Name: Emma
Age: 26
Location: Cambridge, UK
Blog URL: www.fromalditoharrods.com
What is your blog about? It is predominantly a blog about making extra money online – from selling your old worn shoes on eBay to doing surveys, and everything in between. I also talk about thrifty finds and show off my latest boot sale hauls.
Is this your first blog? No. It all started back in the days of Girland and since then I’ve had a few blogs – back when you were only a “serious blogger” if you had a domain, built your own layout and blogged about going to Tesco or your latest crush. I had sad-eyes.net for many, many years.
When did you start your current blog? December 2010
What made you do it? I was bored of seeing the same blogs over and over again. No one seemed to blog about making money online, unless it was some kind of scam – the “hand me over £500 and I’ll share my 100% fail safe method”. I wanted to write about something different, and something that I’m passionate about. I get a genuine thrill when I’m able to show people how to make some extra money.
What was your first blog post about? My first post was an introduction into who I am and my first “make £10 a day” challenge for January 2011.
What do you think is the most useful tool to you as a blogger? Social media as a whole. I use forums to get my money making ideas and from that I use social media to carry out research – if a company have complaints all over their Facebook page about payments never being made then I don’t want to be working for them. Once a post is published I’m able to reach readers by publishing to Twitter and Facebook, as well as interaction with other bloggers.
Do people in your “real life” know about your blog? Yes, family, friends, colleagues and people I meet in everyday life. I firmly believe that my blog has helped me to get the job I have today – as a website administrator for a comparison site. Whilst I didn’t list my blog on my CV or mention the name in the interview, having a behind the scenes knowledge of the web industry and how social media works really helped me. It is also useful when I can point a friend or colleague towards my site when I’m sharing my latest money making find.
What has been the one thing (blog post, project, etc) you’ve been really proud of? I’m really proud of a blog post called “Make £1,000”. It is a list of 100 things to do to earn £10. The blog post took a long time to research and write, but it is a great starting point for someone wanting to earn a bit of extra cash. You can see it http://fromalditoharrods.com/make-1000/
Where do you see your blog in a year? I’m going to be upfront about this – as someone who has a money making blog, of course I want it to be earning me more money! Alongside that goes a bigger audience and more valuable content, which is what I’m striving for.
What do you wish you knew when starting your blog? How much the blogging scene has changed since my earlier days. Back when I was blogging at Sad-Eyes.net there were few bloggers out there, social media didn’t exist and people got to your blog using bookmarks. I was naive about it all.
What do you wish you know about now? That just because I don’t blog about fashion, lifestyle or food, it doesn’t make my blog irrelevant. I still struggle with that!
How do you keep motivated to post? I’ve tried setting myself goals to publish X posts per week, but it just doesn’t happen. I blog when I have something to say. Because I research all money making schemes to make sure I get paid before telling my readers about it, I might be doing a lot of behind the scenes work, but posts may be few and far between. Once I’ve got evidence that something has worked I can’t wait to share it with my readers – and then get tweets, emails or even texts telling me that they’ve made some money really keeps me motivated to continue.
Anything else you’d like to add? Remember that anyone can read your blog! Write about things you wouldn’t mind your grandmother reading and that you don’t mind reading back in 10 years. And most of all, just be yourself.
