Banned Blogger and Proud
Bloggers and social influencers have come under fire this week, thanks to a certain Irishman. Who instead of simply saying “no thank you, it’s not for us” when approached by a YouTuber, he chose to instead publicly shame her and ban all bloggers and social influencers from his establishment. Now I could go on and on about what a complete douche he is, but I won’t. Some people will find what he did hilarious, some will be disgusted and see it as nothing more than online bullying. Whichever camp you sit in, I’m not going to change your opinion on this.
However, what left me stunned was the general opinion when it comes to blogging and social influencing in general. If you check out the comments on his response, you can see there is a lot of hatred out there for bloggers and the “free stuff” we apparently try and rip brands out of on a daily basis. My fellow bloggers reading this will (I hope) share my shock and sadness over what has happened this week. For all you non bloggers out there though, that maybe don’t have an understanding of what this job entails (and yes, it IS a job), I thought I’d just take a little time and give you an insight into what my day looks like now as a blogger and freelance writer.
IS BLOGGING ACTUALLY A REAL JOB THOUGH?
First of all let me start by saying that digital marketing – such as social influencing and blogging – is a recognised form of marketing used and valued by many brands. Similar to big martketing campaigns, we are used by companies and PR’s to showcase their products. It’s all just on a smaller, and more local level than national campaigns. Most bloggers will slip these kinds of posts in amongst their own content, whatever that may be.
For me as a parenting and lifestyle blogger, that includes craft ideas, days out, books reviews etc. All of these are mine to share and not endorsed by anyone. Now and then you will see a review pop up that has been commissioned by a brand and these are easy to find, as they will come with a disclosure at the bottom telling you exactly under what terms I have been asked to post the review. This is a legal requirement and will ALWAYS be there. If it’s not, then it means the post is 100% me.
Now, one of the things I have been challenged on is that most of my reviews are positive, and I agree. On a whole they are. This is because – to be brutally honest – I won’t just accept anything that’s offered to me. I will only accept an offer to review a product if I think myself or a member of my family will love it. Else, why else accept? No one wants to be stuck with something that they do not want, but will take hours and hours of work to create and promote.
This bring me onto what creating a post actually entails.
WOULD YOU STILL SAY THIS IS FOR “FREE” STUFF?
Before I became a blogger, I had a naive idea that I would simply write posts and publish them. End of. I wish that were true. In reality this is what it really looks like:
- Emails back and forth with the brands agreeing terms. Usually between 5 – 15 emails. I often have to promote my blog, showcase my writing and photography skills and provide stats and data analytics to ensure I am ‘value’ for money
- Negociation skills are key at this stage as many people will want the world – deliverables that take hours upon hours of work – in return for a £10 product. Marketing, photography and copywriting all for £10? I’d like to see them get that with corporate companies. Anyway…..I digress.
- Product arrives (you have to wait until this stage before continuing, as some things just never arrive)
- Plan out content of post – will it be a straight review? A tell a story? Day out? etc.
- Photograph product (with equipment that costs a lot of money) – if there are kids unvolved this takes a LONG time
- Edit pictures (using software that usually has a licence cost)
- Draft post
- Final edit of post
- SEO optimise post
- Create header image
- Create pinnable image
- Add in alt attributes for all images ensuring they are sized appropropriately so not to slow down your site
- Publish post (on your blog which usually has a monthly hosting cost)
- Go back to brand
- Share to Facebook, respond to comments, engage
- Share to Twitter, respond to comments, engage
- Share to Instagram, respond to comments, engage
- Share to Pinterest
- Respond to comments on the post
- Share anywhere else I can think of, as if people don’t know it’s there then no one will read it.
And this is just the reviews. Alongside this there is my own content. For which a craft post for example will take a long time setting and up then clearning up after. A video takes hours to edit and put together. Keeping on top of social is an uphill battle to say the least.
Then there is the day on day stuff, like: searching for work, pitching for jobs, creating social content unrelated to the blog. Networking, researching, looking for ideas and scoping them out. Looking for tools to help the blog, taking stock pictures as ‘go to’ images for non specific posts like this one. This is to name but a few of the things which fill my evenings. After all, I have two young children to look after during the day.
NOW LET’S TALK MONEY
The reality is that unless you are a ‘big’ blogger, many of us won’t get additional payment for a review. Often we will simply get the product in exchange for service. This can be as little as a few £ for a shampoo for example, or the entrance fee covered for an attraction. I’ve lost count of how many times people have told me how lucky I am because of all the “free” stuff I get through the blog. The reality is though that I work hard creating content, taking and editing pictures, creating a social media plan, making and editing videos all alongside creating and promoting my own work and trying to keep my audience engaged. But you know, it’s still free apparantly.
In reality though, break that value down to an hourly rate and….well, let’s just say I did that once and just got depressed by the number on the page. Personally, I do this because I love to write and love this little corner of the internet that I’ve created for myself and my family. I live in hope that one day, my social following will get big enough that I may be able to start charging for reviews and general content and be able to generate a regular income from it. I may be able to at least get that hourly rate up to minimum wage….now THAT would be living the dream. Could you imagine that guys response if that poor girl had actually asked to be paid for the marketing she did for his business though?! I shudder at the thought.
SAVE YOUR PITY (NOT THAT YOU HAVE ANY)
Now, let me be clear – this isn’t a pity post. I love what I do and am proud to do it. This little blog – alongside a little PAYE work and copywriting – helps keep a roof over our head. It allows us to save more almost a grand on childcare each month, and gives me the flexibility to be able to be here for my children while they are young. We have to be creative though if we want to earn money. With sponsored posts, paid advertising and anything else we can find to bring in an income while keeping a balance between earning money to pay the mortage, and not to piss off our readers by shoving too much sponsored content out there.
So, there we have it. A job I am passionate about, but one that has me working the longest hours I’ve ever done for the least amount of pay. And do you know what, I love it. I just find it frustrating that while one half of what I do in copywriting is accepted as a ‘proper job’, the other half of blogging is no where near there yet.
Now, if you’re still with me then (i) well done for sticking through my little essay, and (2) over to you. What do you think it is that stops people thinking of blogging as a real job?
This was such a wonderful post, and I feel it will be eye opening to many people who don’t blog. Blogging is a lot of work and takes so much time and energy, you are correct in saying people who don’t do it usually don’t understand. I commend you for making this post and talking so eloquently about these points.
It really is so much work isn’t it?! Thank goodness we love it!
From what I gather though he didn’t actually name her did he? She ‘named’ herself by making a video about it?! I find it hard to side with either of them to be honest. Idiots all round who give hotels and bloggers a bad name!
I don’t think they helped themselves at all. Unfortunately the blacked out name was lightened in the original thread and shared. So her name, email address etc was shared for all to see. To be fair this is where research is so important. One look at his Facebook page by her would have told her that he likes to do this kind of thing a lot!
Bravo Sonia. Great article, could have not say it better!
Ahh thank you!
Brilliant post!! Non bloggers just don’t understand the sheer amount of work that goes into it all, sometimes with children about some things are just not possible to do either and time needs to be planned and scheduled.
Fantastic post xx
Thank you. And yes, add children into the equation and things get so much harder!
No. This entitlement needs to stop. As a hotel owner in Southern California, it is aggravating to receive emails from mundane online personalities who feel they should receive complimentary amenities simply for amassing a small cluster of brain dead followers too stupid to go out and experience these things on their own.
It’s not an entitlement, it’s a question to you. Something you are able to say no to. If someone works in sales, or as a lawyer (or any other job where they need to go out and search for clients) it’s praised when they get new work. Why should blogging be any different. Bloggers may contact you, you as a business owner can review their brand and make a decision and decide if they fit with yours. Or, if you don’t like this kind of marketing at all, you can politely say thanks but no thanks. A lot of work goes into writing and promoting. So what part of that is entitled? It’s offering a service in exchange for another.
But paying for a magazine advert is ok from your point of view, Deidre?
Google: marketing demographics.
If you don’t get it then good luck with your business…
Thank you for writing this on behalf of all bloggers! This needed to be said and explained. I saw the hateful post and the comments the other day and it is just so sad.
Thank you so much. I do think it’s a lack of understanding. For some reason we all have such a bad reputation at the moment!
Great post tippytupps, A good eye opener for the ill-informed out there, stick with it you are a very entertaining and informative talent
Thank you !
Good on you for opening the eyes of the sceptics. Keep up the good work. I find your blogs very enlightening.
That’s great to hear!
Great post and a great blog. It explained very clearly to me the amount of work a blogger has to do to make a living and how difficult it is. The tricky thing is in explaining to the likes of the hotel owner that the blogger’s write up is worth anything to them. Which I would say, it definitely is worth something, given the number of followers the blogger has. But is it worth a free stay in the hotel? Not sure. And how important is the review to the general reader? If you, as a blogger, receive something for ‘nothing’, be it a night at a hotel or a day out with the children, or even a bottle of shampoo, it becomes very difficult to write a negative review, I think. How easy is it to be objective? And if you do give a negative review does that then impact negatively on the possibility of further work for the blogger? Very difficult if neither blogger nor hotel is getting paid.
I think that’s a really good point. The value of what is being asked for, has to match the value that the blogger can offer. A start up blogger with a new following has unrealistic expectations if they think that the are in a position to pitch for a holiday. Similarly though, a blogger with a reach of over 50k, can’t be expected to work for a bottle of shampoo. It’s all about balance.
With regards to writing a negative review, I can only speak for myself and say that all opinions are always my own, and that relationship goes both ways. Yes, a brand may not want to work with you again, but would you want to work with them if the experience or product was not a good one? Most likely not. As a blogger who also reads other bloggers, one thing I like is that the reviews are usually balanced.
What you have to remember is that most bloggers will offer a range of services, a brand can choose a sponsored post which provides a marketing message which wants to be projected by the brand, or a review which is the bloggers own opinion of what is being tested (what is being delivered by a blogger legally, should always be disclosed. So if in doubt check out the end of the post). If all they wanted was positives, they can always go down the sponsored route which allows them to manage that risk. In my experience so far though, most brands welcome a balanced view and recognise that it will never be positive all the time. Perhaps I’ve been lucky so far though, and have simply not experienced the friction that can cause.
This is so true! I was cheering you on as i read x
Ahh thank you!
Yes I saw all of this go down! It’s awful. Thank you for posting about this and on behalf of us bloggers!
I love this post and agree wholeheartedly with all of it. I do all those things too and still find it hard to call my blog a job. I know it certainly is for those bloggers out there making a monthly income. It is a strange one isn’t it, I think what stops people having any respect for it at all is that they don’t know what goes into it, as you have described here, and therefore they think anyone could do it and so they think that devalues it. Also I think as we’re not employed by someone and we work all hours and get paid sporadically and such that they don’t think of it as a ‘job’ . On another note I thought the way that fella carried on was despicable and pure online bullying, She held herself really well in her response video. Personally, I would now actively avoid anything that person owns or runs.
Awesome post! Totally needed to be said! There are a lot of skeptics out there -Thank you for writing this!
Great post! He was so unprofessional. I completely agree with everything you’ve said!
This is a great post and it makes such an important point! There is SOOO much more work put into the job of blogging than most people realize!
Britt | http://alternativelyspeaking.ca
I read about this in the media and I’ve heard of this cafe before so completely believe they’d say this. and wasn’t shocked. A lot of what they say is done with the intent of sarcasm, but is in fact rather hurtful.