I started this blog just over three years ago. After my hysterectomy, I had all this renewed energy and I started feeling sexy again, so I wanted an outlet for my thoughts around that. Hence this blog. I have to admit that I didn’t think I would last this long. Many times over the years have I considered giving it up. But each time, when my slump kept continuing, other sex bloggers reached out and encouraged me to keep going.
I started with just thoughts and some book reviews. At that time I thought I was just a voice calling in the wilderness with no one to hear me. Which was not entirely wrong: in the beginning, I was happy if I had a reader a day. Now I average over 5,500 page views a month! It’s sometimes so easy to look at how well others are doing and then being hard on ourselves, which I constantly do. But when I look at how far I have come, I am amazed and so grateful.
Back in the day, when I was just a baby blogger, I just used WordPress to make my site. Once I connected with more sex bloggers, I learned how dangerous that is, particularly when you talk about sex. WordPress has full control over your blog if you don’t self-host, so that is a huge risk. I made the move to self-hosting not too soon after I started blogging and for a while, I was really happy. I had full control over my blog and I could customise it the way I wanted.
Sadly, my web host went bust without warning, taking three years worth of payment – and the contents of my blog – with it. I was devastated, especially since I had been stupid and hadn’t made regular back-ups of my site. Thanks to the help of Michael (aka domsigns) I was able to recover a number of my old blog posts and I found a new web host. I now have my domain name registered with one company and my hosting with another. And I take regular back-ups of both my WordPress posts and my site in general. (And you should too!)
And now my blog has quietly tipped over the 300 blog posts mark. I have never really made money off my blog. When I was still doing sex toy reviews, I was not savvy enough to use my affiliate links in such a way that I made money off them. I also made the decision not to advertise on my blog, as in the beginning I simply didn’t have enough traffic to be attractive to companies and now I don’t review sex toys anymore, so it won’t make sense to companies to advertise.
I tried Patreon for a brief spell, but I didn’t feel like I had anything to offer that people would want to pay for, so that never really got off the ground. (I also didn’t get any Patreons after months of advertising, so that was another consideration.) And despite having a Ko-Fi link on my site, I can count on the fingers of half a hand how many times someone has bought me a coffee. I’m just not very good at actively raising money to keep my site running. I keep all my stories free on my site and the only thing I advertise is my debut novel (and I’m not even really successful at that, looking at the sales figures of my book).
My website has always been my place. A place where I called the shots and where I could do whatever I wanted. Monetising means compromise, a compromise I wasn’t willing to make. I don’t have enough time to devote myself to SEO and marketing, and that’s fine. My blog is my hobby. My stories are free, as I like the freedom to write whatever I want. To experiment with different stories or writing styles.
This does not mean that my blog hasn’t been profitable at all. Thanks to my blog, I have been able to get some paid writing gigs. I write regular non-fiction articles for a website (under my real name) and I have written quite a few erotic short stories for various websites and apps. I am grateful for those opportunities.
I am happy I have kept my blog running for all these years. I like that I am participating in memes more often, as it keeps me motivated to blog and it does bring more traffic to my site. I have decided to give up trying to fit into the sex blogging community. I am not really the fitting-in type anyhow and the sooner I accept that I will always be an outlier, the happier I will be. It’s fine: I do things my way and I appreciate that isn’t for everyone. I enjoy blogging for me, and that is something I have to keep in mind. My blog is my happy place. It hasn’t been that way for some time, but since I made the decision to blog about what I want rather than what I think my readers might want, I have felt a lot better about it all.
Onward to 400 blog posts!
To read other blog posts for January Jumpstart, click on the badge below.
The Insatiable Jane Travers
Would you choose a stable marriage over a lifetime of excitement? What if you could have it both?
It’s the roaring twenties.
Naive virgin Jane Travers arrives at her friend’s country home hoping to spend a summer away from her strict aunt and uncle in New York. She’s been promised wild parties and endless excitement, but she soon finds herself in over her head. With the help of the sexy singer Lillian Smith, and her old flame Sidney Fitzroy, Jane starts to explore her sexuality, blossoming from an innocent virgin to an insatiable vixen.
With Sidney and Lillian both satisfying her deepest desires, Jane cannot imagine ever going back to her aunt and uncle’s restrictive household. But without an income of her own, her only escape is marriage. Sidney can offer her a stable life as a married woman, but with Lillian, she’d have a lifetime of excitement.
How can she choose when her heart—and body—belongs to both of them?
I think you have come to a very important decision, to blog for you about what you want, and that makes your blog feel like fun and not work! On to 400 posts indeed!
Thank you for your lovely words at the top of your post, and of course for linking up this week 🙂
Rebel xox
Great post and thank goodness for self hosting and for Domsigns. I think it’s interesting how people fall into this whole thing and how the purpose of our blog changes over time. Interesting too how the blog can be a stepping stone to other avenues.
Ah I am happy to give you a nudge. We were baby bloggers together and I so so agree with what you said about your blog being your place. I feel the same about mine x
I started with blogger, but wordpress had a lot more attractive features, so I switched. I went self hosted 5 years ago and I haven’t looked back since. It is good that you write what you want.