Editing The Pen Addict 211/transcript (section)

== Money Aspect ==


'''Ed Jelley:''' So, that's one of the questions we're going to focus on here in a minute is the money aspect. And that's hugely important. And we never talk about it because it's awkward to talk about, right? But it's probably number one most important thing on a lot of our lists when you look at the amount of time and commitment and effort you're putting into things. And so, I think, you know, like, what you were telling to me, you know, you're seeing those results from, like, everyday carry. But you built this thing at edgelly.com around the stationary blog. And I've had this – when, you know, I've stepped away in the past, I have this feeling of guilt. Like, I'm letting people down other than myself.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' That's the problem I mainly run into is, like, I have people that are, like, have me in their RSS feed and, like, you know, follow me on Twitter and like me on Facebook. And it's, like, I feel like I owe you guys, like, you're here for a reason. I'm, like, I brought you here. And then it's, like, I'm going to, you know, I'm going to maybe take, like, two months off. And then, like, I watch my page views tank and I look at my Amazon revenue and it's, like, not great. Granted, we're not in, like, a super spending season, but it's, like, it's still – that's what supports the site and that's what, you know, makes me be able to sustain it.

'''Ed Jelley:''' Right now is the single worst time to look at stats because summertime, it tanks hard. It's probably, like, 25% down easily just in traffic, revenue, things like that in the blogosphere just because the summertime is that way. You know, people are out and about doing other things other than reading blogs.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Let me focus on the money bar a moment. Because I think that it is an interesting issue and there's something that I always feel worth clarifying is when you start something like this, blogging, podcasting is what I can speak to, I don't think that it should ever be started with the intention of making money. I think if you start out with that intention, you'll probably end up in a not great situation by the end of it. But that's how I always look at it. These things that I believe should come from a source of interest or intrigue or passion or just because, you know, maybe you'd love to do it one day, but you never do it and immediately try and find money. You know, like, I have people contact me and they're like, oh, I want to start a show, but I need advertisers. And it's like, well, let's think about this is that that's not how it works because you there isn't money just floating around to be given to everyone. Like there is only money available for a small selection of things.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' And the thing is, you have to work for it, too. I mean, it's not like I started posting ads on day one. I was posting four reviews a week until I got enough views. I'm like, oh, my God, I got 10,000 views this month or 8,000 or whatever my first month was. I'm like, this is crazy. And it's like I didn't run out and go look for advertisers. I didn't start monetizing anything until about a year ago.

'''Myke Hurley:''' Money is only available for a small set of people. And even then, there's not an infinite amount. There is an amount of money that would be available to everyone. You know, so even then, even if you're in a successful situation, you're in a great position, it doesn't necessarily mean money is going to come to you. So money only really should come into this once you've matured into what you're doing and you have a good idea of what your future is going to look like and you know what your statistics are like and you know what your trends are like. Because then you're also being fair to the company or individual that's giving you money to promote their product, to do advertising or to your readers in a membership style, which that's a whole other thing to talk about maybe another time. But that's, yeah. So the money thing is awkward. But if you're coming at this wanting to make money straight away, I think that maybe it's worth just slightly reevaluating what your goals are.

'''Ed Jelley:''' And Ed's someone who's done it right. And there's a group of stations, pretty much every stationery blog that's in existence right now does it right. The ones that I've gotten emails, I'm sure Ed's gotten emails, where, hey, I'm thinking about starting a stationery blog. How do I get stuff or how do I make money from it? You never hear from those people again, right? You know, Ed and Anna and myself and Myke and, you know, dozens of other people I'm leaving off. Never. No one started this thinking I'm going to make money out of this blog. I sure didn't.

'''Brad Dowdy:''' Yeah. You don't get like a box delivered to your door with like free stuff. It's like you just post. I started a blog and like a box full of $2,000 worth of pen stuff doesn't just show up. You got to kind of work for that.

'''Ed Jelley:''' Right. And it takes a long time and consistency and effort. And, you know, that's what, you know, you've shown Ed over the years. And, you know, what do you, I mean, what, what do you want to do with, with edjelly.com? Is there something, you know, is it something that it's time to move on from? Is it something where you want to reboot it? Have you had those thoughts on, you know, what's the path going to be? Because like we, we mentioned before, the hardest thing I think is, is that guilt of like, you're letting people down, but you know, you also have to look out for number one, you know, you just got married, you just bought a house, you have a job, you have a bunch of good side gigs going. And where do things break down for your stationary blog?

'''Brad Dowdy:''' I think like the problem is that you go full steam out the gate and then you keep full steaming. And then like, you kind of run out of coal in a way. Like I, you know, everybody has their own preferences. And then it's like, are you reviewing stuff? Like just because you have credit to a retailer or are you doing it because like, wow, this is really cool. Or do you kind of get like jaded where it's like, yeah, that's cool. But like, it's close to this, which I already have two of. And it's like, I don't want to get it again just because it's in green this time. And it's like, I feel like once you get a couple of years in, you kind of know what you like and know what you don't like. And that like exploration, like a type of, you know, excitement starts to taper off because it is, you know, I don't want to say it's just pens and paper because it's obviously a very big deal to everybody listening myself and you and Myke too. But, you know, even you must get a little bit, you know, unenthused with new products that are not necessarily new. And I'm sure you know what you like. You have your top five pens. Like you've gone through so many to get there. And it's like a lot of those have been in that list for a long time. And it's like, yeah, you're trying. But like, you know, you like that.

'''Ed Jelley:''' Yeah, we've had that conversation. It's like, what do I actually adjust in this list? There's nothing that's been created or new in the market that's forced a bunch of change. And, you know, then I also look at it from the aspect of I still enjoy like I'm one that I've and I've always been this way. I'll review the different colors of the gel ink pen. I don't know. It's just like a thing that I enjoy. But it's not everyone's style either.