ShoutMeLoud June 2016 Transparency Report

Howdy Shouters,

How are you doing? So another month has passed by & I’m here with many juicy updates related to blogging, last month’s experiences & most importantly, our transparency report.

A quick brief for newcomers:

Our transparency report is a monthly series where we share all of the important things that we have learned so that you don’t have to experiment as much & can take smart, immediate action. Along with this, we also share last month’s traffic . This will give you an idea about new traffic sources and/or new income sources that you can apply to your blog.

To get a better picture of why we share such confidential reports, you should refer to these two posts:

1. Why Bloggers Share Their Income Report & Why You Should Also Do It
2. Blogging Income Report: The Mega List (with chart)

Alright, so now it’s time to share some of the news regarding ShoutMeLoud as well as some of the mistakes & learnings we’ve made last month.

Let’s start with the biggest news that many of you have been waiting for…

Shout University Launch:

Yes! The big wait is over & Shout University is now almost live. Why “almost”?

• Because this is the soft launch & only selected people were allowed to reserve a seat.

On the 30th of June, we launched Shout University & it was one of the biggest achievements for me in the past several years.

We worked very hard for the last 2 month to launch this project. Shout University has been my biggest dream for many, many years.

So far we are getting great reviews about the courses in our soft launch.

Currently, we are live with 3 modules:

• AdSense Mastery
• WordPress Learning Course
• WordPress Video Training

The most popular lesson is the extended version of our micro-niche site experiment. Here you can learn the secret of niche blogging + keyword research. This itself is worth the cost of membership.

In the coming months, we will be live with:

• Affiliate Marketing Course
• SEO Mastery
• YouTube Money Maker

In the near future, the following modules will be added:

• Social Media Marketing
• Email Marketing

Making a soft launch is helping us to work closely with a few students & refine the product to perfection before we offer it to everyone. Moreover, people who signed up for the soft launch also got a special discount + 6 months of extra time on their package.

You can learn more about Shout University here. If you like, you can blog about it on your blog or talk about it with those who want to learn about making money by blogging in a systematic manner.

Well…

OK, just for the readers of this post, we will open registration for the next 48 hours. This is your time to enroll at Shout University & enjoy this early bird advantage. Right now, you can enroll for a 20% discount.

• Grab the Shout University early bird discount.

Incorporating a Company in the U.S.A:

I researched about incorporating a company in the U.S.A. back in 2013, but I decided not to do it as opening a bank account was not so easy without actually being present in the U.S.A. But I realized that having a Stripe account will help a lot in collecting payment for our store & also for our new membership program.

I recently got to know about the Atlas by Stripe program for incorporating a company in the U.S.A. The biggest advantage of using Atlas by Stripe is that it helps you incorporate the company, open a bank account, and create a Stripe account. With all of these, you can also open a U.S.A based PayPal account which helps you to do business globally with fewer restrictions.

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I was lucky enough to receive the Atlas invite and started the application. As of right now, the process of incorporation is still in progress, but before the end of this month, it will be all done.

For those who don’t have the Atlas by Stripe invitation yet, but wish to open a Stripe account in the U.S.A, here is a hack which has been used by many & works flawlessly.

However, this is a hack so follow it at your own risk:

• Open an LLC in Delaware using DelawareINC. (They have a pretty solid reputation for helping individuals around the globe.)
• They help you get an EIN number for a few extra fees. The total comes out to be $372.
• Get a U.S. phone number using Skype or Google Voice.
• Get a virtual U.S. Address.
• Open a Payoneer account  that will give you a U.S. checking bank account.
• Sign up for a Stripe account.
• Create a PayPal account.

As I said, I know a few friends who have used this trick & it worked for them without any problem. Though, you need to do it at your risk.

Note: It’s safer if you travel to the U.S. occasionally, or you have a relative or friend living in the U.S.

I recommend DelawareInc for two reasons:

1. It came to me recommended by a good friend.
2. My personal experience with them has been wonderful.

I first booked an LLC incorporation through them, but later on I got an Atlas by Stripe invitation. After 24 hours, I had to ask them to cancel the order & they refunded me 100% without charging anything. Also, they are very responsive with email & Skype support.

A few of my friends also are considering Singapore for incorporating a company. I admit, I have limited information about it.

• If you have more details about Singapore or any other countries which are heaven for online entrepreneurs to incorporate companies, do let us know in the comments or email me directly at admin[at]shoutmeloud.com
• One of our readers on Facebook recommended a few more countries including Bahrain. I researched about Bahrain a bit & it certainly looks appealing. Here are the countries recommended by Ashish Dung Dung:

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I will keep sharing my experience as I have learned much throughout this process. Here is a good resource that help you find countries where you can form a company.

But for now, let’s look at our traffic report for last month.

June 2016 Traffic Report

June was a month of zero downtime! Thank you Kinsta hosting!

Overall, our traffic has improved & we received more traffic than we did in the month of May 2016.

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The majority of our traffic comes from the following three countries:

• India
• United States
• United Kingdom

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Followed by the following countries (as shown in the above screenshot):

• Pakistan
• Canada
• Australia
• Philippines
• Indonesia
• Bangladesh
• United Arab Emirates

PushEngage Push Notification Traffic:

I have been using PushEngage on ShoutMeLoud for web-based push notifications. If you haven’t yet integrated it, you should do that right now. I’m seeing great results from the web-based push notifications as you can see in the below screenshot.

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PushEngage’s free plan offers up to 2500 subscribers & you don’t need HTTPS. Apart from that, I really like their WordPress plugin as it automatically sends notifications when you publish a new post. I will do a detailed guide soon.

For now, do create an account & follow the instructions to set this up with your WordPress blog (or any other platform that you are using).

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While configuring, make sure you select “Use featured image from post as custom image for notifications.” This will improve CTR.

It currently supports single domains only, but in the near future they will be offering multiple domain integration.

• Create a free account on PushEngage

Well, that’s all from the traffic department.

• If you are a WordPress developer or know someone who is & wants to be part of our team, feel free to contact us at jobs[at]shoutmeloud.com with the subject: “I’m the one”

With this we end our monthly transparency report.

Now it’s your turn to tell me & everyone else about your traffic + earnings from the past month. What new things did you try? What have you discovered & learned?

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