Why blogging may not be for you

while everyone will give you tips on how to start a blog and make money, here are 10 things that nobody is telling you about- and they may make you change your mind about blogging!

Lately it looks like everyone and their mother are starting a blog, and everyone is sharing tips on how to make it on Instagram, how to start making money and how to get to 100K followers.

Here’s the thing- while I’m not at 100K followers, I am a mommy blogger, I do get to make a bit of money through the sponsored content I create, I did make plenty of sponsored makeovers in my home, and I got the chance to be a brand ambassador for a couple of brands.. I guess you can call me a full-time blogger.

while everyone will give you tips on how to start a blog and make money, here are 10 things that nobody is telling you about- and they may make you change your mind about blogging!

But here’s why I think you should think twice before you’ll decide to put all your efforts and time in to trying to create (a profitable) blog and social media:

  1. It’s a lot of work – much more than a regular 8 to 5. Whoever claimed that you can work during kids naps and make full income money, lied to you. I have worked 15 to 20 hours per week for two years BEFORE I got to be paid my very first dollar for blogging. And now, I work almost every evening of the week, most weekends and every moment of baby naps. And when I’m with my kids, I may be shooting new content and creating things with them around. It never ends.
  2. You may lose your real life social life – if you have kids and home and want to work as a blogger, then you may not have time for anything else. Including real life connections.
  3. The comparison game and jealousy in the industry is strong – and the bar is getting higher every day. While I’m happy to have build real friendships through blogging, this industry is actually very hard on friendships – there’s alway that one friend who “got” new furniture, the one who was paid to travel and the one who got all the campaigns. Even us bloggers we tend to forget how much work goes in to all of these gigs and see only the fun part- and feel jealous. It’s a constant mental effort to not compare yourself to others and to cheer on friends while doing your thing.
  4. People will criticize you for whatever you do. If you think that moms are criticised a lot, well let me tell you about bloggers. There’s always someone who thinks you’re sharing too much : too intimate photos, too explicit images, too styled content, too unstyled photos, too photoshopped, not organic enough, too many sponsored content in a row etc..
  5. The scope of work is more than just “snapping photos”. Prepare yourself to learn all about the backend of managing a website, branding, editing photos, communicating with brands and public relation agencies, styling, modeling, pitching ideas and lastly  all the strategies for managing social media platforms.
  6. If you want to be a mommy blogger, ask yourself how much of family time can you devote to photo shoots. Now multiply that times four.
  7. Algorithms – the bloggers nemesis. They constantly change, making our work unpredictable and leaving us bloggers without control over the result of our efforts. (This one is quite stressful to be honest- the feeling of lack of control over the final result of the work – the reach of your posts and the engagement we get- since it always changes with the new algorithms through different platforms )
  8. Bribing your kids for a photo – you may start with a firm belief that you’ll only photograph your kids in a candid natural way and only when they want to –  but when you have deadlines and contracts, and kids that prefer doing whatever it is but smiling nicely to the photo – you might resolve to bribing..( aka, mom fail..)
  9. You may become addicted to your phone – because there’s a fine line between working on your phone during any free time that you might have, and checking your phone every ten minutes to see the emails and dm’s. To be honest I am working hard on myself not to become addicted to my phone!
  10. And lastly, you might get anxiety. Half of the bloggers/ instagrammers that I know have either suffered from anxiety or panic attacks and many have burn out and end up with depression. I’m lucky not to be one of them, but I do sometimes feel uninspired and worried, and since I know these are the first stages of burnout, this is when I unplug and reevaluate my work. Of course, there’s no hard research data here, but I think that the above points might have something to do with it.

Now, please don’t think I whine about my blogging journey. I just feel that with all the information out there and  all the ” tips to grow fast” and “make money as a mommy blogger now” there is a big chunk missing. And I think that if you dream of becoming a mommy blogger, you should know the full picture. 

Now, you might ask , why am I still doing this? Well, there are some bright sides to all that – the creative freedom of writing, creating and photographing what I want and how I want, the ability to work while being a mom of a baby, and the opportunities that come along the way. (I don’t think I would be able to write a book if I didn’t have my blog!) These are the things that still keep me going.

Lastly, if you want to start blogging, monetize your instagram and be the next It Mommy Blogger – go for it! Just make sure to be aware of all the aspects of mommy blogging – because whoever said it’s the easy route, was lying.

 

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