Over the last decade or so a sub-industry of online marketing has sprung up. It is an industry that generates online content which is centered around teaching you how to make money by creating online content.
It is filled with influencers teaching you how to be an influencer and bloggers teaching you how to blog. They often come with grand promises of earning thousands of dollars a month by following their practices.
A simple Pinterest search for How to Make Money Blogging gives a visual clue into how over saturated the market is. You can see similar results in Google and YouTube.
This post isn’t a criticism of earning an income through content generation. In fact, this post is the first of an experimental series I am working on. The goal will be to see exactly what it takes to go from having a free blog on WordPress.com to a business that earns revenue by creating content. More on that to come.
However, it has been my experience that these soothsayers of profit forget to ask one foundational and simple question: do you even like to blog?
Do you enjoy putting fingers to keyboard and staring down a cursor on a white screen? Is the process of digging deep to find words that are worthy of being shared enjoyable? Are you up for the battle of fighting imposter syndrome and constantly debating whether this post even matters? Is it worth it?
These are questions I have been asking myself recently.
My blogging journey started in 2006 when a group of people from my community started the trend. In fact, this site (formerly known as phantomblonde.wordpress.com) is the very first blog I started. You can even go way back to see my first and super unimpressive post.
Over the years, I have gone through the full swing of blogging experiences. Sometimes I used it as a personal diary that provided way too much information. Other times I tried to use it as an infomercial. The inconsistency of my blogging practice was the most consistent thing about it. One of the most common blog posts I found myself writing were of the “Sorry I disappeared but I’m back and I’ll be better!” variety.
Since 2018 I have been on an intentional blogging hiatus. I took a break because I found myself in a monetization mentality which became overwhelming. I felt trapped by the idea that I had to blog a certain way, write a certain way, and that if it wasn’t generating income it wasn’t worth my time.
Now, pretty two years later I am back. I’m not going to make promises about being a better blogger. I’m not going to apologize for disappearing. I’m just going to answer a simple question and move forward.
Do you even like to blog?
Yes. Yes, I do.
Jess Boctor 