The goal of this post is to be completely transparent and uncover what I have personally discovered as the good and bad of blogging.

Before we get into the thick of things, let me start off by saying that I encourage anyone to get their feet wet and start a blog for the overall learning experience (and especially because there are so many potential benefits).

However, I also think it’s important to be realistic and highlight a few areas that aren’t so sexy or attractive when it comes to blogging.

We see a lot of blogging success stories online (which are incredibly inspiring), but what we don’t see are the millions of people that are struggling to gain any sort of traction with their website.

Also, the successful bloggers generally had to work pretty hard initially and stay consistent for a long period of time before they gained momentum and saw any noticeable results.

Now again, this article is not trying to scare you away from blogging at all and in fact, in my opinion there are way more pros than cons when it comes to blogging.

But I do want to be honest and list out both the positives and negatives that I’ve experienced.

Creating and running a blog whether it’s part-time or full-time can be an incredible opportunity and hopefully this article will help answer any questions you may have and steer you in the right direction.

Blogging Pros and Cons

Like any type of business, there are pros and cons that should be considered before getting involved. Just because blogging is the right business model for one person, doesn’t mean it’s a good fit for another. Please take the time to read the blogging pros and cons below to see if this is something that you would like to pursue.

Pros of Blogging

1.) Very Inexpensive to Get Up & Running

One of the biggest benefits to starting a blog is that it is incredibly inexpensive to get up and running. Remember, a blog is a business (if you treat it like one) that you can have live on the web for literally $3 per month. Compare this to a brick and mortar store (like a local jewelry shop) and the expenses are way WAY less. This is part of the reason why online businesses in general are so attractive. You don’t have to pay rent, there’s less overall overhead expenses and it’s affordable for almost anyone who wants to get involved.

2.) Flexibility To Work from Anywhere with an Internet Connection

This is an attractive benefit to many aspiring bloggers as you are not confined to one place when you work on your business. You can work from home, the local coffee shop, while on vacation or anywhere where there’s a solid Internet connection. To me, this is insanely liberating and one of the reasons why I started my blog to begin with. I really enjoy working from home and having the option to choose where I spend my working hours. So many people are restricted to an office cubicle for example which I know can feel like being shackled to the ground (I used to work an office job and very much disliked the cubicle lifestyle). With blogging, the flexibility is endless and really provides you with location freedom that so many people strive for.

3.) Asset that Works For You 24/7

For me personally as someone who has always been obsessed with investing, creating various streams of income and entrepreneurship, this is my favorite “pro” when it comes to blogging. Once your blog starts gaining some momentum and especially if you’re beginning to generate a steady flow of organic traffic from the search engines, it turns into an asset that works for you 24/7, 365 days a year. In fact, I wrote a whole post on this here. You can be sleeping, at the park, playing golf, eating lunch etc. and your blog can be working for you, generating traffic, leads and sales on autopilot. Now it will indeed take some work to get to this point and that’s one of my “cons” below, but in my opinion it’s way worth the effort to have an asset like this working for you at all times of the day. Once you publish a blog post, it is up there forever for people to discover.

4.) Can Work Into a Busy Schedule

Many of the successful bloggers we see today worked on their blogs part-time before making the transition to full-time. So the good news here is that people who currently work a full-time job, can absolutely still be building a profitable blog part-time on the side. As long as you’re giving it 1-2 hours per day or alternatively devoting your weekends to your blog, it’s the type of online business that doesn’t require full-time work when first starting out. Blogging is such an amazing opportunity because almost anyone can work it into their chaotic and busy schedules.

5.) No Ceiling on Income You Can Earn

Every blogger’s income will be different, but having the global reach that you do when running a website gives you an earning potential that is really unlimited. With billions of people using the Internet and so many different traffic sources to tap into, it’s not uncommon to hear people making full-time incomes from their blog (and sometimes much more). As bloggers we are always producing more content and working on growing our readership which makes it very possible to earn a very good income and scale up overtime. I will caution that bloggers should not be too focused on income though when just getting started and instead be more focused on providing as much value to the marketplace as possible. If you do this, it will give you a much better shot at earning the type of income that you want from your blog.

6.) Positions Yourself as an Authority in Your Niche

Having your own personal blog is a great way to position yourself as an authority figure in your niche. Building a reputation and credibility is crucially important in the online space and can lead to more people sharing your content and more doors opened. Through blogging you can provide your expertise on a given subject, valuable information, tips, tricks, insights and more to slowly build up the authority for your brand and your website. Having a platform such as a blog to communicate relevant information allows you to really brand yourself as an expert and influencer in your niche overtime.

Cons of Blogging:

1.) Growing Competition

It seems like almost everyone nowadays has a blog and the competition continues to grow each and every year. However, in my eyes, competition is a good thing and it’s important to note that most bloggers will quit only after a couple months of blogging anyways. Keep in mind though that everything is much more saturated in general these days and for example, it’s not as easy to rank on page #1 of Google as it used to be. You will have to be creative in your content generation strategy and really work hard to stand out from the growing competition. This is something to be prepared for when starting your blogging business.

2.) Takes Time to Gain Traction

Each and every blog is unique. Some blogs will grow very slowly and others will grow incredibly fast. In general though it’s important to understand that blogging does indeed take a while to start gaining some traction. Organic growth of a blog does not happen overnight and you will need to be producing high-quality content on a consistent basis. There are also no guarantees that your blog will gain traction in the first place, so some people may think that this is a bit of a gamble. However, if you really stick with it and focus on publishing content that will really help your audience, there’s no reason why you can’t start seeing results for yourself. Just know that you must be in this for the long-term in order to succeed.

3.) Requires Hard Work & Strong Commitment

Let’s face it, you really do have to put in a lot of work if you eventually want to make a career/full-time living from your blog. It takes hard work to style your blog, create quality content, implement proper SEO, build a following and keep readers engaged. It takes hard work to build your email list, create your own products and build up your blogging revenue. Plain and simple, blogging is not easy and requires a strong long-term commitment (as discussed above) in order to have any shot at success. If you’re not willing to roll your sleeves up and put in some serious effort, a blog might not be the best option for you.

4.) Requires Some Technical Knowledge

In order to properly set up, manage and maintain your blog, you will need to be prepared for some technical work. Luckily, if you’re using WordPress they make it really easy to craft your blog the way you want it. Nonetheless, you will still need to install necessary plugins, set up an external email autoresponder, ensure your website speed is fast, equip your blog with necessary tools, widgets and much more. This shouldn’t sway you away from creating a blog to begin with though because all of this can be learned and there is a wealth of information online to help you.

Conclusion

I hope this blogging pros and cons list was helpful and gives you a better idea of what it takes to create, manage and run a blog. Again, this is based off of my personal experience. To re-iterate, the cons of blogging that I provided are definitely not to scare anyone away but to help reveal a few areas where some people may run into obstacles. In my opinion, I think anyone should start a blog if they are really interested and devoted as it will be a learning experience like no other. The pros of blogging to me far outweigh the cons and this can truly be a business model that provides more freedom, flexibility and opportunity for many people!

Have you started your blog yet? If not, you may want to read this here.

If you’re looking for additional assistance and/or coaching, please visit my page here.

Check out my video version of this post here!