I’ve been blogging for over 11 years now and let me tell you–I’ve made some stupid mistakes. This is especially true when I think about my finances. Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of smart decisions I’ve made along the way as well. However, I’d be lying if I told you that I would do everything the exact same way. Today I want to talk to you about how to invest in your blog. There are good ways and some not so good ways to do it. Do you know the difference?

6 ways to invest in your blog

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how so many content creators won’t even bat an eye when it comes to shelling out money to enter a big giveaway. Whether it’s because they feel like they need bigger numbers before brands will work with them, or it’s merely a vanity thing. However, so often if they would take that same amount of money and actually invest it into their own blog, they’d be doing themselves a huge favor. Check out some of the best ways to invest in your blog.

pay a professional

I never spent any money on my blog until I’d earned some. Once I had a couple blogging partnerships under my belt I reached out to a graphic designer and web developer. She switched my free Blogger site over to WordPress, designed my website and logo, and walked me through a million little details. It was so worth it to pay someone who knew what they were doing instead of spending hundreds of hours trying to figure it out for myself.

automate what makes sense

There are lots of services out there that will do tasks for you. It’s true that Instagram has repeatedly said they don’t like thirds party apps. However, Pinterest and Tailwind are BFFs so consider a Tailwind subscription. Or set up some applets with IFTTT (If This Then That) to automatically schedule things to your social channel when another action occurs. For example, I’m horrible at keeping up with Twitter. So I have some friends who blog quality content and I have IFTTT set up to automatically share their blog posts to my Twitter account.

upgrade your equipment

Instead of spending a bunch of money on giveaways to grow your social audiences, why not invest in equipment? Maybe saving up money for a better camera will pay off with better images for your blog and Instagram. or maybe you’d like to upgrade from free Canva to a Photoshop option. I recently splurged on a nifty new ring light desk lamp to use for blog images and videos.

book a brand photoshoot

I think one of the best investments in your blog/business is to book a brand photoshoot. For so long I didn’t think it would be beneficial to me as a blogger but I was completely wrong! If you can work in just one or two brand shoots a year you will always have a good stockpile of images for evergreen blog posts, social media shares, and headshot requests. You can read more about why you should book a brand photoshoot in this blog post.

consider continuing education

There are so many great conferences and retreats that are available for content creators. One of the plus sides of the Pandemic madness of the past couple years is that there are lots of virtual options now too if you can’t travel to one. I’ve been fortunate enough to go to one, and I even spoke at a couple virtual ones earlier in the year! Best of all, any type of conference is a write-off on your taxes. Conference fees, hotel stays, meals, travel expenses… in the infamous words of David Rose–“that’s a write off”. Looking for a conference to attend? Check out the Magical Media Retreat I’m co-hosting in January.

take your time

All good things take time. You can’t expect to explode on Instagram or triple your pageviews overnight. Does that occasionally happen? Eh, maybe. Generally speaking though slow and steady wins the race with blogging. I’ve talked to many bloggers and influencers over the years who regret trying to take shortcuts. It might seem like impossibly slow growth sometimes but eventually you get what you give. Investing time in your blog and the channels that bring traffic to your blog (in my case it’s mostly Pinterest!) will pay off!

How do you plan to invest in your blog in 2022?