All the truth about BLOGGERS

Leggi in italiano

How do they earn a living? Who pays them? Do they really work whenever they want and wherever they like?

The internet is full of good tips about how to become a successful blogger/fashion blogger/travel blogger/whatever blogger.

As a matter of fact, it’s an interesting and fascinating profession. Writing, having the chance to freely manage your time (are we really sure about it?), dealing with things you like (this is another controversial argument…).
Let’s say that there is a huge amount of unanswered questions about this new mythological digital free-lance profession, dressed up with stereotypes and false myths.

Let’s see together some of them and let’s try to answer to some of the main questions and curiosities about bloggers.

1 – How do they make a living?
They will tell you that Fashion Bloggers and Travel Bloggers are the most required (by who?), those who can make [up] their living by blogging with collaborations and advertisements. Well, it’s not 100% true.
It’s like to say that all ballet dancers can make their living with it, paying bills and house-rents.
First of all most of bloggers don’t earn money just with their blogs. They also write, for example, for company blogs for money. They’ll make it only if there’s a customer that finds them good and smart.
Just like a journalist, a blogger doesn’t have to be super expert in the subjects of any client; they must be eager (and able) to:

– study new subjects
– make them interesting for as many people as possible
– being able to tell them
– being able to share them on social networks

Then, eventually, a blogger also writes for her/his personal blog, used as a virtual show room or as a free-place to finally express personal opinions or interests and as another way to gain (some) money.
The latter opportunity mostly depends on the amount of visits, and that’s why travel and fashion bloggers have a little more opportnities; they deal with subjects interesting for much more people than IT blogs, pet blogs, drone blogs, disability issues blogs etc.

2 – Blogger’s freedom
‘They say’ bloggers can work whenever and wherever they want and freedom has no price.
Well, there’s much to say abut these sentences, often also referring to free-lances in general.
The truth is that the digital workers from a remote work station (less cool than ‘free-lance bloggers but much more close to reality), work whenever they MUST and from wherever they CAN.

For the client it really doesn’t matter if you are in a holiday inn or at the top of an iceberg. You must do what they pay you for.
Here are some places where I’ve recently worked:

Le’s go with the ‘freedom’ with your working schedule. If the deadlines are regular, no problem, with a bit of good organization you can start working at 8 or 10 am sipping coffee in your pajamas and commenting what’s going on on facebook to your friends with kids and cats. But if, for example, all customers are in the planning stage, preparing events, planning changes to promote, you can start working at 4:00 in the morning to finish at 20.00, since at 9 pm you must be to some event in he middle of a rainy but cool nowhere taking photos.

3 – You can work with a smartphone
Not at all. You need an Iphone, possibly the last one. I don’t like to advertise labels that definitely don’t need it, and that don’t give me a dime to do it. But I must tell it: when I just had a smartphone I could chek stuffs. Now I can make videos while travellling, writing articles, editing photos and I don’t even need the tablet; except for certain types of on line adjustments, with an IPhone you can blog easily by your mobile.

4 – Blogs are declining/dead
Let’s be plain: Having a website and not having a blog inside it, is like having a shop-window and keeping the shutters down. The web is a square packed with brands, websites, online stores. A constantly updated blog is for companies a way to move up a position in the search engines and be found by users who don’t know them yet.
Even a facebook page is useless without  fresh news to share at least once a week.
And it is useless for such news to be written directly as a post on a Facebook page, because

1- they must take visitors on your web page, the place where you sell your products
2- less then 12% of the facbook population reads posts longer that 150 types (I’m not a part of that ‘less than 12%’).

That’s why companies need a blog with updated articles that can catch the attention of as many people as possible, possibly from all over the world, to be shared on social nets. Bloggers must to that, too.

In short, a blogger doesn’t work where he/she wants but where he/she has to.
A blogger must study hard, every day. Better if also (in) other languages.
They often work overnight.

And thet’s the broken bloggers fairytale.