I came across a survey last month that I found interesting, but also a bit scary. Larry over at The Solopreneur Life posted results from a survey they conducted. In that survey, they asked their readers to answer 2 questions: how old was their business and how much money did they personally make from it. Here’s the original article for you to check out.
Survey: 51% of Solopreneurs Made Less Than $20,000 in 2010 « The Solopreneur Life.
Included in that 51% is the 15.7% that lost money in 2010. That certainly doesn’t sound like the dream of working for yourself that we all picture when we get started.
Having said that, there are a lot of details that we don’t see.
- Correlation between age of business and earnings
- Financial goals of those businesses
- Overall financial health of the solopreneurs
For example, if I was running a business on the weekends to supplement my full-time job, then $15,000 would be great. However, if all 51% of the businesses were 5+ years old and the sole income for their families, then that’s bad news.
I’m not about to ask you personal details about your income last year, but I would like to know how you felt about your 2010 results. Did you exceed your expectations? Do you have high hopes for 2011, or are you worried that things will get worse?