Thoughts After BlogHer: Blog for Money Not Swag

by Deb Ng on August 9, 2010

Ever since returning home from BlogHer this past weekend, I can’t help but wonder if this conference is truly educational for women who blog. Hear me out, becausae I’m not trying to slam BlogHer. It is what it is – a place for bloggers to enjoy each other’s company, court brands and receive some basic education. However, I don’t see it as being truly a place where women can learn to rise in the ranks of social media and blogging and especially to earn money with their blogs.

I saw a lot of things at BlogHer this year, but nothing that indicates it’s there to help empower women. Don’t get me wrong, everyone there was happy to be there and I’m no exception. I had a wonderful time, I just didn’t learn anything to help me grow as a blogger or social media professional. What I did take away was the positive vibe that comes with sisterhood and community. I also learned that many of the bloggers in attendance barely earned anything from their blogs last year.

I talked to many bloggers, including plenty who receive brand sponsorships, and from them I learned:

Quite a few popular bloggers earned less than $1,000 last year but received lots of free stuff. Several of them are away from home often as they receive sponsorship to attend these events, but they don’t earn actual money.
Many bloggers were sponsored by a brand, but none of them (that I spoke with) talked about their sponsor and very few wore t-shirts or other items indicating sponsorship. If I didn’t ask if they received sponsorship to attend BlogHer, I wouldn’t have known. So if they’re not out pimping the brand, where’s the value in sponsoring bloggers?
Very few bloggers actually go home and write about the brands who are passing out freebies and swag at BlogHer.
Many bloggers who I spoke with felt free samples and products were payment enough as they save them from having to buy those items in the supermarket. However, many of these bloggers also receive products they wouldn’t have purchased in the first place.

So at the risk of alienating my friends who are part of the BlogHer community, I’d like to know when the real, actual empowerment begins? How does courting brands in exchange for sponsorships or freebies help a woman to advance as a business person and professional? If BlogHer truly wanted to help women there would be more sessions and vendors teaching us how to make real, actual money as bloggers and rise to the top as social media professionals.

What Dora the Explorer and Elmo have to do with blogs, sisterhood or empowerment is beyond me.

Moreover, I wonder if this does more harm for the cause than good. I’ll be fair, I don’t see much gender discrimination in the blogosphere, but I will say that I do fight off a certain stigma associated with women who blog – that we’re all mommy bloggers or that we prefer to blog in exchange for free stuff. I don’t know how anyone who is serious about their blogging – and about being taken seriously as a blogger – can see this sort of event as a path towards the advancement of women.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’ve received free stuff in exchange for reviews, but not often and because I don’t want my blog to only be about product reviews and giveaways. I also let sponsors know that if I do review their products there’s a chance that the review won’t be a good one. Some have chosen to not do business with me for that reason, and that’s fine. However, my preference is to earn money as a blogger. Any sponsorships (through advertising) I receive are monetary and only for products and servies I believe in. At the end of the year, I won’t have a closet full of freebies but I will have earned enough to help support my family and put a bit aside for some shopping and a rainy day.

Also? More than a few bloggers told me they wanted to learn how to earn more actual money with their blogging, but weren’t sure how to do so, and were just as confused about how to do this on the day they left.

As a skeptical first time attendee, this negativity might be all me. So I’d like to put it to you, BlogHer attendees. How does BlogHer empower you to succeed? What is the benefit to all this brand courting? And, finally, did you earn any money as a blogger in the past year, and if so, was it more than a few hundred dollars per month?

If you want to empower women, don’t give them Swiffers and oatmeal, give them money. Give them a job. A good job.

For more on this, please read:

BlogHer: It Was…Um…Weird - Scoutie Girl
BlogHer From the Eyes of a Reluctant Newbie: Kommein

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Tagged as: blogher

http://www.scoutiegirl.com Tara – Scoutie Girl

Thanks for the link love!

I think more so than giving us jobs, they need to teach how to CREATE the job we want from the things we’re passionate about. That’s what I’ve done and now earn enough to have my husband quit job and help me run the business and become a stay at home dad.

I am a success story but what I’ve done is not hard. I found an audience, addressed their needs, and then started putting dollar signs on the services I offered. I’ve been greeted with as much thanks as I have bucks.

Other women can do this and we can help each other succeed. Letting big business get in the way will only slow things down and gum up the works.

Thanks for your thoughtful post!
http://blog.psjoneswrites.com/2010/08/yes-we-do-need-libraries.html P.S. Jones

I would really like to see the responses to this post. I’ve never been to Blogher, but moments before this post appeared in my RSS reader I was mulling over attending next year because everyone seemed to enjoy Blogher so much. Ten minutes later, I am less enthusiastic. I’ll have to check back and see what the other attendees thought.
http://www.thelingerieaddict.com Treacle

I have to agree with you, Deb.

While I’m glad I went and I’m glad I was able to introduce my blog and brand to more people, I didn’t learn as much as I thought I would. A lot of the information (such as in the monetization panel) felt very, very basic and not at all applicable to people who want to make a full-time living out of blogging and a blog related business.

On the plus side though, everyone was very friendly and seemed to be having lots of fun. I’m just not sure if that’s enough for me to buy a ticket next year.
http://beautyandfashiontech.com Carleen

I am a bit glad that I did not attend BlogHer. Working with brands and accepting sample products is essential to my business since I own product review oriented sites. It also allows me monetize my sites rather effectively though reviews of items that I can use with affiliate links without the expense of multiple product purchases for purposes of review (although I do still purchase a large number of review items) . However, the perception that bloggers will work for swag and perhaps blog solely for swag has always troubled me. From various reports that I have read, it appears that BlogHer is more and more about the swag and less about blogging, although when I attended in 2007 it wasn’t really that way. In any event, getting to know relevant brands is not that difficult and is perhaps better suited for trade shows devoted to the topic (e.g Cosmoprof or the Makeup show for beauty bloggers, home shows for design blogs, food shows for foodies etc). I want my blogging conferences to be about blogging and all the more technical and business oriented issues that go with it. If I need to see lots of makeup for my beauty blog I’ll go to something specific to that.

I also find that many bloggers do not know the most effective ways to monetize their product reviews and many do not understand the various disclosure requirements, both legal and ethical. There are also tax implications to the receipt of non-consumable products. Products may be viewed as compensation by some companies, who might then demand certain link anchor text, which runs into issues with link buying/selling. Doing too many products reviews based on free items can result in less traffic than reviews done of purchased products because the topic gets diluted when 20 (or even hundreds) of bloggers all start writing on the same item that they were sent as part of a PR pitch. These are just a few of the issues that can arise when doing reviews of free products.

This isn’t to say that working with brands is bad. To the contrary, it can be very rewarding and can lead to some great content or contacts for future business collaborations, but I believe that it should be approached with a business like attitude and set policies about how reviews will be done . So, I am curious. Were there sessions at BlogHer on those types of topics since the trade show part of the conference was so brand oriented?
http://www.profitablemommyblogging.com Kelly McCausey

Deb, I could kiss you MMMWUUAA! (There, I just did!)

You are singing my song. It breaks my heart that mom bloggers have been sooo sucked in by the BRAND MONSTER that they’re not thinking things through!

They’re given trips that they’re not even allowed to bring their FAMILIES to and if the product is of any substantial value they are usually provided with BORROWED SAMPLES to review and return and given NO PAYMENT to do so.

I watched a friend get so enamored by the BRAND MONSTER that she abandoned her own profit earning activities to chase an opportunity to be sponsored by a big brand. A year later, she’s burned out and broke.

They’re being used and it breaks my heart.
http://www.abbyhasissues.wordpress.com Abby

I would also be interested in reading the comments on this post from other attendees, but I doubt that the bloggers you speak of read intellectual blogs specifically about writing as much as they read the other blogs with similar themes. I don’t know if that makes sense…

At any rate, I only blog for myself as an outlet, as I am an editor in real life and like the freedom a blog provides. However, many people go into blogging for the exact reason you mentioned–stuff. Many people start blogging as a hobby and as soon as they realize they can be paid to do what they’re doing anyway, they often sacrifice the integrity of their blog to build legions of followers and brand sponsorships.

My point–I think I do have one somewhere–is that many of the people in the blog community I’m involved with are other “things” before they are writers. They might be coming to the BlogHer conference as a way to simply meet other people and build up their readership for whatever reason. I doubt that most of them are serious about writing the way you (we) are, but simply see it as another way to make some extra money on the side. I could be way off with this…
http://www.thursdaybram.com Thursday Bram

You’ve described the reasons that I’ve made a choice not to focus my energies on BlogHer — I believe that it’s a great opportunity for many bloggers, but I get a little exasperated every time I see the figures on how many of the bloggers who attend don’t make a living from their work. I understand that they may not share my priorities, but I really feel that the swag and brands take away opportunities, rather than create them.
http://freelancewritinggigs.com Deb Ng

For those of you who are interested in comments from attendees, you might want to also visit my post at the BlogWorld blog – which has many bloggers countering my points, so you can make a balanced judgment.

http://blog.blogworldexpo.com/2010/08/09/blogworld-v-blogher-the-differences-are-apparant/
http:/wordsforhirellc.com/blog Karen Swim

Deb, I read your posts with great interest and understanding. As a middle aged, childless widow communities like BlogHer did not really appeal to me when the demographic was clearly women with family. It is wonderful to network with other women but in my opinion not worth the ticket of a conference to socialize, there are far too many less expensive, local ways to engage with other women and/or moms. Your impressions were balanced, fair and really helpful to people like me who wondered “am I missing somethng?” How sad that a blogging conference did so little to equip bloggers with professional knowledge that would help them to do their jobs better. The things that I’ve read are so very different than those who have attend SOBCon and other blogging/social media conferences.
http://justlinda.net JustLinda

I don’t do product reviews nor do I even have ads on my blog.

I wasn’t swayed by the sponsors and their wares, though I appreciated the fact that their presence kept the costs down quite a bit so that many people – even those economically disadvantaged – might be able to attend. The conference pass is only $200 for an early-bird pass. It would cost you that much to pay for 6 meals in any city of size (and there is MORE than enough food there so you don’t have to pay for meals).

BlogHer serves a broad audience. I, myself, went to meet people and learn from them. And yes, I did learn some things – ways I can make my blog better, ways I can make my writing better.

Eventually, I do intend to take on a much bigger writing challenge and I think that what I do know on my blog will help me with that.

No, I don’t make a living on my blog and I don’t expect I ever will – I’m not even TRYING to, in fact. The blog costs me money to host and such. Not all of us are trying to “monetize” our blogs. I didn’t even go to any of those sessions.

Maybe it’s not the right conference for some people. I don’t expect it is. But that doesn’t make it immaterial. It can still serve a need for others. It can empower them simply by shining a light on some various ways forward – showcasing what others have done and how they’ve done it. And it can make them bolder just for the connections they make. It can inspire them to take a risk or try an idea.

I’m sorry it wasn’t good for you. Most of the reviews I’ve seen – whether from people who just went for the fun and swag or people who went to learn and grow – have been pretty positive. I hope you find one that better serves your needs!
http://www.themomwrites.com Prerna

Hi Deb,
Since am in India, each year when these conferences roll around, I end up feeling left out. However, posts like these make me feel so much better. I know that I will attend a blogging conference sometime next year but I really want it to be truly helpful since not only will it involve an investment of money but also time and effort.
Thank you for sharing your experience.
http://www.bugginword.com Elly Lou

I think you nailed it. The networking was fantastic, but the content was sh*t. I’m still trying to decide if I got my money’s worth out of it. Realize, I live local – so my only expense was the conference fee. I didn’t have to fly anywhere or pay for a hotel room. Still, I’m not entirely sure it was worth the money. I’m reserving judgment until I see how some of my new contacts play out.
http://twitter.com/alisonjgolden Alison Golden

Hmmm, this is interesting. As a very new blogger who is in the process of finding her voice and her focus, I have been dismayed by what I have seen. Ultimately, I want to make money from my blog and yes I am a mom – I have mommy experiences that I write about but others too – but I don’t belong in the mommy blogosphere with giveaways, badges, blogrolls and the like. I feel I fall somewhere between mommy bloggers and quirky internet marketers. I’m struggling to find a home and with that, traffic.
http://twitter.com/alisonjgolden Alison Golden

Hmmm, this is interesting. As a very new blogger who is in the process of finding her voice and her focus, I have been dismayed by what I have seen. Ultimately, I want to make money from my blog and yes I am a mom – I have mommy experiences that I write about but others too – but I don’t belong in the mommy blogosphere with giveaways, badges, blogrolls and the like. I feel I fall somewhere between mommy bloggers and quirky internet marketers. I’m struggling to find a home and with that, traffic.