My blog design through the years!
My very first post on this blog was in May of 2011. There’s so many people who stumble upon my instagram page and ask me WHO ARE YOU and HOW DID YOU GET HERE? The truth is I’ve been here, for a very long time, working tirelessly on growing this blog, and today I am going to share with you some of the big milestone steps I took in getting from the girl who snapped photos of herself in clothes with a tripod in 2011, to where I am today, running this as a business!
I already wrote a post about 12 tips for starting a blog, but I wanted to dive deeper, because there’s still so many questions that come in about how to grow, how to make money doing this and asking advice on the topic. I can’t fully relate to somebody that is starting out today in 2018, but I can explain what worked for me back in 2011 up until today.
GROWTH HACKS
Post your looks ANYWHERE and EVERYWHERE: The first step to building a blog is finding an audience. There’s a few ways that I went about doing this, but the number one place I gained a following (before instagram) was on Lookbook.nu and on chictopia. While I don’t think these sites have the same kind of traffic they did a few years back, I still think that any free publicity can’t hurt, so if you’re posting a look on your blog you might as well post it other places as well. Through lookbook.nu I gained the original 25K or so followers on instagram, and that’s where my career started.
Comment like it’s your JOB, because it is: Before Instagram existed, people actually commented on blogs to make connections. I saw the comment section as my chance to connect with someone so much, that they really wanted to click over to my site and check me out. It worked a lot of the time, especially if I commented on their blog all the time. I realize this is time consuming, but I would set aside about an hour each day for outreach, and I would sit and read blogs and comment on them. I still do the same on instagram!
Sign up for Bloglovin: I still love Bloglovin, and I joined SO long ago. It’s a great place for readers to consume content, and it just makes it easier for them to read your blog as they read the rest of the blogs they follow. Make it easy for readers, and sign up!
Giveaways: Host giveaways, even if it’s just for a $25 gift card to Forever21! People love free things, and they will share your account to enter!
STARTING TO MAKE MONEY
Affiliate Links: One of the first ways that a blogger can make money before booking partnerships with brands is through affiliate links. There’s two options here – you can use a service that’s based on CTR and pays you per click, or you can get paid when someone converts, or buys the product you are promoting. Shopstyle Collective is my personal favorite affiliate linking company for pay per click advertising – so any time someone clicks on your link you make about .05!
For me, once I noticed that more and more people were actually shopping through my links, I switched to RewardStyle. With RStyle or Liketoknow.it you are paid a commission, so if someone clicks to your item but does not shop you make $0, but if they buy something you can make anywhere from 5-20% commission on the sale. Both are a great option, but in my opinion ShopStyle is a better starting off point!
Partnerships: The other way that bloggers make money is by partnering with brands to help them promote new collection launches, campaign pushes that they’re putting marketing dollars behind, or just to push for conversion on their site. For me, my very first partnership was with Francesca’s Collection – they sent me free items that I picked from their site, and I took photos in these pieces for free. That is how it will begin – a products for photos collaboration. While this may seem like a waste of time, this is where you need to try super duper hard, because if your photos are great then the brand may repost them, leading you to a whole new slew of followers!
My first BIG paid partnership that I was really excited about was writing for the Forever21 blog twice per month. They paid me $500 every month and sent me my picks. That was back in 2013, and was a huge deal for me. I think at the time I had around 50K followers, so you really don’t need to be huge to start booking paid work. The best way to book your first few gigs is to create a media kit with your stats and rates, find the right contact to email (via linkedin, instagram and basically cyber stalking ha!) and pitch yourself! Let these brands know you want to work with them, and show them past examples of success stories!
BIG BUSINESS DECISIONS ALONG THE WAY
Quitting Your Job: This is the biggest decision on this path that you will probably ever make. Tons of you ask me “how I knew” every day, and I can tell you, like most things in life, you’ll just know. I really wish I had left working earlier, and regret that my fear held me back for so long, but I do think that my own timing worked out just fine. I knew it was time to leave when my cup was so full, that things were spilling over. Yes, it was a financial decision (I was probably making around the same amount from my full time job and my blog) but it was also personal – I had this thing that I had grown for so many years, and I either had to say goodbye to it, or fully dive into it. I was getting asked to do projects that interfered with my working hours, and I was missing out on work because of not being available – that’s how I knew!
Hiring A Manager: As most of you may or may not know, I have an amazing manager Kyle who handles all of the contracts and legal mumbo jumbo that I am not so great at handling. I had a manager prior to Kyle at a certain point, but realized I didn’t need it yet back in 2015 and stepped back until I felt like I was ready in 2017. You’ll start to feel like you need a manager to help you out when your e-mails become overwhelming, and you’re booking jobs with serious contracts, including non-compete clauses and lots of legalities that you’re totally unsure of. When I was booking only a few jobs a month I would handle reading all of the contracts, but when it became a few jobs a week, I lost control. Kyle came at a perfect time! Make sure you love the vibe of your manager, and understand everything before you sign – I loved that Kyle’s agency felt small and boutique – it’s like the indie agency of agencies!
Hiring An Assistant or Photographer: This is where I am at now! Actually today! ha! For the longest time Matt was my main person who helped with the blog, but eventually it started to interfere with his work schedule. I had an assistant last year for a few months, but at that time I had Hudson with me full-time and it didn’t feel like the right time. Now my schedule is very set-in-stone, and I can offer someone set hours and days to focus on getting work done! Some bloggers never need an assistant and their husband handles everything, some prefer to shoot with various local photographers, but I went the route of finding 1 person who is with me to help with DEPOP, shooting photos, editing videos, etc. I think this step eventually becomes necessary if you want to keep creating new content, and find yourself alone much of the time. Again, you’ll know when the time is right!
So there you have it, a lot of my big decisions along the way, and ways that I got from point A to point B. I hope this helped anyone else out there stuck on making big decisions that I had to make in the past! Let me know if you enjoyed this post in the comments!