I’m not gonna be a Blogzilla and neither will I ever begin blind-item-ing sticky situations I might have encountered as a blogger even though I have the power to on my site, but, yes, I have had my share of mishaps after almost 4 years of blogging. If ever I expressed a grievance or complained in a situation it was due to inefficiency, mostly, and I always deal with whomever directly. Why not share specific stories, you may ask…that’s simple, this is a beauty blog. Pointing fingers, and even showcasing nameless blame is not beautiful and that’s not what the blog is about. Now if you’ve made a name for yourself and are one of the beauty industry’s foremost authorities it would make sense to openly share if some behavior or situation disappointed you but there’s always a proper way to outline it without tearing someone down. Now sticky situations aside what I do hope for all bloggers is that without turning into Blogzillas we begin to humbly understand the importance of blogging while knowing our worth and the value of the content we put out. Believe it or not, I shall mention my mother, who has almost forever been an ExCom member (executive committee) in the country’s top ad agencies and is now with the country’s largest multi-platform content company. She advised me about carefully choosing what events I attend or set aside time for, I believe we were arguing at the time…about a year ago when the blog peaked. That time I just wanted to confirm for every invitation I received, but I was also trying to launch a career as an MUA. Mom advised that while it is true that if you want more recognition and popularity you attend as many events as you can she wisely said there is also value put out there as well when you limit your availability based on what is RELEVANT to you and your blog. That’s why it’s called Beauty Editing, you don’t show or throw in everything just to be able to have something to post…it’s okay to widen experiences but you make the cut where it matters, especially if you want to curate choice content. For today I’d like you girls, bloggers primarily, to take time to watch a video which isn’t visually stunning but the value of the message is priceless. You can’t put a price on wisdom. This image is not part of the video, the lady in the middle is.
Photo from Pixiwoo’s Body Talk Youtube feature w/ Jane Cunningham
Jane Cunningham (center in photo) is a British gold mine of blogging wisdom (imagine being invited to places like the House of Dior in Paris to stay for a few nights and experience new collections). She’s a more mature insider beauty editor who also happens to have one of the most revered beauty blogs in the UK, British Beauty Blogger, and she even admits her photos aren’t always stunning. The value of her blog comes from advanced previews, new collections, availability and sale announcements, and well-written honest opinions about products and even the beauty industry itself. She gets product previews way ahead of everyone else and while she’s not primarily a Youtube-r (she’s quite self-deprecating about herself on video) what she says is pretty much always relevant and meaningful. Here in this video Jane shares about bloggers having to know their worth, it’s very insightful and it touches on a few notes from my mother’s gush of wisdom as well.
