I’ve been blogging for 16 months and while there are so many things that I love about blogging, there’s at least 20 things that I wish I’d known about blogging before I started.

I have to keep reminding myself that I have developed so many skills over these last 16 months from both blogging and starting a business. It’s been a learning curve and I’ve made mistakes. Has it been challenging, you ask? Yes, remarkably!

Did I think it would go this far? Not really, no. I’m still stunned that I’m doing this full time- it was something that I dreamed about doing, for so long, but when it came to taking it on as a business, I thought that it was only a dream and actually not possible.

There’s obviously a lot of things that I like about blogging, but, it was difficult to do this full time, and as much as I love blogging, I don’t want to say it is easy, when it’s not. There are certainly easier businesses or side hustles to start that have much quicker returns!

I get the feeling that this will be the toughest year yet, for me and my little blog, but who knows what is on the horizon? A crystal ball sounds alluring at this stage… or perhaps not. Sometimes ignorance is bliss as they say.

I just want to take a moment to introduce the iphone photography school. Thanks to this course I was able to up level my photography skills which has been essential in developing my blog, Pinterest and social media accounts. If you’re starting out as a blogger I have to recommend taking any course to improve and develop your skills for blogging. This will help you to get you ahead of the game.

The iphone photography course is easy to fit around your day. You can choose when you study and when to work on your skills. This is brilliant if you’re jus starting your blog. Take it from me, it’s much easier to do at the beginning of your blogging journey, as a year down the line you’ll probably find yourself really busy. This low price won’t last forever, however, so make sure you jump on this deal while you have the chance!

Anyway, I thought I’d sum up 20 things that I’ve learned about blogging full time. Just the bad things I’ve noticed so far, maybe I’ll write something a bit more positive, like 20 amazing things about blogging in the future, but for now at least, here’s 20 things you should know about blogging before you start

20 Things you should know about Blogging before you start

I want to make it clear that going for your dreams often requires you to make sacrifices. It’s not easy, so it won’t be all daisies and rainbows, but it will be worth it! Just like enjoying the view at the top of the mountain, the hike up there is always difficult, but that’s what makes the view so stunning.

1. Starting a business is lonely!

2. If you let stress get to you, you fail or get ill.

3. Everyone will think you’re nuts, “why not just get a job?”

4. You become fair game for people to fire insults at.

5. Pinterest pins will give you comfort.

6. If you neglect your personal relationships, they will fall apart.

7. You drink soo much coffee.

8. Social media is hella addictive and it becomes your new social life. The most important place for your blog though is Pinterest. Social media doesn’t really bring you traffic, it’s more to build a community.

9. You realise who your friends are.

10. You have to happy – all of the time, especially on social media or followers will just find you annoying, self absorbed and whiney.

11. If you’re inconsistent you loose followers and stats, which becomes gruelling and tiresome. You start to fear taking a day off.

12. People think you’re narcissistic if you post photographs of yourself.

13. You have to be good at meeting deadlines. While the majority of blogs start as passion projects, if you really want to start making money, you start to realise that you have to treat this thing like a business.

14. People will try and take advantage of your newbie-ness… “Hey, could you just add this link in here for free?’ “We don’t offer payments but we’d love you to write this for us.”

15. The better you get at blogging, the lonelier it gets!

16. Your perfectionism will reach new heights, think waking up at 4am wondering if you used the correct hashtags on Facebook.

17. Life is just as relentless, except you still have to run a business at the same time. Did you think life would get easier while you’re busier? No way.

18. If you take a break you don’t get paid! If you get sick, you can’t work. It’s worth having self- employment insurance just in case.

19. You start to wish you weren’t a writer, it has to be one of the most difficult, unpredictable and turbulent careers – partly because it makes good writing material. You also realise that writing and blogging are very different writing styles. There’s a real art to blogging.

20. You have to make sacrifices, like giving up your nice reliable job, or selling things to pay the bills- like that antique you never look at, or cutting down on things you enjoy, such as food, takeout coffees or heating.

In conclusion

There’s a lot of good stuff about blogging, but I rarely see anyone write about the bad stuff. Of course, I missed the most annoying thing off this list, which is that nobody ever understands what you do for a living, ever and you have to explain it to people, at least once a day and they still don’t understand.

It’s also very difficult to keep the stamina going as it requires a lot of patience, persistence and determination. For example if you try affiliate marketing, you’re probably going to suck at it for a long time before you get good at it. It’s one of those things, just like blogging, that seems so easy on the surface, but it’s actually not.

I’ve already briefly covered this in my post blogging isn’t a real job, but I thought I’d share it anyway because it’s so relevant.

Sure, blogging has it’s downsides- but so does everything else. Thankfully, I can stand the bad things and still appreciate the good stuff. Like the old proverb says, remember why you started!

Finally, on a positive note, I’ve just been nominated as blogger of the month by Get Blogged so I must be doing something right.

Thanks for reading,

Soph.