I Published My First Journal at 60 — Now Comes the Hard Part

I finally have it in my hands.

Watchmen on the Wall: 30-Day Guided Prayer & Intercession Journal went from an idea, to a file on my computer, to Amazon KDP, and now to an actual journal I can hold.

That's a pretty big receipt for this 60-year-old beginner.

But here's what I'm learning: publishing the product wasn't the finish line. It was the starting line.

And I've already made a mistake that cost me money.

I Was Trying to Fix Something We'd Already Fixed

After making corrections to the journal, I uploaded the corrected files to Amazon KDP. But the customer-facing version I was looking at didn't immediately appear to reflect those corrections.

So I thought something was still wrong.

I kept checking it, trying to figure out what needed to be corrected, and I ordered additional copies.

Then I finally realized what had happened:

I was trying to fix something we'd already fixed.

That was one of those beginner lessons you don't necessarily understand until you experience it yourself.

And that's exactly why I'm documenting this journey.

I could wait until I've figured everything out and then come back and tell you how easy it was. But that wouldn't be the real story.

The real story includes the mistakes too.

Publishing It Doesn't Mean People Will Find It

Once the journal was published, I moved on to another part of this experiment: Amazon advertising.

And I'm keeping that receipt too.

At the time I recorded my latest YouTube update, my Amazon ad had approximately:

98 impressions.
0 clicks.
0 sales.

Now, am I calling that a failure?

No.

It's much too early for that.

What those numbers tell me is simply where I am right now.

The journal has been shown to people, but they haven't clicked on the ad yet. So now I have something real to watch, learn from, and eventually adjust if necessary.

That's very different from simply saying, "I put a product on Amazon, so now I'm in business."

I created the product.

I published the product.

Now I have to learn how to sell the product.

And that's the hard part.

This Is Why I'm Keeping the Receipts

When I started The Digital Carpenter, I decided I didn't want to build a website that only showed the polished results.

I want this website to become the record of what actually happened.

What did I buy?

What tools did I try?

What did they cost?

What mistakes did I make?

What worked?

What didn't?

Did something save me time?

Did something actually help me produce income?

Would I pay for it again?

And eventually, the biggest question:

Did this business actually become profitable?

That's what I mean when I say I'm keeping the receipts.

Some receipts will be actual expenses. Others will be results.

Both matter.

Building an Online Business at 60

I'm learning something else through all of this.

Starting an online business at 60 doesn't mean I have to already understand everything about websites, Amazon KDP, YouTube, advertising, AI tools, digital products, or online marketing.

I'm learning these things by actually doing them.

Sometimes I get it right.

Sometimes I spend money I probably didn't need to spend.

Sometimes I discover a tool that makes the process easier.

And sometimes I discover that something isn't nearly as simple as it looked from the outside.

But I'm still building.

My faith is part of who I am and it will naturally be part of this journey. But The Digital Carpenter is also about putting my hands to the work, learning new skills, testing ideas, and seeing what can actually be built.

So What Happens Next?

That's the part I don't know yet.

And I actually think that's what makes this worth documenting.

I don't want to come back two years from now with a polished success story and tell you that I built an online business.

I want you to see it while I'm building it.

Right now, I have a published journal.

I have an Amazon advertising experiment underway.

I have expenses.

I have some mistakes.

I have a lot left to learn.

And I don't have sales from this experiment to brag about.

Yet.

So we're going to keep watching the numbers, keep learning, and see what happens next.

I'm 60. I'm building. I'm learning. I'm testing. And I'm keeping the receipts.

— Trisha Hayes