Like previous blogiversaries, we’re gonna use this week as an excuse to take a look at the business side of blogging (at least as we know it). As you’ve probably gathered by now, we never intended to start a business when we wrote our first post back in Sept 2007, nor did we ever construct a formal business plan. So this whole adventure has been a learn as we go / roll with the punches / adjust along the way / insert more cliches here kind of deal. And just like we don’t claim to be DIY experts or trained interior designers (we’re just two people with a chihuahua and a baby), we’re not about to pretend that we’re the savviest business people out there either. But like everything else we do, we’re just gonna share our experiences in an effort to help someone out there who might be trying to grow their blog… or is just curious about what we do all day.
We’ve lightly touched on some of this info in past blogiversary posts, but this year we’ve added a lot more details along with some new visuals: PIE CHARTS. Oh yeah, you read that right. Sherry’s math-teacher dad is about to do the happy dance. So get your fork out and prepare to dig in.
Let’s start with a look at how we spend our time… a slice (har-har) of which was somewhat encapsulated in yesterday’s day in the life post. But this is a more global look at all the things we do as opposed to the somewhat random and always-changing things that we do in a day. Oh and to be clear, this is a look at when goes into running Young House Love (so it excludes things like parenting a sixteen month old and other general I’m-an-adult duties like cooking and cleaning). Behold, a very simplified / approximated breakdown (all the pie charts in this post are very general guesses, btw):
The main thing that might surprise you here is that we actually spend a very pretty small sliver of our time actually doing projects (aka “DIYing”). In fact, some weeks it feels like we barely have any more time to tackle our to-do list than we did back when we both had full-time jobs in advertising (that was pre-Clara too, so we might have had more energy, haha). Our weekends (along with weeknights after 7:30 when Clara’s in bed) are still our most productive days in terms of making house progress because the blog is “quieter” (as we say around here). So we can focus more on tasks and less on answering comments and proofing & posting posts. But that pie chart isn’t complicated enough, so…
Here’s a further breakdown of the breakdown above (yup, we broke down a breakdown) to give you a better sense of what we really do within those general categories:
INTERACTING:
- Comments: Our philosophy is that if you take the time to read what we write, the least we can do is return the favor. So we manually moderate all comments so that one of us – usually Sherry – can read it before it risks getting lost in the count and so that we can answer any questions that come up (the only exception to this is giveaway entries, which get approved in bulk since they routinely top 3K and actually topped 10K yesterday, and stopped loading, so we had to start a second giveaway post). Yes, it’s time consuming. And no, it’s probably not the most efficient system. But being part of the conversation on our blog is very important to us and we hate leaving any question unanswered. Farming that duty out to someone like an intern just feels too “answering service” to us, so we’re happy to stay grass roots and hands on.
- Twitter, Facebook & Email: Similarly, we try to be as responsive as possible on other social media. We don’t hover on our Facebook page as much as we used to, but we still try to poke in to respond where needed. And Hootsuite helps us track @mentions on Twitter so we can do our best not to let a tweet question or comment flutter by unnoticed.
WRITING:
- Posts: Well duh, a blog has to have posts right? We’re wordy and we know it (clap your hands!), so this is another major chunk of blogging. And we write around 35 a month, so it keeps us busy. But we’re not sure how you can be a good blogger without spending a good portion of time on your posts. Plus it’s our first love, along with DIY. Writing posts is what we used to do on nights and weekends after long days of working in advertising just for fun. And we still feel that way – it’s a good time.
- BabyCenter & Do It Yourself Magazine: We’ve been lucky enough that writing our blog has spawned other writing gigs, like our weekly post on BabyCenter’s Momformation blog and a regular column in BHG’s Do It Yourself Magazine. So between coordinating those with our bosses over there, coming up with ideas, writing them, taking photos (or briefing an illustrator or photographer in the case of DIY), and answering comments (on BabyCenter), they’re sort of a part time job on their own.
- Book: We’re writing a 260+ page book (due out in Fall of 2012) full of hundreds of projects and photos (more on that here). Some weeks this slice of pie should be muuuch bigger, and some a little smaller. Now that we have 90% of our manuscript turned in (whew!), this slice may actually get permanently larger since it’s time to actually do all of the projects that we talked about and have them photographed at our house by a pro before Christmas (yes, hundreds of them). Should be interesting…
DIY-ING:
- Projects: This is the actual doing of stuff to our house, which we then blog about. Most of these projects might have gotten done even if we didn’t have a blog (DIY is just something we love)… but we definitely take on projects sooner, faster, more thoroughly, and with more gusto than we may have if we didn’t have an audience. The fact that you guys are watching adds pressure, but it’s the good kind that keeps us going. Promise. You guys = momentum.
- Gathering Supplies: This is the part that makes us best friends with the employees at our local thrift stores, home improvement stores, craft stores, fabric stores, lighting outlets, etc. Sometimes running errands (aka: gathering supplies) can take less than an hour. Sweet. And sometimes it can take more than a day to track down something we need. Hunting stuff is always kind of a wild card item on the to-do list. But you know what they say about the thrill of the chase…
PHOTOGRAPHING:
- Photo Taking: Sometimes this is just taking a few moments during each step of a project to snap a few shots. Sometimes it’s cleaning up and styling rooms for “after shots” or “house tour” pictures (Hurricane Clara can leave quite a mess before we swoop in and straighten up so you guys don’t have to stare at a giant stack of books in front of the new desk that we built). This also includes the technical aspects of photography that still take us more time than we’d like (using the tripod, adjusting the aperture, waiting for different times of day to see which light is better, etc), which is why we have…
- Photo Editing: These are things like adjusting the color, exposure, size, and the way that our photos are cropped (sometimes even after thinking we’ve mastered the camera things are too blue or too yellow or too wide or off-center, so we try to adjust them so they look as true to life as possible). This also includes uploading and sorting through the hundreds of pics that we take each week. Wish I were kidding about the “hundreds” part, but we usually average 50-200 photos per post (which can tip the scales at 1,200 photos snapped each week). We then boil them down to under 20 per post and size & upload ’em).
BUSINESS RUNNING:
- Sponsors: This is where most of our money comes from (more on that later) so it involves a lot of fielding advertising requests, notifying sponsors about renewals, sending invoices, and uploading ads to our sidebar. (FYI, we use Google AdManager to serve our sponsors’ ads to our site, which takes a bit of “supervision” but not too much beyond the whole client-relations thing that we do via email).
- Giveaways: We make no money doing this, but it’s our way of “giving back” to our readers (and a way to deflect the free products that we’re offered but no longer accept). Coordinating each week’s giveaway involves a bunch of emails to confirm the prize details, notify the winners, and facilitate the prize delivery. There’s also the task of being the bearer of bad news to folks since we just don’t have room for every prize that we’re emailed about (and sometimes they don’t feel like the right fit for you guys). Which leads me to our next point…
- Saying “No Thank You”: We’re people pleasers, so this is a hard one for us, but we get so many requests each week that we 1) just don’t have enough hours in the day for (i.e. attending a local – or not so local – event), 2) don’t really blog about (i.e. “could you pretty please write about my dog walking service?”) or 3) have a policy against doing (i.e. reviewing a product, adding paid text link ads to posts) that we find ourselves having to decline a lot. Sorry if you’ve been on the receiving end of this. We’ve learned that saying no is difficult, but sometimes it’s necessary for reasons of principle and/or sanity.
- Bookkeeping: Ugh, this bores me too much to talk about. Just pretend I said something interesting about paying bills, filing quarterly taxes, renewing our business license, paying for our own health insurance, managing our site-hosting fees, and organizing receipts. Wish it was less yawn inducing, but it’s a necessary evil when it comes to running your own business (more on that here).
- Technical Stuff: On a good week this slice could all but disappear, but on a busy week we may be installing updates, dealing with server glitches, craaaaaashing entirely (which gives us approximately 50 gray hairs each time), or even doing a whole blog redesign like the one we did a few weeks back (we probably spent 40 hours total on that over the course of about four weeks). Since we’re not technically trained I’m sure all of this takes longer than it should.
So now that we’ve taken a general look at the time aspect of running our blog, let’s talk money. Before you get your hopes up, we’re not gonna detail how much we earn. Call us old fashioned, but we feel like “how much do you make?” joins “who’d you vote for?” and “are those real???” in a our list of conversations not to be had with the entire planet (anything we don’t talk about with friends at dinner usually = off limits here in blog world). In a general sense, we like to say that we make a modest living (we’re not rolling in cheddar, especially after we pay our business-related expenses like hosting fees – which we outline at the end of this post). But we actually think is a good thing because we blog about living modestly, so it all goes hand in hand. But we’re happy to talk about where our money comes from and how that has changed over the last four years. Let’s do it.
Waaay back in 2009 we spoke on a local panel about making money blogging. At the time we sung the praises of a “multi-channel” approach to earning income from your blog. Because, at the time, we (though mainly Sherry, since she was the only full timer then) got money something like this (again, this is a very general guestimate):
We’ll breakdown some of those terms further under the next pie chart, but let’s talk generally for a second. A few years back, despite our best efforts, money from advertising just wasn’t cutting it. So Sherry branched out and started selling inexpensive art prints that she had printed locally and shipped herself (she’s got a fine arts degree). It was sort of like being an Etsy vendor (but she created a shop page on our site to vend them instead). At that time Sherry also began offering custom mood boards to help readers with their “Design Dilemmas” (and briefly even offered smaller services like paint color advice and even short phone consultations).
When it came to pricing those mood boards out, Sherry did some for free first, just to get interest up and a few under her belt. Then she slowly raised her rate using supply & demand as the guide. After being free for a while they were $30, then $60, then $100, and slowly built up to $250 when supply/demand increased over the years (Sherry refused to sell them for more than that, even when the two per week that she would offer up would sell out within two minutes). Oh, we were also writing for Do It Yourself Magazine and our local R Home design magazine, so that’s where we got the whole multi-channel method thing from. We were doing lots of stuff to make a small income. Which was necessary because ad income alone just wasn’t cutting it (I should mentioned here that Sherry took a huge pay cut to go from advertising to blogging, but she just wanted to see it through, and looking back it was a risk that we’re so glad we took).
But now let’s look at a new pie chart. Times have changed, and luckily for the better. As our traffic grew, so did our ad revenue, which meant that we were able to spend less time on services and selling prints (both of which we discontinued after Clara’s birth in May 2010 out of sheer no-time-at-all necessity). The elimination of these services allowed for more time that we could spend focusing on blogging. In fact, while baking making these pie charts I noticed that our currently weekly Google Ad income is larger than what we pulled in our entire first year via Google. This is not to indicate that we’re making an enormous amount now, but rather that what we started at was so laughably small. Hopefully this encourages anyone who is currently earning a few cents a day to stick with it for four years and 2,000+ posts (if you love it I guess, haha, don’t stick with it for the uncertain years-down-the-line dividends). So now our income sources look more like this (this chart might be completely inaccurate since we didn’t really calculate things so it’s not made up of actual percentages – it’s just representative of the general shift in our income sources):
It’s still “multi-channeled” in a way, but the majority of the channels are advertising-based. We still keep our income split across different sources so that if one falters, we aren’t sent into a panic. And in case you’re scratching your head at any of those labels, here’s a quick breakdown:
- Google Ads: These are labelled as such on our sidebar or at the bottom of a post (they’re by the geniuses at Google who take words from our page – or hints from your browsing history – to show you ads that they feel are most relevant to you). We have little say in what’s shown here, except for blocking inappropriate ads. But we love that they’re pretty self-sufficient, which means more time for projects and writing posts.
- Ad Networks: Lots of blogs substitute or supplement Google with ads from a network, which allow for more home improvement specific ads that can also pay more (since they don’t usually have enough “inventory” to fill all slots, we usually use a back-up method that shows Google-Ads when they’re not running). Our ad network is Haven Home Media for anyone wondering, now owned by Reader’s Digest. And they came to us, so we’re not sure how you sleuth an ad network out (in general we believe in focusing on keeping projects/posts great and sponsors/networks will hopefully come to you).
- Sponsors: These are the ads that you see on our sidebar marked as such (as well as folks who get shouted out in a thank you post once a month). These are people/companies that we work with directly, who come to us because they think we’d be a good fit. If we agree (and have room for them, since sometimes we’re “full”) they come on as YHL sponsors and we send them lots of virtual wet kisses. We have a lot of love for them because unlike the random ads that come through an ad network and Google, these folks choose to work with us directly, which is pretty cool of them.
- Amazon Affiliate: There are lots of affiliate programs out there where basically bloggers earn a very small cut (usually around 4-7%) when someone purchases a product that they recommend. The most common affiliate links you’ll find are in our “We’re Digging” sidebar column with a label under them that says “links contain affiliates”(we’re sticklers for labeling ads, sponsors, and affiliates to try to keep things 100% transparent). They’re all items on amazon.com that we love (some of which are things that we’ve actually bought ourselves – like a specific book, camera accessory, decor item, or toy for Clara). Occasionally they pop up in posts about things we’ve bought and loved, where they’re also always clearly marked.
- Writing Gigs: These are the aforementioned BabyCenter and Do It Yourself columns that we write, as well as random things that come our way once in a blue moon (like an opportunity to write an article for another publication).
- Book: Yup, they’re actually paying us to write a book. We can’t believe it either.
But of course, no business is without expenses. And it easy to assume that blogging is a free endeavor (after all, it was when we started in ’07, we even had one of those free urls with wordpress.com at the end of it). But as our traffic and business grew, so did our costs – such as:
- Hosting: Between paying for our site (on LiquidWeb <–affiliate link, fyi) and our images (on Amazon S3) we’re headed towards a five figure year when it comes to hosting expenses alone. Yes, that’s tens of thousands of dollars just to host our site so you guys can read posts and see pics. Totally worth it though. Blank blog page = no readers. And we like having you guys around.
- Taxes: Not that anyone is immune to these, but since no employer is taking out taxes for us upfront, it takes some extra planning on our part (i.e. remembering that about a third of every paycheck needs to be squirreled away because it’s going right back to the government in the form of quarterly tax payments).
- Insurance: When I left my advertising job last May we were suddenly on our own when it came to securing and paying for our own health insurance. And it’s not exactly cheap, but with a little one, good coverage is definitely worth the peace of mind.
- Retirement: Without an employer automatically socking away bits of a paycheck into a 401k (or doing any sort of matching for us), Sherry and I each opened a SEP on our own, which we’re responsible for contributing to regularly.
- Business License/ LLC Fees: Since we’re a legit LLC in Virginia, we pay annual license fees and taxes.
- Professional Help: I know that sounds like a therapist, but what we mainly mean is that we pay our accountant (who does our taxes) and the occasional programmer to help us navigate technical issues (ex: we crash four times in a week and feel like throwing our computers out the window). Though maybe we should consider the therapist sometimes…
- Equipment: If it weren’t for blogging, we probably wouldn’t own a second laptop, a DSLR camera, an HD Flip video camera, an external hard drive, or an iPhone (among other items that I’m probably forgetting right now). But it definitely helps to have some decent “tools” for blogging as efficiently as possible, so we’re glad to invest in them (and yes they’re write offs, which doesn’t make them free, but it takes away a bit of the sting).
- Project Costs: Arguably a lot of these costs would probably have been incurred eventually since we were DIY junkies even before we started our blog (so we would do most of this stuff anyway). But as I mentioned earlier – some of our projects happen (or at least happen at the pace and scale that they do) because of this blog. So we might have done all the things that we did to our current house in two years instead of in nine months if we weren’t home bloggers. Oh and since we get asked this a lot: none of our projects are write-offs since we’re doing them to our primary residence (our house isn’t zoned as an office building, which is a good thing because if it was – and we wrote projects off – we’d owe a big chunk of money to the government if we ever sold it).
If you want more info on the expense side of blogging, we actually wrote about it in more detail last year. But that’s enough out of me for now. Hopefully “peeling back the curtain” helped – whether it’s to use this info as you plan your own blogging business (or other somehow-related venture), or to just help you better understand what goes on behind the scenes around here. It’s certainly a lot more than just doing projects and writing about them, but there’s nothing else we’d rather be doing. Seriously, we’re completely amazed that we ended up “here” and our cup runneth over with gratitude. In fact a pie chart of our gratitude would be 101% full. And now as anything with charts should end – who else is hungry for pie?
Update – Some of the most frequent requests that we get are for info about professionally blogging (how we made our site, how we grew our following, how we make money, etc) so we shared all of the details about how we started a blog, grew our traffic, and turned it into a full time job.
Elizabeth from DC says
Happy Blogiversary! This was a really helpful post. Thanks for sharing! I don’t have a blog, but I have a website and sometimes I can’t get over how much time it takes to do all the admin and respond to emails and reader submissions. It’s nice to see how it works out for you guys. Keep up the great work!
Allyn says
You guys are pretty much rockstars.
But seriously, one of my life goals (working on the super fun life list now) is to make at least $100 from blog ads one day.
I’ve been reading you guys for at least 3 years now, and I’m so proud of all you’ve done! Way to stick to it.
Jill says
John- you should know I just about stood up and applauded you at my desk here at work… that was one heck of a long and detailed and informative post!! Shewwwweeee! God job sir. :) Thanks for lettin us know your biznazzz. Very interesting!
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, thanks Jill. Picture me tipping my hat to you as you applaud.
-John
Jill says
I think I just curtsied in the reply to your hat tippage. I feel like we’re in the olden days now. Good day, sir. ;)
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, this is hilarious. I’m curtseying with you.
xo,
s
Sydney says
Wow…let me tell you that after reading these last few posts, I have a much bigger appreciation for your blog and what you do! I am always (semi-jokingly) telling my husband “we should start a blog like John and Sherry, you could quit your job, and we could just do fun projects all day” because I really thought you guys just did projects and posted about them. I never really thought about all the ins-and-outs of serious bloggers like you guys! Keep up the good work!!! I am an avid Petersik-stalker : )
Debbie says
isnt it funny how owning your own business can be deceiving to the outside world? we have a 20+ million dollar a year business, but when you figure in all the overhead, the building, equipment & vehicle leases, the software licenses, the taxes, the insurance, the “consumables”, the payroll, the vendors, the company airplanes, the lawyers, the accountants etc.. the list goes on for days. its amazing that there is a profit margin, but its never as large as people think it is.
Linley says
This post came at a good time! Sherry, you and your mood boards are now the topic of my weekly economics class journal. I’m supposed to discuss how factors of demand have changed the market for a specific consumer good. Doesn’t it just make you want to sit down with the Wall Street Journal wearing a mustache?? :P
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, yes. Yes it does. Somebody get me my mustache!
xo,
s
Nicole Y. says
I’m so excited for your book! :) You guys are going to do great!
Sara says
Congrats on the book deal! And a great post. Thank you for sharing such details. Very interesting. I would love to be a self-employed blogger (I “thunk”)… I did have my own company (It’s now merged with another company) for the past few years and I learned ALOT all on the go. Yep, the quarterly tax thing, high cost of private insurance, tax time, the pressure of sole provider, odd hours, etc. But I wouldn’t change it at all. It allowed me too spend time with my kids, that I don’t think I would have been able to do otherwise.
Katie says
I wouldn’t be upset if you did get an assistant to answer comments, emails, etc. I think that would be totally legit.
YoungHouseLove says
We have really given it a lot of thought but have decided that we want to keep this thing just the two of us. We’re happy to stay grass roots. Haha. I guess because we’re stubborn DIYers and want to do everything ourselves.
xo,
s
Alex says
just wait until clara learns to type…
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, that will be hilarious. It’ll be comments/posts about pigs and goats and firetrucks.
xo,
s
Clarissa says
Or maybe rather than getting someone to answer emails and possibly lose that personal touch you both are so great at, you can be like Jeff Lewis (yup, Flipping Out follow-up ref from last week) and find a “Gage” to help with the business side of things (ex. filtering writing opportunities, saying “no thank you”, etc.)? Perhaps someone in your personal circle who had spare time to burn and know you well enough to know what’s a good consideration vs. “this would not be S and J approved”?
YoungHouseLove says
Hmm, I do like Gage, so that’s a possibility down the line I guess. I think right now we’re just stubbornly trying not to turn into a machine since we’d rather keep it small and simple (sometimes the time it takes to brief someone else/get briefed about their responses could also just be spent responding ourselves – and we have set up some pretty great “canned messages” in gmail that help us say thanks but no thanks without too much thought most of the time).
xo,
s
Chuck says
Probably not what you’d prefer to do, but for two full time employed parents, adding some Clara help is probably the most obvious. You said you plan on daycare at 2 years old, so beginning a smaller transition now would actually probably help all of you get used to the idea.
YoungHouseLove says
We actually have John’s parents who watch her about 3 hours a week which is such a great help!
xo,
s
Rachel says
Very interesting! Thanks for sharing all the insider details of your blog and business! I had NO idea how much work actually went into blogging until I started a blog of my own!
Hats off to you both! :)
Melissa says
Happy Blogiversary! And great post – so informative :)
On a tangent – can I put in a request for a post / list / something that would help us renters find the rent-friendly projects you guys have done? Reading your blog always gets me itching to fix something up, and then I’ll hit that whole ‘but we don’t own yet, dang it!’ thing and get frustrated.
YoungHouseLove says
We actually have a big section of our Projects page devoted to dorm and rental decor projects. See that “Projects” link under our header? Just scroll down to find the dorm/rental section. Hope it helps!
xo,
s
Sarah says
Congrats on 4 years! Awesome!
WEST ME! In 2008 I moved from Wisconsin to North Carolina, started a new career, and got a dog. Life’s great!
Sarah says
I would love to do something like this. Tough though, to quit something completely and move in a new direction. I don’t know if I could ever leave the comfort and safety of my current job to risk it all on what I’m passionate about. I wish so hard that I could, and major props to you two for surviving that scary – I’m not sure if this will work – part of your adventure. Love reading you guys every day, truly an inspiration in more ways than just DIY.
Sarah says
Totally commented on the wrong post, but, still, CONGRATS!
Jenn says
Do you think it’s possible to make money blogging if you cover multiple topics on your blog? Or would it be better if the blog was more focused? Happy 4 years! You guys are truly an inspiration!
YoungHouseLove says
I think either one can definitely work! There are some huge blogs like Pioneer Woman who covers a ton of stuff!
xo,
s
Naomi says
I totally agree with AarthiD, responding to individual comments and being ral reachable people is a total bonus you guys have for your blog. Keep up the good work!
p.s. Pie charts make me smile
YoungHouseLove says
Aw thanks. You guys are sweet. We love you.
xo,
s
Naomi says
and by ral I mean real, although I’m sure you’re ral people too…
Melissa T. says
I read A LOT of blogs and I have to say that you guys are a class act! It’s rare to find a blogger that is so transparent about the money/business side of blogging as you guys have been and I think that speaks volumes about the kind of people you are. I’m impressed!
Also, as someone who is a book publicist–formerly at S&S, now at a university press–I wish you MUCH success with the book. You guys are such great self-promoters…what we deem as DREAM authors for publicity and marketing teams! :)
Claire says
Thank you for this post. It really is interesting to read and answers a lot of the questions in the vein of, “How do they make a living like this?”
Lilian Garcia says
I just want to say I love you four very much! The colors of the napkin (and your house love) is the colors of Brazil, my country, how cute is that? Green, blue, yellow and white kisses from down here!
YoungHouseLove says
Aw thanks Lillian – I love that. Big wet American kisses from up here back atcha.
xo,
s
Veronika says
Yumy! Those pie charts were so delicious! Just what I needed with my morning coffee! Seriously, I loved that post! You guys work soooo hard and are geniuses to manage it all!
Lot’s of Love!
jessi says
I love that you did this. I am the “behind the scenes” type of person (and an accounting major), so I’ve been trying to figure out in my head since I started reading your blog just how exactly this all works. This post was right up my alley. You actually portrayed your duties with so much sincerity that it makes me want to blog (and I don’t write…ever). I am seriously BFF’s with your blog, and I’m so happy that you can do what you love at home and even for readers’ benefits… You rock my world! Keep it up. :)
Penny says
I just want to say thank you. I have been following your blog for quite awhile now and my husband thinks I am obsessed. ;) We just bought a house a year ago and I was terrified the first time I picked up a paint brush (6 mo. ago) but now I have really gained confidence and a lot of it is due to you guys. Due to my DIY’ing, for the first time, I feel a lot more of an attachment to my home since my blood, sweat, and tears have gone into it. :)
Also, I would just like to say thanks for going through the comments yourselves. The first time I posted a comment about painting my wood paneling, Sherry resonded and I was so excited I took a snippit of it and saved it. It is going to go on my frame wall! It was inspiration.(Update: I painted my wood paneling and in Sherry’s words…luuurrvvee it.)
So now that I am sure your ego is boosted! Have a great day!
YoungHouseLove says
Oh my goodness, that’s so sweet. See, chatting with you guys keeps us sane and makes our day. We never want to give that up!
xo,
s
Myra @ My Blessed Life says
Happy Blogiversary! I loved this post! Being a smaller blogger in the home/diy niche it was inspiring to see your pie charts and to read your encouraging words! Y’all rock! :) xo
Angie says
Can I ask what your long term goals are? I mean, do you think you’ll both be blogging ‘forever’, or are you guys doing this while Clara’s little to spend the most time together as a family? Or are you going to turn yhl into a tv show or something someday? Sorry if that’s too personal–I really admire what you guys do–it would be a dream come true to do what you love with the one you love every day, lol! ;)
YoungHouseLove says
We truly had no idea that we’d end up here five years ago, so we have learned that it’s impossible to predict where we’ll be in five more (and it can make us all anxious and clammy, haha). We love blogging and being home together but we’re not even sure if blogs will still be a thing in a few year’s time, so we just try to trust that whatever got us here will hopefully get us somewhere else that we love in five years! Be it back in advertising, writing more books/magazine articles, or something we can’t even imagine (kind of like the idea of being a full time blogger was to us five years ago).
xo,
s
Angela B says
Oh my goodness, you need to read The Bloggess’ latest post about not having five year plans! http://thebloggess.com/2011/09/i-have-no-fucking-idea-what-im-doing/
YoungHouseLove says
Too funny!
-John
Michelle says
John you might need a vacation after this post haha.
Lots of information. Keep up the great work you guys!
Jamie says
Loved listening to the podcast & congratulations on your blogiversary. I remember those twine lanterns – haha! It definitely makes me feel better when something goes wrong to know that it doesn’t always come easy to you guys either!!
Colleen says
One thing I like about YHL is that you don’t take freebies and don’t get paid to write about products. It is always so refreshing to find sites that celebrate thrift, patience, and making do over expensive perfection.
Catherine says
Long-time reader, first-time commenter here. I just wanted to say that I really appreciate the time you spend on comments. Even though I have never commented before, I read the comments for every post, because there is so much great CONTENT in them! Between the questions that you answer and the other readers’ feedback, the comments provide a whole ‘appendix’ of useful resources to the post itself. PS Love your blog – so freakin’ interesting and instructive!
YoungHouseLove says
I wholeheartedly agree! So many comments are so helpful with additional links and info. We learn something new every day! Love it.
xo,
s
Corinne says
Very cool and interesting post. I’ve always been curious about the finances of blogging. Happy blogiversary!!
sarah says
The two of you have such a great way of writing and sharing your life, your thought process, and your designs- I look forward to reading the posts everyday…
Its so weird to say that myself and all of your other readers really feel like we know you- like if this were an even smaller world I feel like we’d be besties lol
I’m excited for the book to come out! -any way to support you guys! :-) … congrats!
Whitney says
Happy 4th guys!
I just wanted to chime in and let you guys know that I think it is really awesome that you’ve managed to make decent money mostly on ads and sponsors but your site isn’t completely overrun with them and in my opinion there isn’t a single annoying ad (like the ones that pop up in your face or take over the page)!
Congrats and I can’t wait for the book!
YoungHouseLove says
Aw thanks Whitney! Occasionally there’s some rogue code and a little pop up survey or something can come up- but it’s never authorized and we try to shut those down immediately! If you ever see them definitely let us know because sometimes they only show up regionally and we have no idea. But they’re so annoying so we’d never allow them!
xo,
s
Katie J. says
Wow. So it’s “work”.
:)
But work that you love we all can tell. And fantastic you can make a living at it and BOTH get to spend time at home with Clara.
Mary@TheGoodLife says
SOMEONE needs to be singing you Tony Toni Tone… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=STC3I6SwLp4&feature=related
“Do youuu know what to-daaay isss… it’s our {blog}iversary..”
Just feels NECessary. And Nineties-tastic. Careful of that video, though, 1993 is a shock to the system. It’s a little bow-chicka-wow-ow, too, but I think you guys will appreciate the hilarity. I tried to post it yesterday but I think my 12mon old made me leave it open on my screen. Oops. Happy Blogiversary 90s Reference! :P
YoungHouseLove says
Haha- hilarious.
xo,
s
Rosalie says
i listened to the whole song… took me back to 6th grade.
Meagain says
Well I have a comment about comments…actually a question. I’m wondering…do you reply to a comment as you accept it to be posted on your blog? Just curious? Really..I don’t know why I want to know this…
YoungHouseLove says
Yup, that’s how we keep track of what we need to answer. We assume anything pending could have questions so we go down the list and click approve, approve, approve. Say we bump into one that’s a question. In that case we click “reply” so we can answer it, and then the button beneath our reply is “approve and reply” so it approves the comment and published our reply right under it in one click. Pretty handy!
xo,
s
mike @ the lil house that could says
Has condescending Bob poked his head in any of these comments lately?
YoungHouseLove says
Oh man, we haven’t heard from Bob in a while but he usually drops in to chat when we’re discussing wall decor or art!
xo
s
Jill says
who is condescending Bob??? i am such an over protective YHL’r that i can’t believe i have sniffed out his snippy comments! bring it BOB. :) (not tryin to start drama, just would like to see what mr 3 letter word has to say boutchall, yalls my peeps.)
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, sometimes he can be very nice. He’s… quirky.
xo,
s
Kristen says
I kind of love Bob. Sherry is always soooooo nice to him in replies, where I’m like ART is ART and it is SUBJECTIVE and unless you are actually Bob Ross, let YHL do its thing! Not that I have ever said that to him. But I feel he was kind of like a fixture on art posts.
Robin @our semi organic life says
Sending blog love your way since we’re all in awe of what you’ve accomplished! I’ll be in line the first day to get an autographed copy of your book!
Holly says
Love this post and love the behind the scenes glimpse into the blogger life that we are getting this week!
You’re inspiring on many levels, from your wedding (I’m planning) to the projects to the hilarious videos of you and Katie B (makes me miss my besties who live so far away!)
Taking a break at work to ready your blog always brightens my day! Congrats on 4 years and hope for many more until you have to change the site to Old House Love!
Meredith says
Great job this week on all the extra info!
Is there a way to “show all” comments on a post so I can just search for a keyword instead of accidentally repeating a question that was already asked? I try to scan/read the comments before I ask a question, but sometimes I can’t keep up!
I’ve searched your site for more mood board info, but I’m still a little confused about how exactly they worked. Would people pay you to make a mood board for them, or would they buy one you already made? Sorry for asking about something so old you don’t even do it anymore! haha
YoungHouseLove says
As for the mood boards, they were custom mood boards. So folks would send in a pic of their room and answer a questionnaire about their style and what they wanted their room to do and we’d brainstorm layout ideas and hunt down furnishings and accessories to bring it all together. As for how to search the comments, the “show all” button was crashing our site since so many had to load, so we have to keep the comments paged, but you can use a keyword search (command F I think?) on each of the pages of comments which hopefully doesn’t take too long if there are just a few. Hope it helps!
xo,
s
Meredith says
Ah, site crashing. Yes, I suppose that would be the drawback. ;)
Kind of funny how the pieces come together for a new reader… I can’t tell you how many old posts of yours I’ve read in which you’ve linked to other old posts, so before I knew it, I had a dozen or so YHL tabs open. :)
Something else you might find amusing. The first time I saw your House Crashing tab, I got SO EXCTIED. I thought you could come to our house and do a makeover or something. Then I realized you only go to houses that are already awesome, hahaha.
YoungHouseLove says
Aw man, sorry to psych you out. Haha. That would be fun though!
xo,
s
mary says
Even a “just for fun blogger” can spend hours on a post that doesn’t include photography or tutorials. It is obvious that the two of you work very hard and waaay more than 40 hours a week…just like any successful entrepreneur. Throw a book on top of that? Tough indeed. Congrats on all your success and thanks for taking the time to provide details.
Amy @ Croquet & Cocktails says
Thank you! I love this post. I’m relatively new to blogging and I have wondered how you guys make a living doing it. I know that great content is a must, but aside from that it was all just a big ol question mark.
Thanks for being real. You guys are the best!
Tena says
You are such a lovely young family. Thanking my daughter for introducing me to your fun and informative blog! What an inspiration you are!
Blessings!
Vanessa says
Again, Thanks for sharing! On top of being creative and talented, you are ORGANIZED!!!
crystal says
WOW!! That was a bit overwhelming just to read, I bet it feels even more so for ya’ll.
heather says
I have to say that though I agree it would, in pretend-what-if-land, be easier to get an assistant, I’m in your camp of not getting one. Not only is grassroots important but holy smokes – letting someone into your interface *shudder*. If they accidentally deleted a ton of comments, or somehow screwed up it could be catastrophic. Maybe I’m just not a risk taker but that freaks me out.
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, we have nightmares about that. One wrong button push and the ol’ blog is gonezo! Once I accidentally deleted a 2,000+ word post while on vacation (I had written it beforehand so we could have family time on vacay) and I had to sit in the hotel and rewrite the whole thing instead. So depressing. I also deleted a giveaway on my phone once by accident and nearly had a heart attack thinking that we lost all the comments but we were able to get our web folks to somehow restore it. I think aged five years though. Haha.
xo,
s
heather says
Eww. Not. I repeat, not, my cup of tea. More like cup of day old milk that sat overnight on the counter. Gross. Grody. Bad things all around. Pretty much the worst.
I accidentally changed one code once in one of my .php files on my company website and BOOM the entire thing was rendered useless in a split second by forgetting to insert a single “?” to keep something from showing (during my Christmas rush too). Thankfully my hosting site was all “we’re the greatest at fixing shiz” and got it going within an hour again. This equaled the day I realized the wrinkle when I furrow my brow takes like 10 minutes to disappear now. If this happens again I expect my 28th year will bring me arthritis medicine and yelling at teenagers about learning responsibility.
YoungHouseLove says
Oh man, so scary!! Glad it all worked out. As for wrinkles, I have you beat I think. Haha. My smile lines have been permanent since 5th grade. Proof I’m way too annoyingly giddy.
xo,
s
heather says
Or awesome.
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, I dunno about that…
xo,
s
Alison says
I’d love to know how you guys file and organize all your photos. Ie. do you separate blog photos from personal/family photos, do you keep photo files arranged by month, subject, color, etc? I have only been blogging for a few months and already find it overwhelming (not to mention frustrating when trying to find something specific!).
Possible post idea? ;)
YoungHouseLove says
We do separate blog pics and family pics, but store all of them in iPhoto (we back them up every few months on our harddrive and also upload the family ones to flickr so they’re safely stored remotely). As for family pics, we just do those by month (ex: May family, June family) and the project posts are all just labeled as individual projects (ex: rocker reupholstery, dining room painting, desk building, etc). Hope it helps!
xo,
s
RachelSD says
Wow, this post was really fascinating! Love knowing all the business side of things. Can I say that I’m really happy you guys have a retirement plan? I was actually worried about that! (Sorry, penny pincher over here.) Oh, and my husband is going to love seeing how John converted an excel spreadsheet into a pie chart… ooooohhh, I can just imagine what a time suck that is going to be for him!
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, John is a total magician on Excel.
xo,
s
Clarissa says
I submitted a comment but it doesn’t look like it was submitted for moderation. Sorry if it’s a dupe! A lot of people have asked about comment answering outsourcing and that you both didn’t want to lose that personal contact with your readers…but would you take a page from Jeff Lewis and get a “Gage” to help with the business aspect (ex. say “no thank you”, filter writing / speaking opportunities, etc.)? Maybe someone in your personal circle with time to burn since it’s nice to have someone who knows you both well enough to know what you’d consider vs. pass up?
YoungHouseLove says
Sorry, sometimes comments sit in moderation while I work my way to them (answering as I go, but it can take a moment for them to show up) so here’s your original comment with my answer under it: https://www.younghouselove.com/2011/09/blogiversary-iv-time-money-and-pies/comment-page-2/#comment-662584
Hope it helps!
xo,
s
Lesley says
Thank you so much for this post! I always refer to your site when I tell people, no really– it IS possible to blog for a living! I’ve loved being able to watch your site grow and now that I’m blogging myself ( 6 month blogiversary last Sunday! Woo! ), this kind of info is so helpful. I took some notes and will definitely refer back to it over time.
What I loved most though, Sherry, was this little blurb from the Comments section: “so don’t blog to fill a certain niche in a market or satisfy a business plan, do it because you’re so darn passionate about it that you might explode into a pile of rainbows and unicorns.”
Writing about & promoting art and artists is my passion, so that’s why I’m doing it. I often worry about whether I should have a business plan of some kind, but I just write down bloggy-businessy ideas as they come to me so that I can address them once the blog is a little more mature and the readership maintains at a higher rate. Your comment helps assure me that as long as I’m pursuing my passion, good things will come, monetary or not.
Cheers!
Lesley
Kerrie says
I don’t know how to find it but you guys should re-post your first post. I would kinda like to see how different they have become since you are all professional and stuff now! :)
YoungHouseLove says
Ooh, just scroll to the bottom of our home page and click the “last” button next to all the page numbers that you see. You can read forward from the very beginning! Our first post is kind of hilarious and terrible. But it still gets us all nostalgic. Haha.
xo,
s
Amanda E says
Sherry,
I followed your directions cause Kerrie made me curious… and the photo on your first post ever is broken. It’s just a black square with a white exclamation point in a triangle.
https://www.younghouselove.com/page/395/
Thought you’d want to know!
Amanda
YoungHouseLove says
Ack!! No idea how that happened. Yikes. Thanks for the heads up. Poor first post ever. Haha.
xo,
s
Hilary @Thistle Confections says
I was wondering when you guys had time to work on the book! I’m really looking forward to it.
Much as I love blogs, I love holding a book in my hands and looking at the glossy photographs.