Make money from your blog and what you need to know

This is a paid post

When I first started blogging I was really naive about what it all entailed. I just wanted a space to share my feelings as a new mom. It wasn’t even that I thought people would want to read it or were even interested in my life. It was more that I was a little lonely, was home alone with a baby and was lost.

After around 6 months Of writing blog posts, I was getting interest from brands. This started with product reviews. I did a lot of reading of other bloggers posts and in Facebook groups about how to successfully work with brands. I learnt about follow and no follow links. What things I should include in a review. I was finding my feet with reviews and was really enjoying trying new things and sharing what I thought on them.

This then led to paid work with brands which I really didn’t know anything about. I didn’t really know that you could make money from blogging. So again I headed to blogs and Facebook groups to see what I had to do. The problem with this is there is so much information out there that It was all so confusing. I was worried that I was going to get it wrong and I would end up in a trouble with making money from blogging and being paid my maternity leave from my employer.

I do wish that in the early days I would have reached out to an accountant to tell me what I needed to do. To talk me through the process so I felt less stressed about it. Being in payed employment I had never heard of self assessment so this was a huge thing I had to learn. The knowledge and experience of an accountant would of helped for sure.

I did however learn the following

• You need to be organised. You need to make a note of all your income and any outgoings. I do this on a spreadsheet for each tax year. I complete this every month adding in any money that I have been paid and noting down any expenses. The things I expense are things like my website hosting cost, business insurance and if I have attended any events linked to my blog like blogon I then expense the ticket price. There is more that you can expense but I just dont and this is probably where I could do with some help.
• Once you have earned £1,000 you must complete a tax return.
• You need to know your worth. Yes the extra cash is great but are they really paying you what you are worth. All the hard work you put into your blog to then say yes to £5 for one post that you spend hours on is that really right. The answer is no you are worth so much more. You can turn down work it doesnt mean you wont get any again.

Blogging of course has many benifits but it also takes a lot of work. When I first started blogging I didnt think I would make any money from it I didnt even know it was a done thing. Asking for help along the way is fine dont be afraid to ask for help or even seek out a professional that specalise in accounting services for small businesses that will give you the right answers and will stop you turning to google and searching for hours.