Making money from blogging?

Of course it's not all to do with making money, is it? But plenty of bloggers hope it may lead to brass in their pocket. I absolutely hate some of the intellectual snobbery and self indulgent twaddle that passes for blogging but hey that's just me. Conversely, as an apostrophe fiend, my heart also sinks at the state of some blogs - I've heard of 'never mind the grammar, tell the story,' but far too many blogs are crying out for the subbing stick, in my humble opinion. There was an interesting discussion and some excellent advice on Joanne Mallon’s MediawomenUK forum this week when guidance was sought about how much you can expect to get paid. The original poster asked what the going rate for blogging was. Is there one yet, do you think? A journalist whom I much admire called Jane Hoskyn (she has a blog at ladymuck.blogspot.com and was brilliant as an ed at TV Scoop jumped in with words of wisdom, saying that you don’t do it to get rich. The rate she described for five posts a day for a month was equivalent to around half that of a single feature in some women’s weekly magazines.
I’m also blogging for the people behind TV Scoop, getting the same rate over at Corrie Blog posting just once a day mind, and I love it. I do it late at night under the cover of darkness while my kids are asleep. Sure beats hoovering. I balance it with work that is much better paid but being as I am knocking 40, savour the ‘street cred’ (daddyo) that having anything to do with blogging brings me. I also ‘up’ my presence on the web and get to write about something I have an opinion on. It’s lovely to see a post I’ve put up getting lots of comments - especially when they come from overseas. But it’d never pay the bills. If a job came up that required me to demonstrate experience in this field, I’d jump at it and point my prospective employers to my favourite posts about Hayley Cropper turning into Jack Nicholson, Hilda Ogden being such a star and my admiration for the great Sue Cleaver. And give it a few months and hopefully I'll have pitched some eds on any TV-inspired features, just happening to mention the blog to boost my credentials. I have worked as a TV critic for all too short a period before so love to be let loose in this area. And the web stuff feels so much freer than an evening paper ever did. For any blogger who’s new to writing, or is an established blogger, with no experience of pitching or working in the media, they could do worse than check out a new service called Scooptwords which has been set up to sell blog content to editors on behalf of bloggers. They had said they'd take 50 per cent commission off the first sale and less off subsequent sales, but have now said it'll be 25 per cent.Some threw up their hands in horror at the proposed 50/50 split. I for one, would prefer to sell my own stuff whatever the proposed agency fee (hell we are an agency) but then I know how to do that, now. For years I was flogging stories to a national paper through a third party. This allowed me to do that without spending time forging relationships with eds, and chasing newspaper account depts. for my cash. This meant I could spend that time with my children. Now I have the time I am cutting out the middle man. But what I am trying to illustrate is that there are people for whom a 50/50 split can work - okay so they can write - but can they chase a hard-pressed editor to get commissioned? Possibly not. The journalist heading up Scooptwords is Graham Holliday from Noodle Pie  where I have lurked now and again for a good while. It’s a brilliantly evocative blog but it leaves me puzzled why the hell isn’t Graham 20 stone with all those saturated fat soaked delicacies he scoffs? Still he must be burning it off with all the nervous energy that setting up Scooptwords has entailed. Good luck to him. [Linda]

Comments

[Camilla]

Hi Linda,
This was a really interesting article. I read the media women thread with interest too as some of my work is within the blogging field, as you know.

I agree that blogging won't make you rich but I also think that anyone who things they can just write a blog and make enough money not to do anything else all month is deluding themselves. It's equivalent to expecting to survive on writing only one broadsheet article a month!

Similarly, some bloggers spend far too much time and effort on their posts. If you get paid the same for 1000 words as you would for 100 there is very little point in doing enormous amounts of work and self-editing then complaining about the pay (which isn't on a per word basis and seemingly is too young for an industry standard) and that it sucks up all your time. It has to be balanced with other work.

Having said that there are lots of benefits to blogging. It raises your profile if you market yourself well, it is a platform for work so long as it isn't self-indulgent twaddle and some people make money from it.

Camilla

[Linda]

Hi Camilla. Yes I agree. I think of it in terms of how long it takes me and for various reasons, it fits well with other work.