As beauty blogs are quickly turning into businesses and brands all around us, is it becoming more contrived? AB-SO-BLOODY-LUTELY. This is going to just happen anyway with the amount of sponsored posts, brand collaborations and money being churned into the beauty blogging world right now. Like any business I guess, things will change, technology develops, new ways of doing things becomes trendy and that is just life. I’ve been blogging now for over 7 years. When I started, there was NO blogger outreach in terms of PR’s, no events, no ‘blogging community’, no free products and I think it was around 3 year after I started that I even went to an event. I, along with other bloggers, were just doing it I guess for a genuine LOVE of makeup beauty and everything that surrounds it. I remember just loving writing, wanting to become a magazine beauty editor (lols) and thought I would start doing articles on this thing I found called Blogger. I’m so proud to say that and I have stayed true to myself throughout.
I asked an open question on twitter the other day which gained a bit of a reaction ; Why am I seeing so many beauty/makeup blogs written by people who clearly have no actual knowledge of beauty?
A huge majority of bloggers are great and are giving sound advice, and genuine reviews… but as we are all well aware, there is BIG BUCKS to be had in this increasingly popular ‘game’ of blogging/vlogging/youtubing so the line is blurring between genuine reviews and paid-for thumbs up and smiley faces.
Pretty, sweet girls with not much more knowledge than ‘It looks so pretty’ or ‘smells UH-MAZING’, ‘You MUST go buy this’ are seemingly becoming *beauty /makeup gurus* whilst I find myself sitting here thinking ‘I know what is coming out of your mouth is complete bullsh*t’ and ‘how is this even occuring right now’. It’s fine, and it often makes me chuckle as I scratch my head…. and WHO AM I, a mere part-time, half-assed beauty blogger living Essex to be passing judgment on others? A huge part of me is balancing it out and thinking ‘fair play to ’em for creating something from nothing and getting paid’ …Another, more sensible part of me is wondering if their loyal followers are soaking up every bit of information they say and going out to buy these products they so lovingly reviewed for cash.
Where’s the L O V E?
Must we be be educated somewhat in beauty to write ABOUT beauty? I don’t think so..totally. I love reading ‘girl at home’ type blogs. You know the ones where it’s just a normal person like me and you, giving us a real insight on beauty products, skincare, rather than a hugely scientific breakdown or long-sounding ingredients. Normal girls want to see and hear about normal girls’ opinions, ways of doing makeup etc etc, that is part of the beauty of You Tube and why blogs became popular in the first place…..People trusted REAL people over glossy magazines. On the flip, I am a little bit over people forcing themselves into the blogging world and starting a blog because they want to make money, get free shit and become interweb famous like Zoella. That shouldn’t be the foundations for blogging, and this is exactly what is killing it. I am reading so many blogs that have no actual LOVE. It’s like there is no passion about what they are writing about, just more so on the end and ulterior motive of free products and money. Re-gurgitated press releases are just everywhere, there seems to be a huge lack of personality and emotion…yet these blogs are still seemingly doing really well. The trust we put into ‘real girls’ are now fading into obscurity as they are now on-par with glossy magazines in terms of sponsorship, advertising, writing and input.
Self-Entitlement.
Where’s this attitude come from? At events it’s becoming more common of this real bloggy-babe , goody-bag grabbing, self-entitlement attitude. PR’s don’t have to give us anything, and please don’t think because you have 3000 / 8000 / 30,000 followers on twitter that it means you deserve a bunch of Tom Ford makeup sent to you. Be humble, be nice and leave this attitude at home next to your fairy lights and diptyque candles. It will just make this whole process easier and nicer for everyone. I have been at events where bloggers (constantly) turn up and leave before a speech or the showcase has even happened ; that PR company has probably spent thousands on the food, drink, goody bags and other things, so be polite enough to actually get the information before you hotfoot it out the door after 5 minutes with cake around your mouth and your freebies in your bag to get to the next event.
You aren’t entitled to ANYTHING. If brands want to send you products then great, but PR’s have budgets and unfortunately and in most cases it will go to bloggers with the bigger outreach first. I have a few great blogger friends who have been doing it way less time than me….and yeah a bunch of them get loads more products and invited to way more events than me. Sometimes it sucks but guess what…more people read their blog and they have better content so you just gotta suck that shit up and let it go.
This isn’t me hating on fellow beauty bloggers or being jealous about others’ success. It’s simply my observations as a makeup artist, a reader of blogs, and lastly a humble beauty blogger. I want to re-iterate that I personally like reading blogs written by people who don’t necessarily have any beauty or makeup background as the content is still absolutely great, articulate, honest and engaging, but it’s just becoming harder to find these blogs.
A few examples ; Just Nice Things, Tales of A Pale Face, Let’s Talk Beauty, Tattooed Tea Lady, Miss Makeup Magpie …and there are so many more.
What do you think about this? Should you have knowledge on something before you start dishing out advice and telling people what makeup they need? Are you more trusting of beauty bloggers who have worked in the industry or does this not matter to you? SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS.
