'BLOGGING ISN'T A JOB'

If you were anywhere near social media last month, you will have seen, or experienced the ripples of the whole blogger vs hotel fiasco. It blew up, and while I felt absolute outrage on behalf of the influencer Elle Darby, it raised a big point - blogging truly isn't seen as a career option. I've known this deep down for some time, the odd comment here and there, but honestly it's generally from a generation that I don't feel grasp the concept of modern technology. How can I explain to my 70 year old Nan, who grew up in an era where the nearest phone was three streets away in a box - that suddenly I can ring somebody across the world on a computer? Never mind the fact I'm earning an income from what she essentially see's as 'doing nothing'. It's easy to assume that someone who sits on a computer at home, is doing what the other 99% of the population who sit at computers in their homes do - mess around, play games, chat on social and other general nothingness. Usually when someone heads to work, it's a specific zone, whether it's your office, a supermarket floor, in a lorry, there's a designated area in which you need to be, to be seen as working. Blogging doesn't fit that criteria, I can work from my phone on the go, my laptop in a coffee shop, or even head out to an 'event' and it look like a total jolly. It's all still work, just as it would be if I was scanning items on a conveyor belt - yet, still, it's completely unrecognised.

It's ironic to me that blogging isn't seen as a 'proper job'. Given the fact it's a huge umbrella that hosts a whole plethora of other jobs in it's title, one day you're a photographer, then an editor, or a writer, a social media manager, a marketer, the list goes on and on with each of these being a whole career path in their own right - yet as soon as they are labelled under blogger, you're dismissed. Blogging is seen as an easy route, a quick track to freebies and being paid to do nothing, not only is that downright insulting to brands that spend their hard earned marketing budgets on bloggers and influencers, but it's insulting to us ourselves. I don't know many career paths you can be in and not know when your payday will be, have an agreement in place, even contracts but yet when payday rolls around you're ignored and constantly on a hamster wheel of chasing late payments. To get a collaboration in place, promised the world and have it fall through or dismissed as though it didn't happen, till eventually you learn that you don't count your money till it's in your bank and you don't talk about work until it's happened. Blogging isn't easy, the market now is hugely saturated, and whilst I definitely think there is room for everyone, with the trend in bots, buying stats and follow / unfollow, it's harder than ever to grow and be seen.

The freebies? Ah the freebies. A word I completely detest, I can safely say, that I can count on one hand the amount of freebies I've received. It's so rare that bloggers receive a product without strings attached. Even it's a simple share across social, there's usually something more to it than a 'here just have this from us for nothing'. Sure it might look all glitz and glam in a 'What the postman brought' video, whacking out the newest make-up collection from a high end brand, or that not yet released pushchair they've been sent - all 'freebies'. Wrong. They're exchanges. Much like people work hard in their day jobs, cashing cheques behind a kiosk in the bank, or packing parcels in a warehouse, you work for your company and in return, they pay you. That's the same for us, and quite often the payment takes form in products. That pram isn't just for a stroll around the park before it's cracked up on ebay, it may be some bloggers style but it isn't mine. More often than not I accept products to review, that I would have bought anyway. A product will be received, styled, photographed, edited, reviewed, drafted, wrote about and scheduled across social, at the very least, easily half a days work all for something that might cost £30. In reality, though it may look glamorous, blogging can be a lot of work for little gain. Quite often when bloggers start out, it's all without merit or recognition, I blogged aimlessly here at Babies and Beauty for two whole years before I discovered a community I loved.

The truth is, for every paid post, or 'gifted' item in exchange for review, your token blogger has probably written 5 that are solely off their own back. No payment behind the words and effectively unpaid overtime in any other job role. Why do it? Because most bloggers, like myself, didn't really start this to become a job or cash in on our opinions, we began because we enjoyed what we did. A hobby that paid off, not necessarily one that always pays well, but certainly one that I'm happy to call my job now. Though it doesn't always feel like a job, because I wake up excited to work and I think about my job role constantly, getting excited over new ideas and wanting to clock up all the hours I can, it really isn't that different to any other career path. It's new, and for that reason alone I think it's incredibly misunderstood. Blogging is a job and it's ignorance to assume otherwise.