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Behind The Scenes of My 3 Years Blogversary
I’m so happy to be celebrating another blogversary so I want to take you behind the scenes and share what my journey has been thus far.
I can’t believe its been three years since I started this blog because it surely doesn’t feel that long.
This journey really started in 2015 on Instagram only sharing my favourite travel pictures then.
Interested in starting your own fashion or beauty blog? Then check out this post here on how to start a side hustle blog.
A Little Back Story on Travel Beauty Bog
For those of you who might be new here, I am a part-time blogger who started off on wordpress.com then shortly after moved to blogger.com for a couple of months before finally going self-hosted on WordPress.org.
Self-hosted means I own all my content whereas on wordpress.com and blogger.com are free and they had access to all my work even though it was technically mine.
Fast forward to today, I have gone from being a part-time blogger to now Entrepreneur and part-time blogger and it feels empowering.
I’ve always dreamt of having my own business but never imagined that this would be it.
Being a blogger was not something I envisioned, and worse, did not even know existed until around the time I started mine.
All I knew was that I wanted to share my cute photographs, and talk about the things I am passionate about.
Namely travel, beauty and fashion, and that is how Travel Beauty Blog came to life.
Behind The Scenes As An Entrepreneur Blogger
Creating Content And Finding Time To Blog
As a blogger, our job is to create, whether its creating content for our blog or social media platforms the job doesn’t stop at blogging.
In fact we wear many hats such as photographer, editor, social media manager, designer and the list goes on.
Even part-time, blogging is a job by itself and it requires dedication to keep going.
I try to publish at least two new posts every week. But there are times when I feel the need to take a break and may only post once.
How I Come Up With Blog Post Ideas
In terms of having a blog schedule I don’t have one, instead I work on a couple draft posts simultaneously.
Whichever one I want to post next I work on completing it and that’s my routine.
Most times I would have at least 10-15 posts in draft and then decide which ones I would finish first.
I normally take my photographs first and then decide which post in draft it can fit into or I create one from scratch.
My inspiration usually stems from the latest trends that I like, or from fashion blogs like WhoWhatWear.com.
Photo-shoots And Outfit Planning (Behind The Scenes)
How I work is that I plan my outfits in my head then go searching the internet for the items.
Whenever I need some outfit inspiration I use my favourite platforms which are Pinterest and Instagram.
Once I have my outfits together I coordinate a photo-shoot with my photographer Rafael and tell him the ideas I have for the shoot.
We then decide on a day, location and time and get to work.
Due to my tight schedule I usually aim to shoot at least four outfits per shoot which takes about 1.5 hours.
Changing of outfits usually happen at nearby restaurants or at stores that do have one. Sometimes I use his car to change depending on the location we are shooting at.
After the shoot he would send me all the unedited photos and I would choose the ones I want.
Only after shooting my outfits, I would come up with blog post ideas for each one.
Sponsored Work
Earlier this year I finally took my blog seriously and have been doing mostly paid sponsored work.
Although I have not reached out to that many Brands yet but I hope to do so in 2020.
After 2 years of blogging as a hobby I figured I have enough experience to start charging for my work.
This is not to say that I still don’t accept products only in exchange for a post but I would really have to like the brand/products.
Making Money Through Affiliate Marketing
My main goal for this quarter is to focus on making money through affiliate marketing.
As you know this is the time of year where people spend the most money due to the holidays, Black Friday and Cyber Monday.
Part of this process involves creating content around the holidays and curating gift ideas for all budgets.
Behind The Scenes Blogging Expenses Breakdown
Blogging is an investment and yes there is a thing called blog expenses too.
So this is to give you an idea as to what kinds of things I would have to pay for in order to keep this blog running.
While there are many opportunities to make money blogging, its not all a bed of roses.
These are some of the expenses associated with running a blog. All prices below are quoted in US dollars and some are paid monthly or yearly.
- Website domain $15 per year
- Website hosting $370 per year
- Tailwind scheduler $45 per month
- Stock photos for my social media graphics $95 per year
- Online course platform – $40 per month
- Influencer community $15 per month
- Outfits budget – $$$
- Blog Photography $$$
- Miscellaneous $$-$$$
There you have it, some of the things I pay for behind the scenes in order to keep this blog up and running.
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Gratitude: Thank You To All My Tribes
Hopefully this behind the scenes post gave you some clarify in terms of what goes on in my blogging world.
I would like to thank you guys who have been following me since day one and stuck it with me.
Those of you who have signed up to my mailing list, take the time to comment on my blog posts, I owe it to you guys.
Thank you for using my links to make your purchases because that is one of the ways I get paid.
Hope you all continue to stick around for more content and I can’t wait to see where this blog takes me in a few years from now.
Last Updated on May 13, 2024 by Shevy
