I often get questions about why I started A Glass of Goldwater. Maybe even more often is the question of how I started it. I’ve got my “why”, and I’m ready to share it with all of you. And I think I’ll throw some “hows” in there, too. Because #communityovercompetition, amiright?
Remember Frum Girl?
I’ve always loved to write. And I write the way I speak, so I think that makes what I have to say enjoyable to read (just humor me here, k?). I first started out by documenting my religious journey in college, and then in Israel, to keep my friends and family back home up-to-date. Who remembers Frum Girl/The Frum Diaries? Goooood times. And it feels like sooo long ago. Like 7.5 years ago. It was really fun to write. My readers (all 10 of them) really enjoyed it (or that’s what they told me), and I loved documenting my life. I would go back and re-read my posts, and it was like I was re-living my journey all over again.
But Frum Girl got a little older, and she got married and pregnant and had a baby and then another. And it’s not that I wasn’t Frum Girl anymore, but I was just in a totally different place in life. Totally not the same place as when I originally set out to write about my journey back to Judaism to inspire others and myself. It was stressful to come up with content that related to the Torah portion of the week or the Jewish holiday that was coming up. I just had no headspace to be the Frum Girl Rebbetzin I had originally set out to be.
So I stopped writing.
I tried to continue. I really did. But for a year and a half after Miri was born (this includes Azi being born also), I was totally in a Postpartum Depression and Anxiety slump that I could not get out of, no matter how hard I tried. I felt sad, alone and like I was drowning. “Barely surviving” was how I would describe my overall vibes at this point in my life. Forget about writing inspiring and spiritual content for others. I could barely make myself breakfast!
Thank G-d, around the time Miri was 1.5, I sort of started to see the light. Azi was 6 months old, and we kiiiind of allllmost were getting 6 hours of sleep at night. It was summer, and I was able to get both of my babies out of the house by myself. So I started reaching out to friends to get together. I really tried to spend more time with other young moms who had kids around the same age as mine. I started talking about how I had been feeling. And I was shocked to learn that almost all of my mom friends were experiencing some part of how I had been feeling. Overwhelmed, depressed, alone, overworked, tired and the list goes on.
It was crazy.
How had we all been sitting in our homes, feeling like this? Why didn’t we start the conversation about motherhood being SO EFFING HARD a lot sooner? If we had all just stopped comparing ourselves to social media “standards” about what being a mom should be like, it’s probable that we wouldn’t have felt like we needed 5 Diet Cokes and a Vodka Tonic to get through each day.
By the Grace of G-d I felt inspired again. I knew that I had to take the ridiculousness that I felt and run with it. So I started A Glass of Whine (get it?) which shortly thereafter turned into A Glass of Goldwater. A place where motherhood is FAR from perfect, and where we use humor and a whooole lot of lovin’ to get through each day. “Surviving AND thriving”: that was and is the new goal.
So here we are.
I have 2 toddlers who just turned 3 and 2, and I’ve cultivated an amazing community of women who are all here for, pretty much, the same reason. MOTHERHOOD IS HARD. It’s not how so many people make it look on social media. And for some reason our mothers (and mentors) may have neglected to paint the picture of motherhood in a realistic light for us. I share lots and lots of good and happy, but I also share the bad and the ugly. And I give women a platform to share and feel connected as well. I never want another woman to feel like she is battling motherhood alone.
I’ve met some amazing women who have become my friends in the process, and I am so blessed to have been able to cultivate this creative outlet and “hobby” into a side hustle that helps me support my family.
But how? That’s the million dollar question.
It’s not enough to fit into one post, really. But here’s the exciting news. I’m going to be breaking up this “How I Blog” section into 3 separate posts. I want to really give you all a glimpse into the nit and grit of it all. “Blogger” by definition is a pretty loose word, and a lot of people just have no idea what goes on behind the scenes.
In an effort to help others (again, community over competition) and bring light into this whole idea of an “influencer”, I want to share some of what has helped me become “successful”. It’s important to note that I am specifically talking about monetizing a blog for this post’s purposes. There are so many tips/hints/etc that I can share, but for right now, we are solely speaking about things that have helped me turn what I love doing into a means to help support my family.
1. Become an expert.
First and foremost, you need to become an expert in whatever you want to talk about. For example, I’m an expert at being a super imperfect mom to toddlers, while trying to coordinate the chaos that is called life. When you’re an “expert” at something, your audience trusts you and listens to what you have to say. At this point, you have to continue to create content that will both show who you are and be of interest to your readers. It’s important to always ask yourself, “Why are my readers interested in what I have to say?” Is it because they like my style? Or is it because they like the what I’m cooking? When you can answer that question, then you know what content you should produce more of.
Thanks to you all, my amazing followers, I have a community of people who think that what I have to share is worthwhile, so you listen. Without an audience who believes that what you have to say and give is worth listening, there is no brand that is going to want to work with you. So if you’ve got something to say, find your people and run with it. The rest will come.
Once you have your audience and you begin to have a constant stream of content that you’re sharing, you’ll begin to see what’s working and what isn’t. Eventually, with a lot of trial and error, you’ll get your groove and with that will come a regular group of followers who engage with you. This is the first step to getting noticed by brands and businesses.
2. Plan, plan, plan.
I try to have my content planned out a month in advance, and at the very least, two weeks in advance. I know bloggers who plan even farther in advance. Having a content calendar helps me to see my account as a whole, over the course of the entire month. I plan out content based on life events, topics I want to cover, sponsored posts that I have coming up, etc.
If I posted random things each day, it wouldn’t make sense overall. Each post has to be able to stand alone, but you need themes to carry the account beyond that. Let’s use our family road trip this summer as an example. When we got back from our trip, I dedicated the entire month to different travel blog posts. They ranged from Road Trip Activities to Packing Lists to the Ultimate Carry On Bag. And my Instagram posts carried this overall theme of family vacations throughout those few weeks as well. While not every post was about travel, it was a nice, overall feel to my account that fell right in line with what was going on in our lives.
Obviously, this theme was planned ahead of time. Of course, it had to be. But I knew, based on what was going to happen in our lives (family vacation), that I would have stories to share and advice to give after living through 22 hours in a car with my kids (believe it!). So it made perfect sense to work this into the content calendar.
3. Organization is key.
Aside from creating a cohesive feel to my page, planning ahead of time helps me to stay organized. My head would be spinning off (more than it already is) if I had no idea as to what I would post each day. I don’t always take my photos in advance, but I always have a general idea of what I’d like to share each day and week of the month. This helps me to be able to focus on creating day-to-day content because I’m not always worrying about what I’m going to post.
Let’s be very clear here…
Planning does NOT mean that content has to be staged or is fake. That would completely defeat the purpose of A Glass of Goldwater! But for an account to be easy and enjoyable to follow, there has to some sort of flow.
So that’s a little intro to this wild world of blogging. I’ll be doing 2 more big posts about 1) Monetization and working with brands, and 2) How I take my photos and the editing process. I look forward to sharing those with you!
Thanks for sticking around if you’ve made it this far. XO
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