Many moons ago I was once a full-time blogger, now I work full time.

That could all change of course…

I’ve been living a bit of a lie. Well kind of.

I have a job…

There, I’ve said it!

Now we’ve got that out in the open… It usually goes a little bit like this. Whenever an email drops in my inbox inviting me to join a blogging campaign/project or even for travel advice, the sender presumes I blog and travel full time with blogging as my only source of income.

It happens at events too and especially if you’ve been speaking in front of an audience, people will approach you and assume you blog full-time. I feels like you’re kind of living a lie to then confess that you in fact have a day job but travel as much as is possible throughout the year. No one ever thinks that maybe I’ve made a conscious decision not to blog full-time?

It’s never really been a big secret, it’s just that it’s not often that it’s relevant to pop into the conversation or in blog post.

Leaving London

Right now I could leave the job behind and embark on travel blogging full-time, but I’d also have to leave London. That’s not something I want to do. Well not right now anyhow. I’ve learnt to love London over the years and there’s a lot still to discover, so I’m not ready to leave just yet. You see, London is an expensive city, one of the most expensive places in the world (third in fact according to crowd sourced data). Rents and living costs are too high for it to make sense to stay if you’re freelancing (especially as a travel blogger). So going full time as a blogger ultimately means leaving. It’s not that I don’t enjoy traveling for a decent length of time, this blog was born out of traveling the world for two years after all. But for me, right now, London is a perfect base from which to explore Europe and beyond.

Who’s Successful?

It seems like people expect successful travel bloggers to be traveling and blogging full-time, but that isn’t necessarily true. You can be extremely successful at blogging and indeed travel blogging whilst having a full time job.

Are they really Full-Time?

It’s also quite misleading to think that most full-time bloggers are in reality supporting themselves solely from their blog. If you scratch beneath the surface these bloggers actually generate their income from a range of sources. Many acting more like freelancers with a strong online presence than full-time carefree travel bloggers, and therein lies the problem. It’s probably not even intentional but it does give the wrong impression to those newer bloggers chasing the dream of being a full-time travel blogger.

You only have to do a quick Google search to find a load of articles by bloggers adding to this “How I make money travel blogging”, “How to Become a Professional Travel Blogger”. There’s a reason why these posts are written, they drive traffic and bring followers because people want to live the dream of traveling and blogging. Perpetuating the myth is often in these bloggers interest, whether it is true or not.

I think it’s time to be more open and to champion bloggers with full-time jobs. After all it should be about producing content to serve your audience and maybe, just maybe your real audience works full-time and can relate more to you making the most of your holiday time? Perhaps taking city breaks at the weekend rather than full time blogging on a budget in a backpackers?

I’m not saying this is the case for all those bloggers who are blogging (mainly) full-time. I know many who are really amazing bloggers and are very successful, who seem to have got the right balance. I also know many bloggers with full-time jobs that they love or life circumstances that they are in that they wouldn’t want to change in order to become full-time bloggers.

As for me, I’m happy where I am right now. I have plans, like buying a flat in London… plus plenty of travel! That’s not to say that I won’t go full-time and move out of London, but right now, it’s not the right time for me.

As with many things in blogging there is no right or wrong way to do things, but maybe it’s time that we should be championing the bloggers that do have jobs just a little bit more?