A bit about blogging itself

Wednesday, September 10, 2014

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It always amuses me when you get suggestions about what to blog about. I suppose people think that bloggers are hungry for content and presumably have no imagination of how to come up with things to talk about off their own back. Not the case here. I have an excess of material but a lack of time to sort it all out into neat portions.

Of course I'm sure there are plenty of bloggers out there that love to be 'fed' news stories and get tipped off about forthcoming products and events, who perhaps have more reportage/magazine style blogs. If you've read more than a couple of posts from me (that's read: not just looked at the pictures) you will notice that I witter on about where I've been/what I've worn/goals and updates for about 99% of the time. What I don't do is fawn over celebrities, or give a stuff what they are up to or are wearing – what is it with those emails “so and so spotted wearing this/that/the other brand”? Do they honestly imagine we don't know that you gave them those clothes? You might have noticed I'm not all that fussed about so-called celebs, they just don't interest me.

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It's great to work on fun blog projects with friends, local businesses, brands you are really on board with and things that really inspire me. Being asked to help out with a relevant campaign or doing a favour for a friend is pretty cool, it's being part of something which is a lovely feeling.

Do you know what's not cool? Selfish PR. Not the PR people (they have a tough job), but the companies they represent. Being asked to post things with no benefit, being asked to write a post including a backlink for peanuts and the most recent insult; being asked to review a high value item of jewellery (sounded too good to be true, I was right) but instead being sent a worthless mock up. It's disrespectful to ask anyone to do something without offering a mutual benefit isn't it? Of course, people have different ideas of what that means but it's a starting point for discussion.

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Sophie in the Sticks is my space to share things I really enthuse over; photographs, thoughts and if I fancy – nothing at all. I can't tell you just how refreshing it is to be able to have my say on whatever I fancy, it's something I'd recommend to everyone. You can see there are no adverts in my sidebar, it's never been my aim to make money out of blogging. Yes, I accept some 'free' gifts – which are 'payment' for my time and effort posting about them and these are always clearly stated.

If you too blog, then you'll know just how much goes into each post; from taking pictures, uploading, looking through, editing, then writing the text, assembling the post before checking and publishing. Then there is the sharing, promoting and responding to feedback. It all takes time.

I love blogging. It's a brilliant hobby, I'm so grateful for all the amazing opportunities that have come my way and for the wonderful support that you guys have given me. Thank you so much for reading, it's so exciting. Blogger tells me there have been more that 200,000 page views which is madness. I'd love you to stick with me.

Sophie

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Sometimes I am sent items to feature as part of a post and these will be clearly mentioned as part of each post.Everything else is bought by myself. Any sponsored or collaboration posts will be clearly marked. Each post is my own content and all opinions are honest.