I keep asking the question: will 2020 be the year of the blog again? I’ve been in this blogging game for a while… over 7 years now to be precise. I’ve seen blogging go from standing in your bedroom with a self-timer wearing those hideous Jeffery Campbell boots and disco pants, to what it is today, shooting on the streets with professional equipment, photographers and blog themes worth hundreds. It’s changed a lot over the years.
These last 2 or 3 years, Instagram has been where it’s at, and some would say, it’s taken over. It’s a lot quicker, easier, and cheaper to create content and pay for influencers to do so on Instagram compared to blogging, and in some ways, it probably takes less knowledge and expertise than blogging too, which is probably why the platform has grown the way it has. But I’m eager to see how that changes in 2020, or whether it does it all.
Why I’m moving away from Instagram, and back to my blog…
Oversaturation
Oversaturation, We heard that word over and over again in 2019. Instagram, and blogging, is an oversaturated place. Everybody is doing it. Like many, I changed my focus last year to Instagram over blogging because I saw the way the platform was going and I wanted to get ahead of the curve. I was probably a year or two too late.
Yes, there’s still a LOT of people blogging, but it takes a hell of a lot more time and energy for me to write a blog post than it does to snap a quick picture for Instagram. I think a lot of people have given up on their blogs in recent years, and perhaps it’s time we reignited the blogosphere again.
Value and time
I think there’s a lot more value in a blog post. For brands, and for end-readers. Instagram is great for so many things, but it’s a short, snappy app. It’s for people who don’t have a lot of time, who are scrolling through on their way to work, or on their lunch break. For me, It doesn’t have that equal value to a blog post.
The difference with a blog is it’s more than just an image and a caption – it’s a fully curated piece around your favourite beauty routine or your latest handbag purchase. I think there’s a place for Instagram, but much more so, a place for blog posts again too. Magazines are dying out, but that doesn’t mean people don’t want to sit down and read a lengthy article – they just want to access it online now and read it from somebody they can truly trust and relate to. Blogging is replacing the modern magazine.
Quality
Because of the fast-paced nature of Instagram, I think it’s really easy to churn out content piece after content piece, without stopping to think about the quality of them. This is something I’ve been a victim of this year no doubt – I got fixated on posting daily, and ended up posting ‘for the hell of it’, rather than stopping to think about whether the quality was where I wanted it to be. For me, blogging is different from Instagram, in that every post I make, I try to make it as evergreen as possible. In that way, I want each post to be of the highest quality it can be.
In a similar way, I also find the quality on other blogs to be a lot higher than Instagram in general. I feel more inspired by other blog work, and want to surround myself with the best of the best, to help me improve.
Where is your focus for 2020?
Lucy x
