiration! It was the kick in the butt that I needed. I of course joined and I’m looking forward to not only taking my blog to the next level but helping the other participants achieve their goals also!

So what can you expect from this?

Well, first off, I’ll be sharing my inside secrets on Online Money Bloggers. You can check out their blog once every three months where you can find my guest posts on what I’m doing to take my blog to the next level.

You’ll also see a badge for this competition on my right sidebar. This badge will be here during 2012.

A also wanted to give all my fans a huge thank you. Behind God’s blessing on my online ventures, you the fans are what has contributed to much of my online success.

So get excited about this new competition, $30,000 in 2012 here I come!

Welcome to my October monthly roundup! You may have been used to seeing weekly roundups, but I have officially switched to monthly updates. There are a couple resons for this.

First, I was getting burned out spending tons of time doing roundups. I love showcasing other blog’s posts and what carnivals I’ve been featured in, but it was just getting out of hand. Between managing the post each week and formatting, I could be using that time to write EPIC content for YOU!

Another reason is that I think weekly roundups get methodical and repetitive. They seem to lose their special gift of being new and exciting.

Monthly roundups are going to work better. I think you’ll like this!

Lastly, I have decided to share with you some of my stats on a monthly basis. I know other guys like Derek @ Life and my Finances do this and have inspired me. I’m going to bare it all with my statistics and how you what’s happening behind the scenes.

Free Money Wisdom Stats

Total Visitors for October- 5,350

Total Subscribers- 293

Twitter Followers- 1,328

Facebook Fans- 711 (Slurpee anyone?)

LinkedIn Connections- 487

Alexa Ranking- 76,872

Google PR- 3

All in all, not too shabby! I like where my traffic is but I’m excited to breach the 10k mark. As for subscribers, I got my sights set on 500 within the next couple months.

I’m pretty happy with this as I’ve only been blogging for around 10 months, woo hoo!

Some of my goals

I’ve been brainstorming ideas for an E-book and I think I know what i want it to be about. I’m going to be spending countless hours over the next year to create this E-book. It’s probably going to be a paid product, so keep your eyes peeled for updates.

I’m hoping to increase my subscriber count in the coming months. If I saw 500 subscribers by January, that would be awesome! However, with the holidays coming up, I don;t know if this would be possible.

Best posts of October

October was an awesome month full of amazing new posts from around the blog-sphere. I encourage you to give these bloggers some social media love, actually I am TELLING you! They really do deserve it, these posts were truly epic.

Am I A Complete Hypocrite? Or An Opportunist? over at My Journey to Millions

Random Thoughts on Investing over at Investorz Blog

Invest in Yourself! over at Krant Cents

Losing Weight Again over at Prairie EcoThrifter

10 Worst Paying Degrees of 2011 over at Not Made of Money

7 Ways to Safeguard Your Children’s Financial Future over at Squirrelers

Better Off Unemployed Than Working over at Darwin’s Money

Reflections On The Financial Blogger Conference over at KNS Financial

When Frugality = Stupidity: Illusion of Saving Money over at Wealth Informatics

Cheap Halloween Costumes over at PT Money

Carnivals

As usual, I was accepted into multiple Carnivals during the month of October. Here they are!

Festival of Frugality Halloween Edition

Carnival of Financial Camaraderie #1

Carnival of Financial Camaraderie #2

Carnival of Financial Camaraderie #3

Totally Money Carnival #39

Canadian Finance Carnival #56

Carnival of Financial Planning #205

Canadian Finance Carnival #58

Yakezie Carnival October 9th Edition

Canadian Finance Carnival #57

Totally Money Carnival #40

Carnival of Financial Planning #206

Totally Money Blog Carnival #41

Staff Writing

I was incredibly busy during October and didn’t have too much time to staff write. I actually had cut down my staff writing positions in Septermber to just three websites: ChristianPF, GenXFinance, and MoneyCrashers.

I’m back to my writing schedule so keep an eye out for weekly staff posts at those blogs.

On to November!

This brings us to the conclusion of my first monthly update! I’m looking forward to a strong month of November and can’t wait to get my hands on some turkey!