Yesterday I was looking through my calendar, trying to plan the upcoming week when it dawned on me that I have now been blogging full-time for over a year. Looking back now from when I first made the decision to pursue La Petite Noob as my full-time career, it's incredible to think of how much has happened and how far I have come. While I feel as though I've documented my journey since starting to blog full-time, I have never really touched on the feelings and decisions I had to make when making that fateful decision to stop working a day job and commit myself fully to the blog. Seeing as how some of the most questions that I get have to do about blogging as a business, I thought that I would share 5 questions to ask yourself before deciding to blog full-time.
1. Am I Making Enough Money To Sustain Myself?
This seems like the most obvious question to ask yourself before making a drastic career move, but it's also the one that is most overlooked. Here's the thing; if you're making money from your side-hustle, it's easy to feel as though you're doing well-enough financially to support yourself. For me anyways, while I was working I was using my paycheque to cover my bills and savings, and anything that came in from the blog was mine to play with - I felt like I was rich! This financial arrangement made it easy to fool myself into thinking that I would be able to easily support myself with only my freelance income. When I really sat down and did the numbers, calculating all of the bills and necessities that would need to be covered, I soon realized that my blogging income would
just cover my basic necessities - a far cry from the disposable income I had to play with while working a day-job.
After sitting down and getting real about the numbers, I was able to make a more educated decision about what life would be like when blogging full-time. As much as I was tempted to fudge the calculations, or under estimate how much money I would need to pay all of my bills to make the decision to go full-time with my blog easier, it was to my benefit to be as realistic as possible. The process of realistically evaluating my finances helped me to manage my own expectations about life as a full-time blogger, and helped me to make an informed decision about choosing to blog full-time.
2. Do I Have Savings?
I'm a huge advocate for having financial savings, no matter what situation you're in work-wise. Living paycheque to paycheque is a difficult way to live in general, and is particularly stressful when those paycheques aren't coming in consistently. Having a savings account to fall back on to get you through slow periods while blogging is absolutely paramount before making the decision to quit your job and blog full-time. Even if you feel ready to make the leap into blogging full-time, but don't have a ton of money saved up, I would definitely recommend delaying that decision by a few months to help build up your savings account. No matter what level you're at with your blog, there will be slow periods. Having financial savings to carry you through the slow periods of blogging not only will help you from making bad career decisions just for the money, but will also give you some peace of mind.
3. Do I Have The Support Of My Loved Ones?
This is a tricky one for me, since I don't necessarily believe that having the support of the people around you is imperative for making the decision to blog full-time - but it definitely makes that decision a lot easier.
When I was first toying with the idea of pursuing my blog as my full-time career, my husband Brian was definitely not thrilled with the idea. I don't blame him; it's a new industry without any guarantees, and we're a young couple trying to save for our future. It took me a long time to slowly try to change his mind, but with time (and a few meltdowns) I was able to show him that my side-hustle could really work for us if I made it my career.
As much as I love blogging full-time, it's still a job and with any job there are hard days. Especially in the beginning, I had a really tough time adjusting to being my own boss and had a lot of bad days. Being able to talk about the hard days with your loved ones is so important, and so much easier when they understand and support your career move.
4. What Is My Plan?
If you're thinking about quitting your job to pursue your blog as a full-time career, you need a plan. A business plan, a plan for your content, a plan for budgeting, a plan for your weekly schedules, a plan B, a plan for absolutely everything. Your side-hustle will turn into your full-time career, and that transition will be so much smoother if you take the time to plan and become as organized as possible. While I wasn't nearly as organized as I should have been when I start started blogging full-time, I quickly realized the importance of having a plan.
5. Is This My Passion?
The decision to quit your job and blog full-time is difficult, and you need to ask yourself some really tough questions and be honest with your answers. The number one, most important question to ask yourself is if your blog is truly your passion. Being your own boss is not an easy feat, but it is all 100% worth it if your company is your true passion. Having a passion for your own blog means being driven to continue, even when times get tough and the money isn't coming in. Having a passion for your blog means that you're able to go to bat for yourself when others are trying to negotiate your worth. The passion you have for your own blog will be your motivation and what drives you forward. Everything else can be sacrificed, but passion is paramount.
I love being able to have La Petite Noob as my full-time gig. The decision to blog full-time wasn't easy, but I'm glad that I was able to ask myself these 5 questions to make the transition a little easier.
What do you guys think? Are you thinking of making the jump to blog full-time? What questions did you ask yourself if your blog is your full-time career? Let me know!
xo Joëlle
