Relatable vs Aspirational Blogging.
Oh yes, yet another Twitter spat. They're everywhere, it seems the minority of the blogging community can't let something go without arguing, without indirecting someone...we can't let everyone just be. (On a side note last night I saw loads of tweets about some drama I legit couldn't even find. Oh Twitter).
Lately I've seen a lot of stuff about relatable bloggers and aspirational bloggers and which of the two is better, or whether we can have a bloggersphere in which we can all live (clue - we can).
So in case you aren't familiar with the terms, relateable bloggers are the types of bloggers who are on a par with you as the reader. They're likely to shop in Primark and New Look and do hauls including loads of cacti and stationery. They probably don't go on sponsored holidays or press trips and they're more likely to do a post on the morning commute than on a Charlotte Tilbury lipstick that costs the same as your monthly rent. They probably take part in a few Twitter chats and talk about their love of a Maccie D's almost weekly.
Aspirational bloggers are likely to be the types of bloggers who have been around a while and have built up a brand rather than a blog. They might have their own range of products or a makeup line and more than half of their blog posts and youtube vids will be sponsored or paid to write in some way. They're the type of Instagram grids you follow to lust over the trips away and the beaches and all the flatlay goals. They probably do a lot of high end makeup and fashion posts that are quite often professionally photographed rather than a quick snap on a trusty iPhone.
My personal preference will always be relatable. I need those girls who are on the same level with me, who will source beautiful Primark items so I can go out and buy them all, who will talk to me on Twitter and who will let me nosey into their lives with a few sarcastic memes thrown in. I like to visit blogs where I read the posts with a thousand nods and a OMG ME TOO. I need to read posts from people who are living the same kind of life as me because the best part of relatable blogging is it makes you feel like someone else is in the same boat.
I like to think I'm a relatable blogger. I don't have any spare cash, my beauty hauls is more a few bargains from Boots than a forty quid mascara and I often write about my love for social media and my hate for anything shitty in the press about twenty somethings. But does that mean I don't like aspirational bloggers? Does it heck.
I don't really read aspirational blogs, simply because it isn't my thing. I'm not of the Zoella and Tanya Burr generation, I came into blogging too late to watch them build their empires. InTheFrow and Freddy Cousin Brown and Fashion Mumblr are just not my jam- simply because I don't find their lives aspirational - I don't read them because I don't want the same things. Even if I was rich enough to afford it, the clothes and makeup and holidays are just not in my interests.
But that doesn't mean I don't find their careers aspirational. That doesn't mean I don't like the girls, doesn't mean I don't check out their Instagrams, doesn't mean I don't think they're amazzzzzzing women.
You can't deny, whether you like aspirational bloggers, relatable bloggers or a bit of both - aspirational bloggers have carved a career for themselves in a way nobody really had before and let's be honest, most of us wish we could even have a bit of their success. Whether you blog for yourself, blog for your audience, blog for the freebies or blog in the hope of getting invited on swanky holidays....there is some part of the majority of us who wants something, something to come from this blogging lark and turn it into a viable side line if nothing else.
I don't read aspirational blogs but I absolutely am of the YASSS GURL YOU SLAYING mentality.
At the end of the day, what the flip does it matter if you're an aspirational blogger or a relatable blogger or a bit of both blogger or a fits into no category blogger. You write what you want to write, you read what you want to read, you do you but let's all just stop tearing eachother down for doing our own thing yeah?