Auto news on Youtube Mar 28 2018

hey guys, Colleen here- DIYer behind LemonThistle.com, today I'm excited to be

here with some of my favorite bloggers from Western Canada and we're going to

be answering some questions that we get all the time. This is Lindi from Love Create

Celebrate. We've got Kristi from Making it in the Mountains and Christina from

the DIY Mommy. We have four different questions that we're taking on and we're

gonna put them all in a playlist for you below so you can hop around and check

those out. This video is going to be all about how to make money blogging and

the reality behind that for us. We are here on a girls weekend in Jasper and we

were talking about all the things that we get asked all the time and we thought

it would be really fun to do a collab and put it together on YouTube for you

guys so you can get to know us a little bit better and to kind of break down

some of those walls between viewers and bloggers. Before we get into money I just

kind of want to hear your guys' blogging story; when did you get started;

how did you get started and what were your goals in starting blogging... how did

you get here. My blog started more as just for fun so it was when I had to

quit my web design business and my graphic design business because it was just too

much when I had a newborn. Too many commitments and when my daughter was six

months old I really felt the need to have another creative outlet and since

I had the skills all ready to do web design and things I thought a blog

would be the perfect thing to do so I just wanted to make stuff and write

about it and it was just for fun and since then it's become a full-time

career just over the years. And you started how long ago? Nine years.

So Christina has been blogging forever. I'm like a senior citizen in the blogging world.

I'm trying to compute how many years I've been blogging and I think it's four.

I started when we lived 12 hours away from the rest of our family and so it was sort of

just a way that we were- we had bought this new house so we were hoping to do a

bunch of not renovations but things to it and we wanted to be able to share

with everyone and that just seemed like an easy way to do it and I had no idea

blogging was a career or something you could do to make money

it was just something I did to share with my family. I'm the same- When I started

I had moved away and I lived in different province than my family and stuff. I think it's three

years ago but I just did it because I want to share what I'm making with my

mom basically. I don't know. And then other people were looking at it and then all of a sudden I was like oh look, people are looking at this

random little website I started. And I had no idea people made money blogging. I really had no clue when I started.

I started- I knew people need money blogging but that wasn't my goal I

didn't want to do that. I was pregnant with my first- my twins and I was on bed

rest really early and I was bored. I went from working

three jobs to doing nothing and I knew that I wouldn't be able to go back to

working contract work like I was working and I had previously started businesses that I didn't actually like, so I thought

You know what- I'm going to start a blog. I'm going to write it while I'm on Mat leave

and then when I'm off Mat leave, I'm going to decide what I didn't hate

writing about for a year and then maybe I'll start a business doing that. It'll be great.

and then by the end of that year, people had started to ask me

to contribute. I went back to work for a little bit but it just was too

much to do both and I decided I can stay home with my kids.

I can put the time into this and make this my new job.

that took a couple years

So when did it change to a business for you guys? When did it go from being a hobby or some way to share some things to

being like okay this is a business- what was that switch?

For me me it was oh it was

about five years after I started so it's quite a while after I started when we

started building our house and I have seen other bloggers get sponsorships

from businesses to give them products to do their DIYs and so I thought I should try it- why not.

So I approached a bunch of brands and they

agreed to give us tons of material for our home so we save like thousands of

money building our home from these brands giving us- and then later I

learned oh the brands can give you stuff plus they can pay you for sharing that

stuff so it was about- I started the blog 2009 I started making money

in about 2014 and then 2015-16 started making like a full-time income from the blog.

I honestly think the switch for the wasn't that long ago it was fairly

recent at another job for a long time I had a couple mat leaves and that's when I started putting effort

into the blog, I was at home with my kids like you said I needed that sort of creative outlet

I started doing more and then recently things happened with my daycare and other

things personally that just caused me to say never mind

I'm gonna stay at home with my kids now and I don't think it was till after that

when I was like I'm gonna put some push into this and make it business because even

before I considered it like a hobby when I had this other real job it was like

a side hustle -yeah it was a hobby. I think for me it was- I ended up

stumbling into this amazing group of bloggers that were some were at the same

stage as me and some were well above me and I feel like people just started

lifting me up and opening my eyes to new opportunities that this career could

bring to our lives and then we bought this house that like our first

fixer-upper. We had always had like new houses and this was our first fixer-upper where

we actually had to do some work we weren't really in a position to be a

you know I'll just move in and renovate the whole house with a contractor and

it's just started to evolve like I had people lifting me up and showing me the

way and and I just took advantage of all those opportunities and

turned them into what I needed them to be. Yeah. Mine changed not into a blogging business until not

very long ago same thing I started in 2013 and when I decided not to go back I

mean I was working contract work so it's not like I was making that much money

anyways but I thought- okay if I can make the difference between what I would pay

and day care and what I would make at work which is like $200. Like you don't

make that much money above paying for daycare for two babies let me tell you

and if I can do that in a month that would be great so I started doing kind

of social media help for businesses because I'm like well now I know how to

schedule social media that's something I'm really great at-I can help them with

their images so that's when I started making money and I didn't switch to

doing things with my own blog until it was getting- I was pregnant again and

I was like this is so stressful being on other people's timelines and I mean if I'm

gonna be home and I can't I can't be doing all this so I decided to just

take a step back and see where it went. How have you made money over the years

what are the different things that you've tried and done?

I think blogging is such an interesting interesting career because it's

constantly evolving the ways that you can make money blogging and for me it's

not just blogging anymore it's just it's a whole bunch of different avenues so I

make money through sponsored posts on the blog and still my biggest source of

income through pay-per-click ads on the blog and also through affiliate links on

the blog so that's when you post a link and people buy stuff in the link and you

get a percentage and then now with YouTube that's a whole other avenue I'm

getting paid for pay-per-click ads on YouTube sponsorships on YouTube videos

and other things like speaking engagements and products I have a pillow line and

stuff like that so I think you for blogging you do have to be really open to all

sorts of avenues if you want to be successful. And I've heard it said too

that your blog is kind of like your home base right and it's a springboard to do

the other things that could bring in income. it's not necessarily like I have to-

the end all- or yeah exactly it's really a door opener. yeah I agree

The same as Christina like the biggest thing for me has been sponsored posts

and some really great partnerships with brands and I make money from the ads on

my website. I'm just branching out to youtube so that is not necessarily a

source of income for me but- there will be- and it's a really it's a really fun

avenue to explore because I think it's a new branch of things that I can bring to

brands as well so even if it's not necessarily YouTube that I'm making

money on I feel like it's it's opening up some opportunities with brands and

sponsors you know so yeah

And I mean for me it's the same like the same sort

of base things and I I'm just at the point now where I'm starting to think

about how I want to branch out of the blog like people do- write various ebooks

or real books or people you know branch into speaking engagement and different things where they

make new forms of income. Or shops that they have. So I haven't really

pushed out that boundary yet but I'm at that point where I'm wondering which Avenue I want

to go to start exploring.

I feel like maybe I was a little bit more creative

in how to make income because my my traffic was not huge and so I thought hey why not try these

other things and so I've done- yeah managing social media for brands and

I've done managing blogger programs for brands,

I've done writing as small businesses. I wrote a wedding blog- a couple wedding blogs for a while as their business

I mean I feel like I've done a lot of different things. I've been kind of like oh- I'll try that sure, I'll try it. and if it doesn't work out- that's okay.

Let's try something else.

And it all evolved from this little sort of blog. I had a printable shop on Etsy for a little bit. And then after I started blogging for money

I guess mostly it was guest posts on other people's sites and contributor posts

on other people's sites- that was my first taste of- Oh oh my gosh I can make a

little bit of pocket change now I have an e course that I sell on

brush lettering and I have another eCourse on idea generation as well

-you're a jack of all trades- yeah- I have a store where I sell things I just feel

like I try at all but my biggest my biggest is sponsored work and

then ad income

how do you balance making money with authenticity?

Yeah, that's a tough one I think blogging has evolved so much now that people are

finally kind of accepting that there are sponsorships and like readers are

accepting sponsored posts more but I think it is our responsibility to write

about things that were truly passionate about and products that we truly love that we

truly would you use I think that is really really important and I think

people can probably see right through bloggers and vloggers that share things

that they don't truly believe in.

I think that it's hard to when you start

blogging again I started I was just like someone wants to pay me to write about that.

Yeah sure, but now that I've sort of found my niche more and found my vision

and my brand and there's definitely things that I will -

there's money opportunities that I'm like oh that doesn't really fit with what I would actually

use at home so I have to say no to that.

yeah so I I think the most important thing to me the thing that's always

driving or at least in the background of all of my sponsored anything is that my

readers trust me yeah and my word counts for something and I don't want

to lose that yeah I don't. like I purchased things

because friends have recommended them and I want to be that friend that

recommends to to my audiences and I I want it to be genuine. you don't want

them to be disappointed -no on that note too there's been a couple of times

where I've had like sponsored content on my blog and then use that product or used

something that I thought was going to be great and then was disappointed

and that's a struggle - cause you have to- Like I'm not gonna lie my readers like

that's just- so I have to go back to people and say

well this was my experience and this is how- what I'm willing to do but I can't

you know say that I liked this or that it works easily or xyz

and sometimes they come to you and say we're not comfortable with you sharing that so

just scrap it yeah and I'm okay with that yeah

I actually just the other

day I was going back and work with the brand and they wanted me to write about

this and I'm like this is actually a really great topic this is something I

was going to write about anyways which for me is immediately like great fit and

I already had that post in mind yeah but then they didn't want to provide the

service. I don't feel comfortable recommending something unless I've tried it

and I know that I like it. if I'm not gonna tell a friend about it I'm not

gonna talk about it.

what is the biggest challenge in regards to blogging as a

business that you've had that's specifically in making money in blogging

I think for me the biggest challenge was what I said before was having those

sponsorships that don't if it doesn't turn out the way I envisioned it I hoped

that it would I think that yeah being authentic with my readers

being authentic with myself or my home. you know using- I don't want to promote a product

that I didn't like or that didn't work properly or that's at a store I wouldn't

shop at or whatever yeah. and learning about that balance because at

first as a new blogger you just want to do it all

Now I think for me if I'm thinking about the business side of blogging its money

management because sometimes yeah it's like most businesses like its most

entrepreneurial endeavours you're gonna have seasons where you have lots of

income and you're gonna have seasons where you have hardly income

and with blogging it's so all over the place cuz like around Christmas time you're

gonna be raking in the cash from affiliate sales and sponsorships and

then in January you're gonna have you're gonna make 5 bucks that month right

so it's like learning how to manage that income especially if you're using it to

provide for your family yeah and even where to invest like

reinvest some of that income into your blog too

yeah i find that tricky too.

it's so I think for me it's really important to me that I don't feel

like I'm coming off as I'm selling something to my readers yeah

I don't want to be my blog is not in an advertisement for people that I'm

working with it's me genuinely sharing things from my life and my home. yeah

in a natural way.

it's it's genuine it's organic it's it's my life right and I don't want

my blog to become an advertisement for someone else. It is a big struggle. And I would say for me the

communication and managing expectations not just from your readers who we love

them we want to meet their needs but for the amount of time that we put into it like

we have to see some sort of monetary return or we can't put that time in and also from

brands who want you to post like their logo and this infographic and this

that because it's like hey I value you my readers and I know I'm not

I don't want to see that I don't want to be sold to and kind of

managing that and in contracts and try to know... I mean we

want to think the best of everything that it's all going to work out but in

reality like we have to read contracts and try to put in it okay I'm going to

do this many photos and no I'm not gonna do a photo in the store that I don't

shop at. And no I'm like and you have to be really it's a business and that's hard

yeah just stay true to yourself and I think that can be really hard because -

brands do have expectations and how their money is being spent and that's fair. Absolutley.

But I feel like we need to juggle- first of all I feel like I know my audience best I pay really

close attention to what they respond to and what they like and I try to give out

good content that they can relate to I feel like I'm the expert of my audience and

so I want to make sure I'm staying true to myself and what keeping my audience

what they need while still getting a brand what what they're expecting right.

what's one thing that worked really well or that you want to focus on more?

For me it's been video so I started I started writing tutorials on my blog nine years

ago and now within the last three years I started building my YouTube channel

and I never ever would have thought that that would have been something that I

would focus on or something that did both for me because I feel like I'm very

self conscious of how I speak sometimes how I look and stuff and there's so many

younger people on YouTube it's such a different audience but it's been such a

cool thing to try and I think there's a really big audience on YouTube

ready to see some more home decor DIY like real life stuff that's not on HGTV

that's more of raw on YouTube and it's good

and I've been able to get lots of brand interested in YouTube and video and stuff

like that so I think that's something that I have been successful with over the last

couple years but I want to keep growing. I do know like a big I talked to you

guys about this I've got this vision from where I want to take my blog this

year and I'm really clear about it or it's been a while since I feel like that

happened so I'm really excited to make some changes and to a really hone

where my blog going so.

yeah yeah we talked about a

lot cuz we're both in that where I was saying I'm just sort of found a vision

and changed some things about my blog and changed about what I'm sharing

and I'm really happy with where it is right now and just trying to see where I

want to branch further from there.

I think alot of that is trial and error

because you don't really know what's going to work for you until you do it

and until people respond yeah like I always -when I started my blog I wanted

to make baby clothes right and now I am doing decor videos and people love them.

at one time in life I posted a recipe

and we were just talking about how yummy that was last night

I would say for me one thing that I've always focused on that's worked really

well for me is the teaching aspect of blogging if I'm gonna post a tutorial I

want to give detailed photos and instructions and real like avoid this

because I did that and that's always worked really well for me I didn't mention

actually do workshops as well- and that brings in some income- so i just try it all, i just like to try it all. but one

thing when I want to focus more on it's not necessarily the teaching but the

sharing because I've had their time with home decor being like well how can I

share that that's just an idea yeah right so how can I break them into

more posts but just to like let you guys in more on my thought process and you

guys have really inspired me to do that like here's my vision for the room

okay here's my update and I've always been like no unless it's finished and done

and I can do the whole start to finish in one post I'm not going to do it.

Alright so my question for you guys now that this is done

If you are a blogger what's the one thing that you found

either challenging or that it's helped you in

your success? and if you are not a blogger what's one thing that you didn't know

from this video? hopefully you learned something. I hope you guys like this

video if you did please make sure to hit that thumbs up button and you can

subscribe to my channel for more DIY and decor videos and I hope that you

subscribe to all of us and enjoy all our videos.

check out the playlist

for the rest of these Q&A style videos we have one on authenticity and

blogging; home decor- finding your home decor style; and managing work-life

balance while you're working from home. see you guys next time

youtube YouTube let's do youtube. be authentic

no pressure. be authentic.