{Blogging 101} Lets talk about freebies

Blogging and freebies seem to have become synonymous lately.

People start blogging under the pretense that they are going to start receiving free stuff the minute they hit the publish button.

There is also the impression that as bloggers, we spend our days signing for packages of free stuff.

So lets talk a little bit more about the realities of this free stuff.

They are not free. The definition of free is “without cost or payment.”

While it is true that I do not pay for the free stuff I receive, it is not without a cost to me.

For example, I receive a blog drop. It is a great blog drop, products I actually use. I need to unpack the box, lay the products out nicely to take a photo, I need to take a photo (this usually takes a few tries), I need to post the photo to my social media networks, I need to mention the brand, make sure the hashtags are right.

So the free stuff I just received took up, at best an hour of my time. If it is something my kids can use, it can take longer to get decent photos.

What does an hour of your time cost? Mine isn’t for free. An hour spent on my free stuff means an hour less spent on something that could generate an income.

I worked hard to get noticed. I think the biggest mistake blogging newbies make is that they can start a blog today and get free stuff tomorrow. It does not work like that. My blog didn’t  end up in on a brands radar by osmosis. I had to work hard to get noticed.I had to provide regular content, build up my following, be consistent and work every single day and making a name for myself.

I can’t sit down and just thrash out a blog post in 5 minutes, there is a lot of planning, thinking and editing that goes into writing a blog post. I have to either take photos or find images that will work with the post. The process takes time. It takes time every single day. Not weekly, monthly or when I feel like it, every single day even if I do not post, I have to reply to comments, plan future posts or manage my social media accounts.

It is hard work.

Again how much do you charge for your time?

Sometimes the free stuff isn’t really that great. This doesn’t happen often but sometimes I get a package and I am not really sure what to do with it. One of the first blog drops I ever received was toilet paper. Now lets just take a minute to think about that. How do you Instagram toilet paper? We received a lovely Fathers Day package but it had a phone case in for a phone we don’t have, we don’t know anyone who has that phone, so it has ended up taking space in a drawer somewhere.  I recently received a pair of slippers, they were so stunning but the wrong size, so I had to swap them (suddenly they aren’t free any more).

So I have a drawer full of free stuff. Glamorous hey!

It may sound like I am ungrateful or don’t enjoy what I do when in fact it is just the opposite. I love blogging. I love receiving blog drops and products to review. We have been very lucky to receive some really stunning products and over the years I have developed some really good relationships with PR people and brands.

It irritates me no end though when people continually refer to all the free stuff we receive as bloggers and how great that must be!

Few things in life are free, blog drops are not one of them. Every single one of us who receive blog drops or products to review has worked extremely hard to get sent those products. We have slaved away for hours to create content our readers want to read, we have put ourselves out there for the world to see (and judge). We have read article after article on how to make our blogs successful. We have waged war with code we don’t understand and images that won’t align.

If you are going to start blogging because you want to receive free stuff then I suggest you re-think your motivations. You can turn your blog into a business but free stuff is not the same thing, no amount of free toilet paper will pay your rent.