Blogging For Fun: The Lost Art

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Blogging for fun. Remember those days? *stares whimsically out over a field of corn, breeze blowing in my hair*. A couple of months ago, I sent a tweet about how it seems that all blogging advice nowadays is written with the assumption that the blogger reading it is either a) a full time blogger or b) wants to be a full-time blogger. The “how to be a full-time blogger” posts have been rife over the last few years.

And I’m not excusing myself. I’ve succumbed to it as well, with more and more of my content over the last few years being about how to make money, how to gain sponsored blog posts and how to turn your blog into a business. And whilst I love those posts and love creating those posts, it hit me quite hard this year that just because blogging is my job and what I want to do, doesn’t mean it’s the same for everyone else.

• Not everyone wants to be a full-time blogger.
• Not everyone wants to or needs to earn money from their blog.
• Not everyone who blogs needs to write for an audience.

And honestly? I felt like a bit of shit that I had excluded such a large majority of people from my blogging advice because I’d started focusing so heavily on the money and business side of things. So I vowed going forward to start producing content that will aid those who are blogging for fun more.

Because I think people forget that you can want to grow a blog, increase your following and get more readers WITHOUT wanting to do it as a job. Those two things are not mutually exclusive.

Before we go on, I just want to talk about 4 things that will and still occur when you’re blogging for fun. Most of you probably already know these things already but if not, hopefully this will be a bit of a heads up for you:

Blogging for fun will still take up a lot of your time

If blogging is your hobby, it will STILL take up a lot of your time. Blogging is a very multi-layered thing. From content creation, to graphic design, to social media and more. So YES you can still grow your blog as a hobby blogger but it WILL take time and effort. HOWEVER, if you’re a hobby blogger, then you’re in control of just how much time you can / will put into your blog. As opposed to someone who blogs full-time, who has to put in a lot of hours to make it work.

It might still cost you money

Another point I want to make is that if you’re blogging for fun, it might still cost you money. It doesn’t HAVE to. But it might. But that’s okay because the way I see it is that a lot of hobbies cost money anyway. Enjoy painting in your free time? You spent money on the materials. Is one of your favourite hobbies playing video games? Games aren’t cheap. So accept the fact that blogging as a hobby might still cost you. But there’s nothing wrong with that.

Blogging for fun has no reflection on your skill or talent

Blogging for fun as opposed to blogging as a job has no reflection on your skills as a writer or content creator. TRUST ME. I’ve seen many blogs run by bloggers that aren’t doing it full-time which are head and shoulders above some full-time blogs. This is a bit of mindset shift that you might need to make but know your worth as a hobby blogger.

You might still want to learn about SEO

And finally, if you want to grow your blog (even if it is a hobby) then you might still want to learn about SEO. SEO is not resigned for those who want to take it full-time. It’s for everyone. And it’s a vital part of growing a blog. Crossing over with the money point of this post, you might want to invest in resources such as this Keyword Research for Bloggers eBook to help you with your SEO.

After doing a bit of research and asking around on Twitter, I identified 4 main elements of blogging for fun that people seem to struggle with the most:

• Time management
• Priorities
• Balance
• Goal setting

These are the 4 areas which cropped up the most in different variations. And luckily for me, 4 areas that I’m extremely passionate about. Time management, priorities, balance and goal setting are important factors into self growth as well as blogging so as this mostly a personal development blog, I’m very happy that they overlap.

I talk a LOT about that overlap and how blogging and mindset go hand in hand in my new course Blogging Mindset Mastery, which you can enroll in here and is definitely valuable for those who blog for fun as well as those who want to take this full-time!

I had questions like:

What tasks should I prioritize? What would you do if you only had a couple hours per week to blog? What are the easiest low-maintenance ways to make a couple bucks here and there?

I’m struggling building up my blog with limited time as well – e.g. I struggle to comment on others blog as much as I would like and approaching brands as a hobby blogger? 

As it’s not my career, I find it difficult to balance my job and my hobby of blogging, as blogging can take up a LOT of time (even as a hobby) Would love any advice on that.

For me, it is totally finding a way to set realistic goals for development when it’s not about getting sponsored posts or making a certain amount of money coz I’m floundering right now with what I actually want!

So, in order to do this justice and give people the advice they really need and want, in the New Year I’m going to be starting a series of blog posts which address all the problems people are facing above and more. From mindset to time management, finding balance and goal setting. If you’re blogging for fun and feeling like the advice for you is lacking, you’re definitely going to want to stick around in the New Year.

My aim is to help hobby bloggers grow their blog and thrive in this industry. And as soon as I realised that I wasn’t catering to that HUGE group of people anymore, I realise things needed to change.

Are you looking forward to this series in 2020? Are you a hobby blogger who’s struggling with finding advice catered to you? If there’s anything else you’d like covered, let me know in the comments!